Jane Groenewegen

Mr. Speaker, I know, at least for myself, I want to make sure that we use government resources to impact our residents in the most positive way possible. Our public service is a huge piece out there.

I would love to hear the Premier today tell us and confirm with us that layoffs of employees in the public service will be a last resort in terms of reducing the expenditures of this government.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to hear something encouraging from the Premier so that we could look at effecting these cuts and reductions with the absolute least impact on employees as possible.

At any given time in the public service of the G.N.W.T., I believe there’s about a 15 per cent vacancy rate. I know that in some positions, it’s not possible to deliver the programs and services without positions being filled. But with a 15 per cent vacancy rate, isn’t there an opportunity to look at perhaps not re-staffing positions that are not absolutely essential and integral to delivering a program or...

Mr. Chairman, your committee would like to consider Bill 1, Interim Appropriation Act, 2008-2009, in Committee of the Whole today.

I would like to ask the Premier if he would share that valuation that the FMB comes up with, with the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation as a next step, to see if they would like to respond to that dollar value.

Mr. Speaker, I wanted to ask questions on SFA today, but I guess I’ll just have to ask questions on the Deh Cho Bridge instead.

Mr. Speaker, lots of e-mails have been coming into my e-mail box, and I want to sincerely thank people for taking the time to share their opinions and their questions on this very significant piece of capital infrastructure. I encourage that. Whether it is pro or against, I am very interested in hearing people’s input. I also want to thank people who phoned in this morning and took the trouble to become involved through a phone-in radio show on CBC.

Mr. Speaker...

Mr. Speaker, the cost of attending post-secondary institutions continues to rise. With the exception of funding for travel, our Student Financial Assistance Program does not have any mechanism to review these costs on a regular basis and adjust funding levels available to students. For example, Mr. Speaker, the University of Alberta has announced that for the 2008-2009 academic year, the cost of tuition will go up by 4.6 per cent, and the cost to stay in student residence will go up by 8.75 per cent. This is fairly representative of what occurs every year at most southern post-secondary...

I rise on a point of order under Rule 492(1) of Beauchesne’s Parliamentary Rules and Forms, which states that a Minister is not at liberty to read quotes for dispatch or other state paper not before the House without being prepared to lay it on the Table. This is in context to the Premier’s response to my questions yesterday when I was asking questions about the concession agreement.

On page 23 of unedited Hansard, Mr. Roland referred to eligible and ineligible costs that could affect different firms involved and also spoke to issues of guaranteed price, fixed-price contracts, refund of...

I move that we report progress.

Motion carried.

The Premier certainly has the opportunity available to him to pose that question to the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation after FMBS puts that work together.

Moving on to just a slightly different kind of accountability exercise related to the Deh Cho Bridge, I’d like to ask the Premier if he is aware of the exercise that is referred to as a peer review. There was previously a bridge that was under design and contemplation in British Columbia. It was the $1 billion Golden Ears Bridge. It was in B.C. At one point there was a call for a peer review of the financial circumstances surrounding this project...

Mr. Speaker, I believe the agreement with the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation does provide for what they call a value for termination on an occasional, from time-to-time, basis.

I would like to ask the Premier: has such a valuation for termination ever been contemplated by this government or shared with the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation in order to assess what it would cost our government to terminate this project?