EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
The budget I am presenting represents the recent integration of economic development and transportation functions.
For the 2004-05 fiscal year, the departmental operations and maintenance budget in review today is $37,389,000.
Some of the major priorities for the upcoming year are the following:
develop northern innovation and develop it in key sectors of the economy through the Nunavut Economic Development Strategy;
focus on community and regional business development and entrepreneurial skills, particularly in non-decentralized communities;
support locally-produced products through branding, marketing, supply, and distribution;
finalize and implement the Nunavut Mining Strategy with INAC, NTI, industry, and Nunavummiut;
implement the Nunavut Transportation Strategy including the Nunavut-Manitoba road project and the Bathurst Inlet port and road project;  work in partnership with the Northern Air Transportation Association to implement recommendations from the Nunavut Air Services Study;
finalize negotiations with Nav Canada, with assistance from the Nunavut Association of Municipalities on the CARS funding;
secure funding from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to implement the marine investment strategy, Safe Harbours- Healthy Communities, which includes breakwaters and docking facilities; and
implement recommendations of the airport investment strategy, Airports for Nunavummiut and their Economy, in cooperation with Transport Canada.
Mr. Chairman, my department will be proactive, effective, and efficient in the implementation of our mandate through our operations and the delivery of government services and programs.
I look forward to hearing your comments and answering your questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Simailak.
Mr. Curley, you have a comment?
We are going to go for a break right after your comment, so after the break, the minister can go to the table.
We’re ready for your comment, please proceed, Mr. Curley.
Minister we are proud of you and we are in support of you.
I am pleased to provide you with my comments as the Chair of the Standing Committee on Infrastructure, Housing and Economic Development.
The committee has reviewed the 2004-05 main estimates and business plan of the Department of Economic Development and Transportation and had the opportunity to meet with the minister in April.
The 2004 report of the Auditor General details many concerns with respect to Crown corporations.
Members note that both the Nunavut Development Corporation and the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation fall under the responsibility of this department.
Members were pleased that the Development Corporation was not singled out in this year’s report.
Members are concerned, however, by the weaknesses of the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation that were detailed in the report.
Members have serious concerns regarding the corporation and look forward to reviewing the minister’s response to the findings.
Following the passage of amendments to the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation Act in 2003, the regional business development centres are able to borrow money from the Credit Corporation.
Members look forward to greater transparency.
Members strongly urge the minister to ensure that appropriate reporting and administrative controls are in place in this area.
Members are concerned regarding the current state of marine infrastructure in the territory.
Many communities do not have adequate marine facilities, including breakwaters.
This means losses for hunters due to damage to boats during high winds.
Members urge the minister to focus on marine infrastructure in communities to limit losses.
Members further urge the minister to continue negotiations for adequate federal funding under the Safe Harbours strategy.
Members remain concerned regarding the state of airport facilities in the territory.
The size of airplanes that can be landed in many communities is limited by the length and composition of runways.
Nunavummiut are dependent on air transportation, and an increase in the length of airstrips and improvements to airport infrastructure in general could decrease the landed cost of goods.
Members are concerned that airport safety issues are not being addressed because of a lack of funding.
Members noted that the main estimates do not contain information regarding the airports capital assistance program as work performed on behalf of third parties.
Members urge the minister to continue lobbying his federal counterparts for funding for essential airport infrastructure.
Members are concerned that funding is so insufficient for Community Aerodrome Radio Stations.
Insufficient funding combined with shift work and stress make it difficult for hamlets to retain qualified Community Aerodrome Radio Stations operators.
Members urge the minister to continue negotiating with Nav Canada for increased funding for Community Aerodrome Radio Stations.
Members were pleased to note that the department is moving forward with large infrastructure projects such as the Bathurst Inlet port and road project and the Kivalliq-Manitoba road.
Members look forward to reviewing documents related to the Kivalliq-Manitoba road study.
Members were concerned to note that the department’s business plan indicates that the launch of the carving stone supply program was deferred.
Access to carving stone is essential for all communities.
Carving is a way of life for many people and many soapstone quarries are difficult to reach and some are not safe.
Members urge the minister to move forward with this important program.
The Nunavut Economic Development Strategy identifies three sectors with potential for large-scale economic growth.
These sectors are minerals, tourism, and fishing.
Members support the minister’s efforts to pursue an economic development agreement with the federal government.
Committee members are of the view that an economic development agreement is an essential tool to strengthen development in the Nunavut territory.
