Floyd Roland

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, we don't disagree with what the Member stated. Again, the way we recognize it through our audited financial statements, it is considered a grant-in-kind. From our side, we feel that once we get up to speed on the rest of the subsidies and how that work goes on, we would then put this onto that stack, as well. But the initial phase we're working in, it has not been included. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the reason we have become involved again, is the fire marshal who did the inspection back in May of 2002 required us, or the Department of Education, Culture and Employment…This is how it would have worked. The Department of Education, Culture and Employment would have been informed that they would have up until 2006 for use of the facility to come up with other plans. We got involved, as they were notified of this, in securing space and doing the technical work around this evaluation, so that was done.

The Department of Education, Culture and...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the issue around the MAP or the Management Assignment Program is something that we are aware of and I’ve started to look into that matter as the concern has been raised to me. There are no specific targets at that point. There are avenues for any employee within the government workforce to be nominated and move into that program, then they follow through a pretty rigorous assessment program and out of that we see who we can move up the process through the MAP. So there are no specific targets, but it is an issue that we’re aware of and looking to address...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the Member is correct; that through our structure and pricing, we do not incorporate the capital costs of that into the price of the product at the pump. What we do is we do book our environmental amount of approximately $250,000 on an annual basis. So that is taken into consideration. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, to my right I have the deputy minister of Public Works and Services, Bruce Rattray, and to my left I have the director of the petroleum products division, Mr. Mike Aumond.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in the affirmative action policy, we talk about a representative workforce of the population it serves. We don’t have a set percentage that each department has to achieve, but what we do is reference the population that we serve. So in the case of the Northwest Territories, we’re hopeful that we can see 50 percent of the workforce being of the aboriginal peoples in the Northwest Territories. In some cases, we are very close to that. Some departments are achieving that; in some areas they are not. The average we see now is at 32 percent. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the stabilization fund had a limit of $5 million and I’m told it still does. We are looking at making a change to that, but it is $5 million and the idea is plus or minus if the cost of the product goes up significantly that with that stabilization fund there wouldn’t be any massive increases or reductions if the price of fuel were to drop. In this case what we found was the petroleum products division was carrying, for quite some time, a very high amount within the stabilization fund. We were actually going to be hitting the ceiling of $5 million, and...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the average vacancy within government as a whole would vary in the area of probably 12 percent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will have Mr. Rattray provide some detail in that area.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the category of P2 is one of concern to us as a government in reviewing the information. We know we are going to have to look at that. It will be one of the areas within the report. We would like to go through this whole process and bring it together as a package. As a government, we also have to be cognizant of the issues that are out there. We will be reviewing this situation. If we decide to make one piece of it and make a number of changes...We will be reviewing the full impact of taking one piece of it on the government staffing situation. Thank you...