Michael Miltenberger

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think we’re referring to the same document. As well, I was saying, we’re going to lay out looking back ten years at how capital was portioned out across the North, and we’ll provide that information to Members.

Of course we will work with all the stakeholders involved with the Protected Area Strategy. We have a very close working relationship with the aboriginal governments. We have funded…. For example, we assisted Fort Good Hope when we had the Sahtu water conference. We have been involved in various water conferences across the North. As a government we are investing a lot of money in the water strategy, and we are going to continue to invest the resources necessary to work with the aboriginal governments to protect this, one of our most valuable resources.

Mr. Chairman, I’ll refer that question to the Minister of Education, Minister Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Clearly, the rapidly unfolding events that have been happening around the world have had an impact in the country. I indicated to Minister Flaherty just last week when he called that overall we anticipated a chilling effect in terms of credit, cost, the pressure on companies and the dropping of resources on the stock market. There is a whole host of areas where we anticipate there is going to be an impact.

The one good sign, I suppose, is going to be that the price of oil drops, even though we have already purchased our oil for the small communities. The price of oil is...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. There was an agreement relatively early on in Fort Smith with regard to the master development plan — community service, bed issues, the scope laid out within the master development plan. In Hay River there were questions about the catchment area, the population, bed numbers, questions over the master development plan. As well, there was a request that consideration then be given to, rather than a renovation, a new facility, which was also being considered.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have with me Ms. Margaret Melhorn, deputy minister of Finance; Mr. Michael Aumond, deputy minister of Public Works and Services; and Mr. Russ Neudorf, deputy minister of Transportation.

Mr. Chairman, the cash flows are as in the information the Member has before him.

Mr. Speaker, we anticipate that we’re on about a 12 to 18 month planning frame here, in addition to the work we’ve already done. To get us ready to have all the work done, as the Member’s indicated, there’s a whole host of things we have to look at in terms of assessment. There’s legislation. There are a whole number of things we’d have to be clear on, sort out, put in the proper sequence, do the appropriate costings and all the other impacts that we have to do. So it’s going to take some time. We’re going to be working through it through the life of this business planning process for ’09–10...

We’ll be happy to consider that adjustment for the next go-round.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Member raises some good points. Our infrastructure costs are due to distance, isolation and transportation issues that are often higher than other jurisdictions. In terms of the IT side and information services, we are, as well, coping with highly dispersed communities and that type of infrastructure with those costs. It is, as well, that the life cycle time, as the Member is aware, of IT systems is significantly less than a lot of the buildings that we invest money in. So the renewal time is shorter. We have equal distances and all the other challenges that we...