However, Mr. Chairman, members also believe that devolution of responsibility for natural resources is equally important.
Greater control over our resources and increased royalties are key to economic development in Nunavut.
Committee members are well aware of the number of mining operations awaiting federal approval to begin operations.
Members urge the minister to continue lobbying for movement in this area.
Committee members noted that more than two million dollars are budgeted for core funding for the Nunavut Tourism Association.
Members are concerned that some tourism operators are not receiving adequate support from the organization.
Members urge the minister to consider having his department directly provide some of the services that are currently provided by the Nunavut Tourism Association.
This would provide greater support to the association’s current membership: local tourism operators.
The third sector mentioned in the economic development strategy is fishing.
Members encourage the minister to work closely with the Minister of Environment to ensure that the development of fisheries, especially test fisheries in non-decentralized communities, continues in Nunavut.
Members are supportive of the cabinet’s decision to focus on economic development in non-decentralized communities.
Members look forward to seeing concrete short- and long-term plans with respect to development opportunities in these communities.
We’ll take a 45-minute break and we’ll be back here by 6:30 p.m.
>>Committee recessed at 17:38 and resumed at 18:28
If you would introduce your officials.
Hon. David Simailak: With me, on my left, is my deputy minister, Alex Campbell; on my right, Assistant Deputy Minister in charge of Transportation, Reverend Methuselah Kunuk.
Each of the members has 10 minutes for general comments.
If there are no general comments we’ll move directly to questions.
I don’t see any hands.
(Interpretation ends.) We’ll go to Mr. Barnabas.
Very briefly: in regards to the communities that I represent, there is not much employment. It is essential that they get support from Economic Development and Transportation.
We lost a lot of jobs when the Nanisivik Mine closed. I would like to address this department about setting up a development corporation and private businesses.
My communities definitely need help from economic development in order to start small businesses and private corporations. The only way that the people up there can make income is by selling their seal pelts.
Also, we have the carvers who have to keep in mind that there has to be marketing. They use resources from the land and because of the MMPA, they’re not able to utilize the by-products from the animals that they harvest.
I would like to urge this minister to address the Marine Mammal Protection Act so that we can sell our carvings to the United States and other parts of the country.
We also generate revenue by taking out sports hunters; that is the only way that they can get some form of income.
We have very limited employment in our three communities.
There are a lot of challenges and there is a need to make changes to the legislation in order to generate more economic development.
I would first of all like to make some comments on the opening remarks and as the chairman of the Standing Committee on Infrastructure, Housing and Economic Development. With Crown corporations, there are too many agencies… .
The Nunavut Business Credit Corporation and so on… .
Especially, the Auditor General had a few concerns about the department and the Crown corporation that were created by the government.
I’m sure that the officials or deputy minister have read the report that was produced by the Auditor General.
With that in mind, are you going to be doing anything to alleviate the concerns that were identified by the Auditor General? In regards to the financial concerns regarding to the Crown corporations I would like to get a response from your department, because we have way too many concerns, especially with the Crown corporations.
Are we in general comments?
Chairman (interpretation): We were in general comments.
Mr. Peterson, are you going to make general comments?
We are still in general comments.
Or, did you have a question?
Mr. Curley (interpretation): Those were my general comments.
Chairman (interpretation): That was a general comment.
And questions pending.
I welcome the minister and his witnesses, Methusalah and Alex.
My comments will be brief.
I think the Department of Economic Development and Transportation will be one of the most important departments for the next four to five years of our mandate.
Currently, I think there is too heavy a dependence on the government to create all the employment in every community.
I’ve coined a phrase: we have an artificial economy; 90-92 percent of the funds that we have in Nunavut come up from the federal government in some form or manner.
Just about every business in the North depends on those funds.
As we all know in government, when governments cut back it hurts us more in the end. Airlines have to cut services, people can’t buy food, businesses don’t have those construction contracts, and the funds support other businesses in the communities.
We really have to work hard on developing our economy, and I think the three levels of government have to play a role. Not just the territorial government, but the federal government and the municipal governments all have a key role in helping turn our economy around, in developing our economy.
Organizations like chambers of commerce, regional Inuit associations, NTI, all the dev corps: everybody has a role to play, and we need the tools to develop the economy.
I’m talking about things like the economic development agreement that we’ve talked about in this House. We need a regional development agency that every other jurisdiction in Canada has and the North doesn’t seem to have. We need those kinds of tools to develop our economy and give our folks a chance to build a better future.
