Daryl Dolynny

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We, being the Members of this House and the public, were led to believe the work on the Highway No. 4 bypass, which went through some potential high-risk arsenic hotspots, was vetted by our Department of Transportation, ENR and the Giant Mine Remediation Team. We were assured that there was an eye on safety and liability aspects of potential risk to workers and contractors. My question today is for the Minister of Transportation.

Yesterday I tabled a 2008 Queen’s University study, where the author clearly recommended more sampling be done further away from the roaster...

Thank you, and I do apologize. I didn’t mean to get prescriptive in the detail of that question, it’s just the topic did open up and I apologize to the House. So I’ll back up the bus here and get as general as possible.

Will this $40 million advancement in the project, does it deter from any other projects that the department had in the queue for this fiscal year? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. For years we’ve been hearing about our sound fiscal strategy of surpluses, paying down our short-term debt and maintaining a $100 million cushion to our current $800 million borrowing limit. Yet for years there have been a number of pressures that have negatively impacted this fiscal framework. Such things as the personal and corporate income tax estimates for the 2014-15 season that created more than a $30 million void in tax revenues. Plus if you add on top of this fiscal pressure such things as the recent fire seasons of approximately $55 million and last week’s $20...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Your committee has been considering Tabled Document 115-17(5), Northwest Territories Capital Estimates 2015-2016, and would like to report progress. Mr. Speaker, I move that the report of Committee of the Whole be concurred with. Thank you.

I think it’s imperative that we continuously get those updates in terms of both borrowing limits, the short-term and the long-term. I think people need to clearly understand, like balancing a chequebook, where we’re sitting at, especially with large ticket items as we have before us.

The Minister just mentioned the issue of the Inuvik-Tuk highway and what I tried to read between the lines was that it sounds like there is a $40 million accelerated payment happening in this fiscal year. Again, as a Member, I don’t want to talk about the progress of the project, I don’t think that’s in my...

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Does committee agree that we’ve concluded general comments?

Thank you, committee. We will commence after a short break.

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Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Continuing on our questions on general comments, I have Mr. Menicoche.

Good afternoon, committee. I would like to call Committee of the Whole to order. What is the wish of committee? Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. There’s a bit of time left on the clock here, Mr. Blake. Any other comments?