Floyd Roland

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to proceed with first reading of Bill 18, Appropriation Act, 2006-2007.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it gives me pleasure today to introduce in the gallery my wife and daughter. My wife, Shawna, and my daughter, Courtney.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Member has referenced cooking and so on and so forth. I guess one could say there's a new chef in the kitchen now when it comes to the new government in place. We need to get an understanding from where they may come from initially. From that, we will know how much we'll have to push and how much harder.

Mr. Speaker, clearly, as Minister of Finance for the Northwest Territories, and I look down in our fiscal forecast, if we do not get the changes that were requested, and ultimately those changes can be made and should be made in Ottawa because they...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess there are all types of avenues one can consider to the point of taking our tents and setting them up on the front lawns of Parliament, but, more realistically, what we need to do and we have been doing, but we are going to have to enhance it more, is how we have got the message out there. We have a business case. We believe our business case is an adequate one and it’s clear that we have delivered the message to Ottawa about our fiscal situation in the Northwest Territories in the unique situations we encounter being this far north and the conditions that we...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First and foremost, the message today being sent to the companies doing business in the Northwest Territories is, don’t shift your payments out of our jurisdictions. Keep them in the Northwest Territories and continue to look at filing in the Northwest Territories for those companies who do business in the North. The tax arrangements in Canada allow flexibility for where they can file their income. Ultimately the message today is being sent to companies in the Northwest Territories to file their tax in the Northwest Territories because we will be as competitive with...

Mr. Speaker, I give notice that I will deliver the budget address on Thursday, February 2, 2006. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Friday, February 3, 2006, I will move that Bill 18, Appropriation Act, 2006-2007, be read for the first time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it gives me pleasure to introduce someone in our gallery from Inuvik, Ms. Meeka Kisoun, with her baby.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, our fiscal responsibility policy that we put forward to the federal government, and how we deal with the federal government, is based on their terms that this overpayment situation has occurred. They're aware of it; they have the repayment plan that affects every jurisdiction. It's the same plan. It's a three-year plan, and it's also based on your population, of how much is repaid on an annual basis until the third year, which is coming up in the next fiscal cycle we have.

Everything we do is processed in accordance with the rules, and so on. So I think...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to thank the Member for that awe-inspiring question.

---Laughter

Mr. Speaker, this issue is not a new one. We've been trying to deal with this, and how we can deal with our federal counterparts around this issue. We have looked at a number of issues around our fiscal policy, and what we've looked at putting forward is a fiscal responsibility policy that would look at the overall fiscal situation of the government, our ability to borrow and finance that borrowing.

The issue of the overpayment itself, as the Member stated, was a decision made by a previous...