Robert C. McLeod

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, MTS needed to be run as a business and a business decision was made to purchase these double hull barges because they would benefit the company to get into some of the coastal communities, so a decision was made. It was a business decision, and again, I say if there was an opportunity or there is opportunity that MTS was sold, then the government would recover their money, but it was strictly a business decision. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we've paid for the barges. We paid for the barges. The revolving fund was not set up. We paid for the barges and the plan is to have MTS repay that money over 10 years. As I said before, if there's any opportunity and if their revenue is higher than expected they might be able to put more money into repayment of the loan. If they had the revolving fund set up at the time these barges went up for sale then they would have used the revolving fund to purchase these barges, but time was of the essence and a decision had to be made and so a decision was made that we...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. That is correct, but the revolving fund or the MTS I think it is will be paying the money back to the government over 10 years. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I would like to think that all of our projects have opportunities for northern procurement. I'm not sure what the exact procurement will be on this particular project, but I'm sure the Department of Infrastructure will keep Members updated as we move closer to the work on the bridge and what procurement, but we like to think that all of our projects have an opportunity for local and northern procurement. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. My understanding that the price tag on the new bridge is going to be $53 million. It will be built beside the existing bridge, and it will be built to specifications that would allow it to handle larger loads. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Correct, Mr. Chair. The mining industry did have some input. Thank you.

The $750,000, I mean, that's what this government would save. That money just stays within the government. It goes to a lot of the full fleet of programs we offer across government-wide. As far as the socio-economic government, I'm not sure what the Member expects to come out of that. I would have to look at that and see how much work that would actually be. I can say that, with the small communities, it was the small community employment fund that was recently approved, $4.2 million. We think that would go a long way into helping with the employment in the small communities. I'd have to...

Mr. Speaker, I recognize the fact that these small businesses, they work hard, and they provide a service to consumers, and they keep people employed. As I said before, we believe that we have a system in place that helps to try to grow their business. If there are other ways we can look at it, the carbon tax the Member speaks about and the carbon credit, I mean, that is something that, as I said, I think in this House that we are still looking at. We are trying to mitigate the impacts as much as we can on businesses and people in the Northwest Territories, so it is something we continue to...

Mr. Speaker, we appreciate the contribution of small businesses across the Northwest Territories. That is why we believe we have many other programs that are in place to help the businesses grow. I think we have demonstrated that just recently with working with one of the local manufacturing companies to come up with a benefit that would be beneficial to them, and not only to them, to the consumers, so we believe we have programs in place. I take the Member's point about it being a part of the mandate, but the mandate is for four years, so we still have two years left.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following four documents entitled "Supplementary Estimates (Infrastructure Expenditures), No. 3, 2017-2018," "Supplementary Estimates (Operations Expenditures), No. 3, 2017-2018," "Supplementary Estimates (Infrastructure Expenditures), No. 1, 2018-2019," and "Interim Public Accounts of the Government of the Northwest Territories for the Year Ended March 31, 2017." Thank you, Mr. Speaker.