EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
I believe that that was actually two payments made and not duplicate payments or duplicate printing, but it’s actually partial payment probably on the delivery of the furniture to the shipping company and then the balance paid on receipt in the community.
Going back to the project that was done by a local contractor in Kimmirut, apparently he had to wait 90 days to get an electrical inspection done on it. What does the housing corporation do in cases like this where the gentleman has people waiting, paying them, and can’t continue? They can’t do the rough inspection for electrical and it takes 90 days for an electrical inspector to come there and inspect it.
In situations of mandatory inspections, which involve boilers as well as electrical, the Nunavut Housing Corporation does work closely with CGS to try to ensure that CGS inspectors are aware of upcoming inspection requirements.
We realized as well that CGS does have a limited number of inspectors and they have their own capacity challenges related to that.
As well, the contractors are responsible for obtaining permits and giving advanced notice as to when they will be ready. So the Nunavut Housing Corporation does work with the contractors and with CGS to try to coordinate these inspections.
In case, apparently they had given notice halfway through and three weeks later, because the regular inspector was on holidays, they had this inspector from BC or whatever come down to fill in. He had flown to Kimmirut and because the plane was full, they didn’t put his computer on.
He went up to the First Air counter in Kimmirut being fairly rude and basically giving them heck for not having put the computer on.
If he would have just paid a little more attention, he would have realized that they were sending another flight in, but he chose not to wait.
He got on that same plane and went back to Iqaluit, and then the contractor had to wait another five weeks to get the inspection done.
Does the housing corporation compensate them for a lack of using common sense in regard to the electrical inspector?
We have a minister responsible for rough-in inspections, including electrical as well as the boilers.
I think the Minister of CGS would like to comment on that. I’ll give it back to you, Mr. Chairman.
No, your facts are not correct.
It wasn’t an issue of no laptop on the plane that the individual had to return.
It was because the individual had a health issue and the proper medication to address the issue was not on the plane and therefore, he had to return back.
So if the baggage that my colleague is referring to had been there, everything would have been okay, but there are conditions and medical conditions some people have that require that medication to be there and it was not, and it was a health risk not to return immediately.
Well, it’s quite obvious that it’s not the contractor’s fault that he had to wait three months.
So my question to the housing corporation is: does the housing corporation compensate the contractor, because this cost him money, in cases like this?
If it’s in the contract, you probably could do that. So far, I have not signed or instituted the word “not.” I’m kidding.
I think that’s something that will be an ongoing occasion that will happen, but I think we possibly have better ways of improving that.
My cabinet colleagues have commented on the fact that not only the housing corporation does require inspections.
There are mandatory inspections required for private homes and private companies, and other companies in building major infrastructure.
My colleagues have continued to try and find ways to increase the number of inspectors so that they are not putting tremendous pressure on the limited supply of inspectors that we do have.
I think there are a number of ways that we can improve instead of compensating for loss of time or whatnot.
We have enough financial pressures right now with the housing corporation, so I think we may be able to find a solution before long.
If you are a local contractor, if you are a northern contractor, and if you are qualified for NNI, and I realize you are 7 percent for each category, is there a limit as to how much the contractor can get as a benefit?
Is there a maximum dollar value or is it on the total amount of the contract?
I don’t profess to be the NNI authority, but depending on the type of contract, there are limitations. Again I wouldn’t want to commit, off the top of my head, as to which kinds, but for some contracting types, the adjustment is only made on the first $100,000 or so of the bid, while other contracting types, it applies to the full contract value.
Regarding qualifying for being an Inuit company, my understanding was that they would have to have a full-time manager in the territory here and they also have to do all of their business in Nunavut.
If you go on the website on some of these Inuit companies, you will see that their phone number is in Nunavut and their fax number is in Halifax, Nova Scotia. My question is: how do you monitor to make sure that these people are following the rules?
In determining if a company is considered Inuit owned, we rely wholly on the NTI registry of companies.
So that is within their mandate to verify and to register companies as being Inuit owned.
I’ll be so kind to get back to Mr. Elliott.
Thank you for getting back to me.
The whole idea in the lines of questioning are getting to the point where we want to know what’s in place and make sure that things are in place now, and mechanisms are there to make sure that if the federal government was willing to commit more money to the projects such as this, we are able to handle it.
Obviously we need more houses in the territory. Overcrowding is a real problem.
Some of the things Mr. Barriault was saying was that mechanisms are now in place, and I remember from the Deloitte and Touche report, it mentioned that on a monthly basis, tracking would be done of material and costs so that no more over-commitment was made.
