David Ramsay

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, the reason we are suggesting that this be deleted from MACA’s regional operations activity that appears in the supplementary appropriation is the government has taken over responsibility for the building and the land that it sits on and is also responsible, as we are told, for environmental liability and remediation work that has to take place on that property. We weren’t, as a group, satisfied that the government should accept that type of responsibility in taking over this property. That is the reason this motion is before us.

Page 27, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm not going to go on at length. I think a lot of ground was covered by my colleagues here in terms of this proposed expenditure of $3.5 million. I guess there's a couple of fundamental things I just wanted to mention and I guess the first one is the Minister, in discussions we've had with him previous to this on the Deh Cho Hall and the upgrades that were required there, I think he should have come here this evening with the numbers in hand on what the square footage is; at the bare minimum, what the square footage is today that's being utilized by our government...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a couple of other questions. I guess the first one, the obvious one, is why isn't the private sector involved in the procurement of office space? You know, if you do have office space requirements in Inuvik, why aren't you going out to the private sector to have an office building built? Why are you hiring a consultant to run out and do this work when you don't even know what you're doing?

The other thing I'd like the Minister to provide me with is a breakdown of what this $320,000 is going to be spent on, because I really am having trouble trying to understand...

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Villeneuve.

Thanks, Madam Chair. According to some of the, I guess, excuses for the work not getting done, it was the consultants that were also not completing work on time or getting things done and I think the message that I do want to send, Madam Chair, to the Minister, is the work isn’t getting done and I think I just want to send that loud and clear to the Minister. I don’t believe we’re doing enough to make sure the work does get done and I’ll leave it at that, Madam Chair. Thank you.

Advanced education and careers, $4.867 million.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the Minister for that. The last thing I’ll say is that I believe wholeheartedly that the sooner you get all of the stakeholders under one roof to discuss issues that are relative to everybody, then and only then can you come up with a management plan and until you do that you really, like I said, it’s like you really don’t know what the target is, you don’t know what the end game is, you don’t know what the results are going to be. You have to get everybody together. So I’d just leave it at that, Mr. Chairman, and I know the Minister was listening to my...

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Villeneuve.