Bob McLeod

The Public Utilities Board prides itself on the amount of money it saves the average consumer by disallowing some of the costs put forward by the Power Corporation. One of the things we have to take into consideration is if we don’t have the Public Utilities Board reviewing the rate applications, who will review those rates? Who will ensure that the costs are appropriate?

Having said all that, we are undertaking a review. We are looking at how the Public Utilities Board operates, and we’re looking at whether there are other regulatory mechanisms that would be more cost effective and feasible.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The motion that was moved by the Member and was approved by the Legislative Assembly I think will assist us in our review. As I’ve written to the Member, we are undertaking a review. We will be asking the general public, the people who pay the bills, to give us their feedback and direction as to how we should deal with this issue.

The PUB takes direction from this Legislative Assembly. Through the legislation we direct how they should operate. Once this review is undertaken and we obtain the results and we reach agreement as to how we should regulate it, we will then...

At the time of the legislation that was passed and the current thinking as well…. What has been constructed is a new spillway, which would not impact on the rates of the current users. For that reason, it was set up the way it was. There’s a new ownership structure that has been set up for the new spillway that’s being constructed at some point in the near future.

At the time that the legislation was passed, the comments of the Public Utilities Board were not sought.

We are undertaking our review shortly. We’ll be coming out with a discussion paper. I think it would be of great assistance for the community leaders and people to tell us what their concerns are and how they would like to see us operate. We’ll be coming forward with those short term/long term solutions through the business planning process. In the longer term, with the results of the review and feedback and direction from the Members here, we would look at making whatever changes would be required, including restructuring, new rates, what have you.

Mr. Speaker, certainly we want to work with the small communities. Recognizing the high cost of energy in communities and as we roll out our business plans, we expect to have working with the communities be a large part of it.

As we said, we are undertaking a review where we’re going to leave no stone unturned. We’re looking at every option, including if the Legislative Assembly wants to take on the responsibility for setting the power rates. If that’s what we want to do, we will look at that option. Somehow I don’t think we want to do that, but we will undertake a review, and we will come forward with the results.

Mr. Speaker, we’re looking at a wide range of possibilities with regard to rates. We want to hear from the people out there, the electricity users, whether that is something that would be supported. A levelized rate would mean that everybody pays the same rates throughout the Northwest Territories, whether you use hydroelectricity or thermal electricity or diesel electricity. At the time the decision was made to go with the postage rates, it was felt that rates should be accumulated by individual communities. With our review we will go to the communities, and we will find out what the users...

We’re prepared to work with all of the agencies and governments involved in economic development in the region. We’re currently negotiating an MOU on contracting with the Inuvialuit regional council. We are always working for better coordination and streamlining.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think the Northwest Territories has been in the enviable position where it’s been sheltered more than other jurisdictions from the volatility of the national and world economies, especially since our gross domestic product has been consistently strong over the past ten years.

But as a government we’ve introduced some new initiatives. Most recently we’re just in the process of rolling out the SEED Policy, the Strategic Entrepreneurial and Economic Development Program which is geared to levels 2 and 3 communities. We are investing $2.5 million that’s now available under...