I’m just wondering: was that followed through on?
Yes, this has been done. The housing corporation provides monthly reporting to GN Department of Finance, but as well, we do track internally on an ongoing basis all costs that are associated with our contracts, so we have established budgets.
We have also established a process whereby change orders to contracts are reviewed at the directorate office before they are issued.
We have added some layers of control within our computer software systems. We have implemented some systems to be able to track things more closely, especially multi-year contracts. We continue to look for ways to improve those systems, including better software rather than some of the systems we are currently using.
We have implemented controls. We realize that there are better ways of doing things and we are pursuing those as well.
Mr. Elliott: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also remember in the report it mentioned that for what they forecasted and what they were reporting on was up until December 31 of 2010 and now we’re into February of 2011.
With all of the controls you just said, as of December 31, 2010, were we on track in terms of the amount of money that was needed to finish the projects to that point?
Ms. Kimball: I can tell you to date under the NHT trust, we are up to about under $1 million in change orders so far.
We are tracking it project by project and, as Mr. Barriault mentioned, every time we get a new change order request, we do a review, look at the costs, and look at what that’s going to do to the contingency that we already have reserved for this. In addition, we are doing re-forecasting for LHO delivered units to look at what the projected cost to completion is on them.
So far, we are well within our $6.2 million contingency on the NHT projects.
For the CEAP projects, as we are doing tenders and awarding, we are actually comparing the budgets as we are doing the commitment. We have allowed for a contingency based on the historical contingency factor that we saw that is referred to in the reports.
So for example, for CEAP, we are using a 13 percent labour contingency, which will allow for future material change orders or if there are any issues with loss. So far, we are well within our budget on both NHT and CEAP.
Were the SIP houses supposed to be all boarded up and finished by December 31 of 2010?
I know, at least in my community, they are still working on those. Is that a change order that you would be talking about that continues to allow them to work or is that something that will come up later?
Yes, the contracts to close in the SIP units did state a December 15 closing date or completion date, and those dates were met in a number of communities and in others, they were not.
The general contractor had issues with some of their subcontractors, and we have been working closely with them.
A change order has been issued to put in a new completion date.
Specific to Arctic Bay, I believe the work is either completed now or complete this week.
I have met with the general contractor twice today and he assures me that the work in Arctic Bay in particular is complete now.
Mr. Barriault must have known that I was going to ask questions about Arctic Bay, so he was double-checking. Good job!
One of the things you could explain because I don’t understand is if I do a contract with someone and say that I’m going to build a house for an X number of dollars, then you sign on the dotted line and I thought that that was what happened, so doesn’t the contractor or subcontractor have to eat… ?
If they don’t meet the deadline, it’s not our fault. It should be their fault. So why do we pay them more?
Maybe you could explain to me because I don’t understand why we do that.
Yes, we have issued a change order to change the completion dates on the contracts to which the member referred. However, this is at no cost to the Nunavut Housing Corporation, so I just want to make that clear.
The longer the contractor takes to complete the work and has a work crew hired, then the higher the cost is to the contractor, but that does not increase the cost to the housing corporation.
So we had a fixed price contract and that contract value has not changed as a result of any of this.
That does help and it makes a lot of sense to me.
The next question I have then is with all of these sorts of financial controls in place, I know that there are a lot, in talking to different housing managers, of material sitting in our communities all across Nunavut. Since you have been tracking things better and whatnot, do you have a dollar figure?
The biggest amount that we spent on the housing trust from the one report was on the materials and there is probably a lot of material still sitting in the communities. Do you have a dollar figure as to how much is sitting in our communities now?
We do realize that there are surplus materials or leftover materials from the Nunavut Housing Trust construction in every community and we have been trying to identify that.
It’s still a work in progress.
It is definitely a priority of the Nunavut Housing Corporation to identify what is there.
The material can be used if we have shortages on other construction, as well it can be used as part of the maintenance stock for local housing organizations.
If there is material that is of no use to us in future construction or as maintenance, then we can look at means of disposing it and recovering some costs on that.
We have been taking steps to ensure that material is secure and inventoried, but it is a work in progress.
Just for clarification because I want to make sure I heard Mr. Barriault correctly. In speaking to one of the housing managers, I was told that they were not allowed to touch the materials in the community even though they needed them to do some of the repair work within the community on different projects.
So are you saying that they’re allowed to use that equipment?
One of the questions is: could you confirm that they’re allowed to use this information? The second question is: who actually owns this material? Is it the housing association or is it the Nunavut Housing Corporation?