Of course, we also need, as we heard the Premier mention, a devolution agreement. That will help us out as well.
On the municipal side, our airports are in serious need of help.
I mentioned in the House airline safety and transportation a couple weeks ago.
I think we really have to push the Nav Canada folks to give us a bit more help out there to develop our airports.
Give us more funding to develop a safe, reliable air service in Nunavut, because we’re 100 percent dependent on getting around by airplane.
Our economy is linked to our airplanes, transporting people for personal travel and business.
Those are some of my general comments, Mr. Chairman.
I think this is a very important department for our government.
Any more comments on this page?
I will make it as brief as possible.
With the creation of the Department of the Economic Development and Transportation, we now have an opportunity to look for new ventures or economic development programs that could generate more revenue for the people in the communities.
You see a lot of people who cannot make ends meet and who are living hand-to-mouth.
We are aware that there are people with very limited income, or no income at all, who are relying on the government.
With that, there are a lot of people who can barely put food on the table, and I think that we should keep those people in mind and create economic development especially for those communities or for those have-not communities.
They work extremely hard just for their daily existence.
When we are trying to go to Sanikiluaq from here, it’s extremely hard because you have to go through Montreal in order to go to Sanikiluaq or to come up here.
There are individuals who are unilingual, and they have to go through Montreal in order to come up here to attend meetings and so on.
Some people are usually reluctant to take that roundabout way to come over here because of these challenges they have to go through.
I have made this statement many, many times because we have to include Sanikiluaq as a part of Nunavut.
We will then go onto K-5. Mr. Tootoo.
I would just like to make a quick general comment.
I think that the government acknowledged the importance that economic development is going to play in our territory and the future of it.
I think that your department, Mr. Minister, over these next four years, will have to play a crucial role in developing the foundation to make that become a reality.
I think that it is very important for a lot of the reasons that the other members have stated, including resource royalties; as you know, the mining industry is getting set to take off up here.
We have unknown natural resources that are out there.
Today, they are starting to look here more, and we have to be ready to be able to capitalize on it as much as possible when they do come.
They can still get some of those resources cheaper somewhere else. But, they are non-renewable resources, and sooner or later they are going to run out in those other areas of the world, and they are going to have to come and look here.
I think it is crucial that we are ready and prepared to make sure that we capitalize as much as possible on that and reap the rewards of it.
Another area that I think is very important as a renewable resource is our tourism industry.
How many Inuit up north would just love to go out and get paid to go hunting?
If they do the things that they love to do, then get paid just to bring someone along to watch… .
I think that there needs to be a serious look at trying to find ways to better accommodate that industry throughout the territory.
I have been to every community in Nunavut and each and every one of them has something unique and special and nice about it that is marketable.
So, coming up with some type of a plan for how to sell ourselves, whether it be to naturalists, adventurists, or there are extremists, there are rock climbers, and things like that. We have to try and find ways to make Nunavut more attractive to them.
I mean, we are trying to find… .
The biggest cost inhibiters up here are the costs. It will be crucial that we try to find ways to help reduce our transportation costs, develop service industries throughout the territory.
If people are paying that amount of money to come and do something, they expect to be treated well and have good service and have the amenities there that they are used to.
I think that we should try and come up with a strategy to try to identify those and then be able to start a process.
I am not saying that it is going to happen in the next four years, maybe over the next ten years or something, to try and bring ourselves up to a level where we can accommodate that quite easily.
I think the tourism area is something that should be looked at very closely. I guess that it is non-renewable resources that will always be there. Also, it is something that can be tapped into.
That is the strength of Nunavut, of the people: their ability to go out and exercise their traditional rights of going hunting and fishing and camping, and that strength of roughly 85 percent of the population… . We can find a way to build on that strength; that is going to help people all over the territory.
So, I think that is going to be something to look at helping the department push, to achieve over the next few years. Also, with the fishing areas that I have mentioned… . Members are aware that you committed earlier today to look into a port study.
That is another area of economic development, in conjunction with the minister responsible for fisheries, that we have got to look at and try and find ways to capitalize on. We need to find ways to generate our own source of revenue.
So, I think those are some other crucial areas that we are going to have to do. We are going to have to all work together to make sure that we come up with the best possible solutions so that we can to try and deal with that and capitalize on it.
I look forward to working with the minister and his department, over the next four years, to try and help accomplish that.
That is it for my general comments.
(Interpretation.) I do not have any more names.
