Glen Abernethy

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We’re always looking for ways to reduce the cost of fuel in the communities. We’re always looking for the lowest priced vendor. We’re open to exploring options for delivery. For some of our communities, we do a fuel barge. We’re always looking for creative solutions to reduce our costs, be it where the fuel comes from might help us reduce the costs.

As far as subsidies, some concerns about that because if we put in a subsidy within PPD itself, the difference would have to come out of the revolving fund. If we start taking money out of the revolving fund in one area, it...

Details of payments and holdbacks would be proscribed in the contract itself and there would be no difference necessarily between southern and northern contractors. It’s a negotiation of contract that is done between the primary and the Department of Public Works and Services. For some additional information I will go to the deputy minister.

This information is going to be available in the public report. It will be by consumption, but also by price, so that both of those pieces of information are there. The Member is right. I mean, consumption is one thing but prices vary, as we’ve seen with electricity here in the Northwest Territories as of late. That information will be in the public report for committee and for the public to review at large.

I didn’t answer the question because I, quite frankly, forgot it halfway through my response, so I missed it.

Right now, the policy is set up so that an individual who is being harassed or has experienced harassment can report that and go through the process. It isn’t set up so that somebody who witnesses something or thinks they’ve witnessed something can report it, but we do encourage employees to speak with their manager or supervisor on all issues and any issue related to harassment in the workplace, so it isn’t specific to that. As a result, with anonymity, if an individual is bringing...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It would probably be a great idea to have the community get in touch with Public Works and Services directly. I would say, remember that we do have a capital planning process and all projects would have to go through that process, but it doesn’t hurt to start having some of those discussions now for planning purposes in the future. I would encourage the Member to have his communities get in touch with us, where appropriate, and we’d be happy to have that dialogue.

The end results and commissions are, yes.

Some of that would be dealt with by the bonding companies but also negotiations between the primary and the sub based on the accounting practices and operations of the primary as well as the sub. The accountability and liability in those contracts lie between the primary and the sub and not between the GNWT and the sub. So it would be a responsibility of the primary to do that.

We track utilities separately and we’ve been able to cover our utility costs on behalf of the Government of the Northwest Territories with the budget provided. Talking to the deputy, we think we’re going to be tight this year, but other years we’ve been fine and we will continue to work to control those costs and find ways to reduce our costs through things like the Capital Asset Retrofit Fund in order to make sure that the budget we have continues to be suitable and adequate to cover our costs.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my response earlier to the Member’s previous questions, I made reference to the training that is provided. In that training we’re mostly explaining the policy of the program and how it’s outlined with some reference to the types of things that are covered, which would be the harassment that the Member is talking about.

I did have an opportunity earlier today to meet with the Northwest Territories area council for PSAC, and we did talk about our Harassment Free and Respectful Workplace Policy. They did indicate that they have looked at the policy, and although it’s...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We’ll certainly provide that information to the Member and committee. Just following up on that and a comment that we made yesterday, Public Works and Services undertakes the following energy management activities, and I believe this question was asked yesterday, but we do energy consumption analysis and benchmarking, we do detailed energy audits and we do inspections of electrical and mechanical systems that are under our responsibility as part of our energy management on existing facilities. So all that type of stuff is out there, as well, but with respect to the...