Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I presume the billions being referenced are the recent advanced procurement announcement that were out online not too long ago. Mr. Speaker, to my knowledge, those two items are both directed at the airports predominantly, both in Inuvik and in Yellowknife, and are not tied to nor necessarily, you know, dependent upon what may be happening with the Arctic Economic Security Corridor. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I won't speak to whether it's scads or not. There's -- I mean, we have the remote work policy but there's also a lot of folks who do work from home in not necessarily formalized arrangements or agreements, and the challenge -- and it has slowed the work in terms of trying to realign lease footprints because that would then -- if we really realign what the lease footprint is for departments, that reduces the amount of workspace available. But if people are working from home in an -- sort of in an unofficial or un-organized sense, for lack of a better description, then they...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Firstly, yes, investments in having technology that is modern and secure is good value for money. Only in the last few years, really, we brought a lot of our systems up to speed with respect to cyber security from a place where they were, you know, really behind a lot of other jurisdictions in Canada to being at the front end of what's available for cyber security requirements. And given the impact on people's information, on data on the services they depend upon, I would suggest that is very important.

With respect to that said, some of the -- some of the drivers of the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, Mr. Speaker, there is a very detailed business case that looks at different types of structures for this project. There's two parts to it. There's the transmission line that connects our north and south hydro grids, and the second part would be utilizing water that's already in the reservoir and that's not currently being used to generate more power. There's the opportunity to bring Indigenous governments into this project, make them owners of the project, figuring out what kind of equity sources they have and what might backstop, what kinds of funds stacks they...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I mean, there is right now, in progress, work to convert MTS to a Crown corporation and it -- otherwise -- I mean, I do want to emphasize for folks in smaller communities and, you know, up the Mackenzie Valley up into the High Arctic that it is recognized that the barge resupply is an essential service which makes it difficult to simply run it as one might a private company, and that's where the decision was ultimately made to try to convert it to a Crown corporation, the hope being, Mr. Chair, that we can make -- take advantage of some of what are efficiencies in a...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Mr. Chair, there there is in the 2026-2027 Budget, a proposed increase. Obviously that remains to be seen, how that goes here, but it's still before committee. But there is a proposed increase to student financial assistance. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it's in fact the folks down in the Taltson zone who are seeing the largest rate impacts. They had been paying an amount that wasn't reflective of the impacts of having increased infrastructure in their region and as a result of that, Mr. Speaker, it's actually that area that's seeing the greatest increase, not folks who are in the northern zone on this particular occasion. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is being driven by some unexpected issues that came to light once the bridge system was opened up for the already-known repairs that were taking place, and as a result of that, when they identified an opportunity to do some additional work on shuttering plates, rubber control springs, that these two warranted replacement, and as an opportunity, given that the bridge was already opened up -- well, paused for traffic or reduced traffic and had these cable systems opened up, it was an opportunity to ensure that this work also got done at the same time. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So this includes the drinking water testing and short-term remediations that were discussed just previously. There's also funds within this component here for funding under the national action plan to end gender-based violence. There's an amount here -- oh, sorry, Mr. Chair. Are we on -- my mistake. Let me just turn that to the deputy minister, please. I was looking at the wrong line item, please.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is funding that is meant to support and enhance emergency services and firefighter education across all communities. So there's two different things happening here, Mr. Chair. Regional centres will see the training done brought to the national fire protection association standard. That's for regional fire departments. As well, Mr. Chair, then there will be, for smaller communities, the assistant fire marshals and contract trainers will be providing first aid and emergency response training to those small communities so that they can support their own initiatives. And...