A simple answer to that is anything the housing association owns, the housing corporation owns since we are their funding agent and they are our managing agent and partner in the communities but are wholly funded by the Nunavut Housing Corporation.
All of the property and materials are actually property of the Nunavut Housing Corporation.
Any material that is surplus to construction while there is still other construction ongoing, the corporation has been trying to reserve that material in case it is needed rather than having to fly in material, for example, if we do find a shortfall at some point.
Once those construction activities are completed, that’s when we can discuss with the local housing organizations what materials can be of use to them as well.
So the housing associations across the territory are being asked right now to do the inventory of what’s in the community, or who will be doing that inventory?
One thing the Nunavut Housing Corporation is cognizant of is the fact that local housing organizations do have their mandate in terms of providing maintenance services to public housing and to our tenants.
However, they are also our partners in delivering housing and addressing priorities in the communities. So between the Nunavut Housing Corporation and our LHO partners, we will be undertaking this inventory and cleanup of materials this coming spring or when weather is more amenable to that.
Isn’t it true that this all has to be done before the next sealift that comes along? It’s now about $3 million worth of sea cans sitting around in Nunavut that need to be shipped back south.
I’m just wondering if the minister could confirm that.
One of the challenges that we’ve had with our LHOs in most communities has been the lack of warehouse and storage space.
We know that we have many warehouses that have not been replaced in over 20 years, so there have been some challenges in that area.
Before we dispose of any of the sea containers that were brought up as part of housing trust construction, we will first assess to see what can be used and what is practical to use for LHO storage, including storage of any surplus materials that may be of use.
We will also look at means of disposal of those sea containers, whether it is to ship them back south or whether it is to sell them locally.
So we will assess all of those different options before we decide.
Thank you for those answers because it actually confirms some of the other questions that I was going to ask. Maybe if I could get some firm commitments.
One would be: when do you think this inventory would be done? That way we will be able to know when it will be done, maybe a date of some sort. As well, when is this assessment of what sea cans will be and will not be shipped out?
Some of the concerns that the local housing authorities have is where are they going to put this stuff if they have to dump everything from other sea cans into one.
They need time to be able to do that because, as you have mentioned, they already have their operational duties on a day-to-day basis to be providing services within the communities. So they are actually being strained on their services they are providing, which normally was contracted out to southern people too. So I think there is a little bit of animosity there.
As Mr. Curley said in our last meeting, we want to make sure that we are not overburdening our local housing authorities and recognizing the good work that they already do. Thanks.
Hon. Tagak Curley: Thank you. I just wanted to comment a bit.
I’m not 100 percent personally convinced there are a whole lot of materials that are leftover. That is not at all to minimize the need for having proper disposal guidelines or policies.
One area that I would like to consider that we consider when disposing extra material is the charity groups that have difficulty in getting materials to do maintenance stuff and so on in communities.
So that’s something that we may have to do, but I will work with the officials and see whether or not we can find, in consultation with the local housing associations, the best possible route because each community will have different stocks of extra material, and so on.
So it’s important that we have those guidelines in place before we start actually proceeding with one month of disposing all of the materials throughout Nunavut.
So they will stagger, there will be different times, and so on, but it’s important that we have a proper disposal policy. That’s something that I will commit to work with my housing corporation officials.
Mr. Elliott: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Then the question would be: is there a contract? I’m sure you probably have a specific number as to how many sea cans there are in Nunavut that came up from the south.
Do we actually own those or are they leased?
Mr. Barriault: The sea cans are all owned by the Nunavut Housing Corporation.
So if the sea cans are actually sent south again, there would actually be some income that would come back to the Nunavut Housing Corporation. Is that correct?
Mr. Barriault: Again we would have to look at costs and revenues.
So there is a cost to shipping sea cans, even on a return leg, and we have to compare what that cost is compared to what we could sell them for in the south. It may not be practical.
We don’t want to be leaving a mess in every community, but if there are uses in the communities, then that may be a better alternative.
So if local community members were interested in purchasing these sea cans, would they be allowed to contact the local housing authority or would they have to contact the Nunavut Housing Corporation to purchase them?
Again I would like to remind the member that we are trying to deal with issues that have gone on in the past pertaining to the documents before us. We are not necessarily trying to look ahead at this point. I just want to remind you of that.
That is one option that the housing corporation will be looking at is, as I mentioned earlier, disposal within the community.
If we choose to dispose of some locally, then we will make sure that it is available to all in a public fashion.
I was hoping to get confirmation in terms of the issue of the telehandlers. I know that there were a lot of questions before about costs and whatnot.
