David Krutko

Mr. Speaker, I believe that by logistically working together with other departments it will also allow for possible savings in getting a lot of these materials into our communities. We do have fuel resupply; we do have the winter road construction, which they have open roads to ensure that we are able to resupply those communities. So I would like to thank the Minister for that, but how soon does the Minister intend to come back to the House with the assurance that that decision has been made? Are we talking this fall capital session? Will we see that being approved in that session? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the 16th Assembly made a decision to change our capital planning process and approval of the main estimates. Now we approve our capital estimates in the fall session and the main estimates are being approved in the spring session.

One of the fundamental reasons for that was for the infrastructure departments to be able to take advantage of the construction season, logistical challenges such as taking advantage of the ice roads, and ensuring that we are able to construct in a reasonable time and allow for the contractors and service providers to be able to...

Mr. Speaker, your committee would like to report progress. Mr. Speaker, I move that the report of Committee of the Whole be concurred with.

At this time I will call for a short break before we proceed in Committee of the Whole.

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Mr. Speaker, also I think for the residents and also talking to the contractors, for them, they’d sooner be building in the summer months than having to conclude their construction possibly right to the year end, because most of them do have contracts by way of supply, ship and erect where they have to...(inaudible)...but then also their contract is usually coming to an end March 31st and they’re trying to get all their work done before year end and a lot of them are basically trying to construct in the middle of winter. So, again, I think it’s an advantage to take advantage of the weather we...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are directed to the Minister of the Housing Corporation. It’s in regard to the way capital infrastructure is now being approved through this House. In most cases most of our infrastructure departments are now being approved in the fall session so it allows for the departments to be able to allow their contracts to be let in the fall, allow for logistics to get those materials and contracts in place before the spring session, get them into our communities on the ice roads, and also ensure that we take advantage of the long summer construction...

I would like to call Committee of the Whole back to order for consideration of Tabled Document 4-16(5). What is the wish of the committee? Mr. Abernethy.

Mr. Speaker, again, I believe that in order to accomplish this, we are going to have to do it as a pilot project. Like you say, it is one of those projects that we have to test out and see exactly how it will be applied and, more importantly, how it will hold up on the Dempster Highway and other roads in the region. I think it is something that we have to look at in light of climate change and other effects we are seeing. I think that this is something that we as government have to seriously consider. I would just like to ask the Minister again, is it possible to come forward with some sort of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are to the Minister of Transportation in regards to the area of chipseal or basically some sort of program that can be used to upgrade or resurface the Dempster Highway. At some point we are going to have to resurface that highway. We are already looking at the widening, which hopefully in the next couple of years will be concluded, but we will have to find a product to surface the Dempster in the future.

I would like to ask the Minister in regards to the possibility of a pilot project. I know I have asked this to three previous Ministers of Transportation...

Mr. Speaker, I believe that these types of programs do develop community capacity, but more importantly, it allows our athletes to be able to train similar to other athletes in the larger centres but train on facilities that are designed for their activity, regardless if it’s cross-country skiing or snowshoeing or even the ability to be able to use that facility for community usage. So I’d just like to ask the Minister, can his department consider looking at some sort of an initiative that allows communities to work on a program that develops Community Trails so that it can be used for...