I just want to make a short comment, as well, that was relayed to me by my constituents earlier on in regards to tourism in our communities. And, I would like to thank the minister and his officials for sitting there.
They do not have booking agents in Nunavut for the tourism industry in our area.
When people retire, or some officials retire, the funding goes down south. There is this one individual in Kugluktuk who would like to start up a booking agency in our community. Also, he wants to represent the Hunters and Trappers Organization, maybe have an office in the Hunters and Trappers Organization to be a booking agent for tourism.
I feel that if we have a booking agent in our region, in the Kitikmeot region, this way the big-game hunters that want to come up here can book through local Hunters and Trappers Organizations. This way some sort of income would stay in the communities, and this would give local people a chance to make a little bit of income as well.
That is the comment I want to make.
I also want to support the people that do not have an income to try and find ways to make some income.
That is about all I have to say.
Chairman (interpretation): Mr. Mapsalak.
I, too, have a short comment to make for the non-decentralized communities: they do not have employment in some of these communities that are not decentralized. The communities that I represent both have potential with mining and also with cleaning up DEW Line sites in that area.
In Repulse Bay, there is also mining. They go in, and when they are finished that we will not see these mining companies again. We have to think about this for the future, for the non-decentralized communities.
We would like to see something that will keep growing. These are more my concerns because it is difficult in the communities that do not have employment or jobs.
I would like to see ongoing employment in these two communities.
These are the comments that I wanted to make. Especially the smaller communities should not be having any more cuts; they should give them more funding.
I do not have anymore names written down.
We are under K-5.
My concerns were on the Auditor General’s… .
There are four of them in the Auditor General’s report, on page 53. It states that the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation that… . What is the updated status in the 2001-02… .
The report was a bit late last year.
There have been a number of loans that were approved; some were even approved by e-mail.
They were not signed, and these were the concerns of the Auditor General.
What is your status on that today?
Hon. David Simailak (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Yes, we are making sure that the Nunavut Development Corporation board of directors knew about the Auditor General’s report. So, everything is starting to fall into place.
There are committees that have been set up to look after this and also that we are addressing the policies that the Auditor General was concerned about (Interpretation ends.) and introducing a computerized accounting system which encourages the separation of duties.
Also, on financial issues, and this has been brought up to date, they are now introducing thorough financial reports for the board, introducing formal monitoring mechanisms, undertaking formal board training, training staff and board on governance issues, and inviting the Auditor General to attend board meetings and meetings with finance and audit committees.
(Interpretation begins.) Yes, these are updated, up to today, by the board of directors and the staff.
Mr. Curley (interpretation): I would like thank you, Mr. Minister.
Especially, there was a concern raised that the policy was not properly in place, and the corporation has to make revenues in order to run properly.
Also, when we had a standing committee meeting, that the tourism industry… . Right now, there is a potential for movement in tourism and a lot of communities would like to see this.
The smaller communities do have concerns.
I was at a meeting last winter, right before we were first sitting, and the Kitkmeot and the Keewatin regions had their economic development conference, too, and they were very concerned.
There was a lot of concern because the tourism industry is contracted right now. I would like to know if this has been brought up to date, because it could benefit a lot of communities, especially in the summertime and of course, in the wintertime.
Hon. David Simailak (interpretation): Yes, these are our concerns, as well that the communities would like to run their own affairs on these.
Right now, through Nunavut Tourism, we are negotiating on how we could help the people in the communities to start up their own tourism in their community.
We are jointly working with Nunavut Tourism.
I know that this needs to be discussed because we need to promote them and we need to give them assistance.
One issue that I was very pleased with, one issue that you raised, is to provide information to the communities in regards to businesses.
For some time now, I am sure that the communities have been expecting that kind of information, especially the smaller communities; they want to see that.
Once the program has been set up… . We will be expecting it, and I am sure that communities will be expecting it.
So, I am encouraging you.
I know that small businesses get small contracts, and as they grow they get bigger contracts. The training is very important.
If you do not understand clearly, and if you do not get adequate finance controllers, the business will go down instantly. It is impossible to get assistance from the government, if you are not Nunavut Power Corporation.
For that reason, I would encourage you to promote this when it becomes a program.
Yes, we are concerned about those, especially in the smaller communities.
The community economic development officers… . We do have CEDOs at the municipality and the city level.
As the economic development department, we give support on the training aspect and provide training.
Yes, the communities’ private businesses need to be given more support and assistance. I, myself, was a private business person and my business went bankrupt.