In a conversation I had with someone, I just wanted to confirm for sure that the Nunavut Housing Corporation owns all of the telehandlers that are in the community. They are not leased. They belong to the local housing authority, as Mr. Barriault said, which is also the Nunavut Housing Corporation.
All of the telehandlers that were brought into the communities by the Nunavut Housing Corporation are indeed owned by the Nunavut Housing Corporation.
Getting to what the Chairman was talking about, I think part of the reason why we’re asking the questions we are is to find out what mechanisms are in place to make sure that something like this doesn’t happen again.
I’m wondering if the minister could explain. In terms of the board of directors that’s being set up, I know that there was assistance given by the Minister of Community and Government Services, with his deputy minister being on some type of ad hoc committee.
Is that being more formalized?
When can we start seeing some movement on that?
Once again I wish to remind you that we’re trying to deal with issues of the past based on the document.
However, given that you have less than one minute, I’ll ask Mr. Barriault, perhaps, to respond or Minister Curley.
We do have a cabinet direction to proceed in changing the legislation as part of our work plan.
During the committee process earlier this fall, I indicated that it would likely be springtime when we introduce the amendment of the Nunavut Housing Corporation’s mandate and legislation.
So once that is in place, they will begin implementing that new legislation and it would likely carry through the summer, and so on.
Having the ex-officio representative from CGS has been important because we need to cooperate with CGS on a number of major capital planning issues, as well as sharing of resources in dealing with the cost issues, and so on. So it’s been beneficial.
Once that legislation is in place, there will likely be a new disengagement obviously with the current governing structure that we have.
For instance, my officials on both sides will no longer be on the governance structure, no doubt.
Therefore, that will change.
Eventually the CGS ex officio will probably have to fade out as well, but they all will have to be planned so that we have a clear understanding of exactly when the directive that is currently in place has come to an end and that kind of stuff.
These are under a serious work plan right now and fully engaged with all that right now.
I think we’re on track so far.
I’m sorry. I thought I was actually asking questions that were from the report in terms of some of the things that the contractor saw as needing improvement or just different mechanisms within the Nunavut Housing Corporation to be able to do their job better.
I was sort of asking questions to get some answers and see what the Nunavut Housing Corporation has been doing to make those changes, but I was trying to stay away from going back into the past because, in some respects, the past can’t be changed and I didn’t want to be accused of being and going into witch hunting.
So one of the questions I have then with the Deloitte and Touche report was one of the big questions was that there is a lot of data that was missing in terms of the two big issues that Mr. Barriault mentioned earlier were the proper budgeting and then the tracking with that being on track.
The proper budgeting didn’t happen because, according to the report, that information where they got their figures and their numbers for the over-commitments weren’t found.
So my question was: at any time since the people who were doing the report were doing the report and since we did questioning in October and now you’ve had three or four months to follow up, and we are going to be asking more questions, but has anybody gone and actually talked to Peter Scott to ask him what happened and which cabinet drawer he left all of the files and figures in or has anyone talked to Chris D’Arcy, who was working for the Nunavut Housing Corporation at the same time, who is still working within the Government of Nunavut, to maybe find out the answers that we are looking for?
I’m trying to make sense of what you alluded to; it’s kind of difficult to really get the rationale behind the whole thing.
If we needed to speak to those guys, we would.
Obviously I think the problems that were identified not only by the auditors, two sets of auditors, one by what you just quoted and then we had another audit, as well as a number of reports that we have got from the Auditor General, I think these are very important pieces of documents that have allowed us to come to this place where we now have a system, I think, of tracking permission. If we need to go back to them to learn about their mistakes, I think that would be a poor way of operating a huge corporation.
I would like Lori Kimball to respond to some of the missing data kind of issue that you alluded to and whether or not she can make sense of what I’m saying.
When I took over as CFO, I went through what I could find in the computer on the shared drive and personal drive, and the data that is contained within this report is everything that I found on there. So we didn’t phone up previous employees; we just worked with what we found in the office. Unfortunately that’s the degree of data.
One of the key things that contributed to the NHT issue is the fact that the budget was done at $275,000 per unit, which was based on five-plex costing five years ago, and duplexes and singles were basically done as two-fifths or one-fifth of that cost, which, as you know, doing a single family dwelling is not one-fifth of the cost of a five-plex.
So there are some basic flaws that were in the original data as well as lack of inflation, etcetera, and that, as Mr. Barriault has mentioned, is the main driving force is the budget issues with the original budget.
Mr. Elliott, your time has come up.