Floyd Roland

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the numbers that were provided were using just actual costs in comparison to where the costs are now. So it wasn’t budgeted based on the old hospital, just comparing the 2002-03 year with the actuals for 2003-04 to show the increases that occurred. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Supplementary Appropriation No. 2 requests authority for additional appropriations of $11.201 million for operations expenditures and $5.450 million for capital investment expenditures.

Major items included in this request for operations expenditures are as follows:

$4.7 million for the Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development for additional fire suppression costs incurred due to severe forest fire conditions in 2004.

$2.5 million for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment for emergency repairs to Samuel Hearne Senior Secondary School in...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess ultimately we’ve come down to the fact that there was an underestimating of the consumption of power and the gas, as well as maintenance required for the facility. The facility did double in size from just over 4,000 square metres to over 8,000 square metres. The new code requirements for air exchange units and air cooling systems add more to the cost of the ongoing daily operation of that.

For example, from 2002-03 to 2003-04 the heating costs increased by over 80 percent. Power consumption has more than doubled from just over one million kilowatts to just...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the member is right on the process of how things go and the numbers. Where the money came from was the money would have been lapsed by the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, if it did not have to book this. Because it had to book this, it put them over the budget, and now by the shortfall that is showing here.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The amount in the document covers two years. The first year shortfall is the 2003-04 fiscal year and that’s about $919,000. That’s made up by the increase in heating fuel costs as well as power and a small amount for maintenance. The heating fuel cost increased substantially, the volume is almost 80 percent of what was existing. So there is a substantial jump. For recourse, for anybody else outside, I am informed that we have very little room for recourse. As to when the building was initially designed, estimates were put in place and then construction and coming...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, as Mr. Voytilla stated, when we realized there was a potential loss, we had to build in the numbers of what we estimated that would be. The money wasn’t paid out at the time, but it had to be accounted for. In following the rules, once you make that accounted, it is a liability and has to be set off against our budgets, and we didn’t have the full appropriation amount in our budget. That is why we are coming forward with this. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, that amount was worked on by a number of groups. One would be the Department of Public Works and Services, one would be through Health and Social Services and, as well, the health board. I believe there was a consultant involved in working with the health board on the design, what it would take to operate and so on. There were a number of groups that were involved in this. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it is something that I do appreciate, is the fact that we have limited resources in the Northwest Territories and we need to spend it wisely. In this particular situation, an RFP was let, responses were received, all of them did not, for one reason or another, qualify with what was out there. Upon discussions with all the parties involved, it was sought that one company did have space available that was required by the Legal Services Board. The Legal Services Board requested space that was visible, had easy access and a storefront. That was some of the main...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the office space the Member is speaking of is one that is worked on between the Legal Services Board, being the client, and Public Works and Services, as the one involved in the issuing of the RFP that went out and trying to see if any of the RFPs that were returned fit the criteria, and, going on that, recommend to the parties involved that that would be the way to go. My understanding of the process on the office space was the RFP was issued. Three responses were received. Two were on time, but did not fit the RFP. One came in but was late. Phone calls...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’d like to thank the Member for his positive comments about the TSC. In coming together, in bringing this together, it has had its difficulties, but we’ve been working through them and looking at the next phase of bringing the service together to be more efficient as a government. So I don’t have a timeline as of yet. I’ll speak to my departments that are involved in this and look at what timing we can put in place for this discussion. Thank you.