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April 23,

GOVERNMENT SERVICES COMMITTEE

Pursuant to Standing Order 68, Eddie Joyce, MHA for

Bay of Islands, substitutes for Randy Edmunds, MHA for Torngat Mountains.

Pursuant to Standing Order 68, Kevin Pollard, MHA for Baie Verte

Springdale, substitutes for Calvin Peach, MHA for Bellevue.

The Committee met at 6:00 p.m. in the Assembly Chamber.

CHAIR (Forsey): Good evening, everyone.

We are here to do the Estimates of Transportation and Works. We have three

hours if we need it, and if we do not, well that is fine. Usually we start with

fifteen minutes. We will start with Eddie and then go down to the NDP.

Before we do that, I will ask for the introductions of the Committee. Okay,

we will start with

MR. JOYCE: Eddie Joyce, MHA, Bay of Islands.

MR. LETTO: Graham Letto, researcher.

CHAIR: George, introduction?

MR. MURPHY: Oh, sorry. I thought you were going right down the same row.

Ivan's light is on here.

MR. MORGAN: Ivan Morgan, NDP research; thanks.

MR. MURPHY: George Murphy, MHA, St. John's East.

MR. POLLARD: Kevin Pollard, MHA, Baie Verte Springdale.

MR. PEACH: Calvin Peach, MHA, Bellevue.

MR. LANE: Paul Lane, MHA, Mount Pearl South.

MR. DINN: John Dinn, MHA, Kilbride.

CHAIR: Clayton Forsey, District of Exploits, and Chair.

The first order of business before we get into the minister and

Transportation and Works Department, you have copies of the minutes of the

Government Services Committee, April 17, 2013, Department of Finance. I will ask

for a motion for the adoption of these minutes.

MR. PEACH: So moved.

CHAIR: Do we need a seconder for that? Yes, we will have a seconder.

The Member for St. John's

MR. LANE: Mount Pearl South.

CHAIR: Mount Pearl South my apologies.

On motion, minutes adopted as circulated.

CHAIR: Minister, if you want to introduce your staff, or they can

introduce themselves, and if you have an introduction before we start questions

that is fine.

Please remember, if someone other than the minister is answering the

question, to introduce yourself for the media people, because sometimes they

cannot pick up who is speaking. If it is the minister, they can get you pretty

quick because you do a lot of the answering.

Minister.

MR. DAVIS: Thank you, Mr. Chair, and members of the House, and also staff

who are here tonight.

I will start by introducing myself, and if it is okay with you, Mr. Chair,

then allow for my staff to introduce themselves. Then we can check their mikes

to make sure, and then I have a short introduction that I will run through.

CHAIR: Sure, that is fine.

MR. DAVIS: Paul Davis, Minister of Transportation and Works.

MR. CHIPPETT: Jamie Chippett, Deputy Minister, Transportation and Works.

MR. GOSSE: Gary Gosse, Assistant Deputy Minister for the Transportation

Branch.

MR. GRANDY: Cory Grandy, Assistant Deputy Minister for the Works Branch.

MR. MORIARITY: Ed Moriarity, Communications Director, Department of

Transportation and Works.

MR. ANTLE: Kevin Antle, Departmental Comptroller for Transportation and

Works.

MR. BOWDEN: Keith Bowden, Executive Director, Works Branch.

MR. HARVEY: Max Harvey, Assistant Deputy Minister, Marine Transportation

Services.

MR. DAVIS: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I know most of the members are quite familiar with the department, but I will

have just a brief overview of the department, its branches set up, and some of

the investments and some of the work that has gone on recently.

The Department of Transportation and Works is divided into four branches:

Transportation, Marine, Works, and Strategic and Corporate Services. The

Transportation Branch is responsible for the provision and maintenance of our

provincial road transportation network. Some of the key areas in the branch

include providing summer and winter maintenance, which winter maintenance being

snow clearing and ice control on approximately 9,800 kilometres of primary and

secondary highways and roadways, and also community access roads.

They are also responsible for the construction of new roads and the

management of road improvement projects; the management of our government's

fleet, which is in excess of 3,000 vehicles, including our light vehicles and

heavy vehicles, heavy equipment, utility vehicles and other vehicles, such as

snowmobiles, all-terrain vehicles, et cetera.

The Marine Transportation Branch is responsible for the provision,

maintenance and management of seventeen provincial ferries servicing thirty

communities throughout the Province. The Marine operations include key areas,

such as the transportation of 900,000 passengers annually, 400,000 vehicles, and

approximately 20,000 tons of freight.

The provision of fleet modernization through the government's Vessel

Replacement Plan also comes under this branch; the provision of vessel

modifications and refits of government-owned vessels and the operation of

government-owned vessels with a complement of approximately 275 marine staff.

Our Works Branch is responsible for the management and maintenance of 840

buildings on 380 sites across the Province. Key areas under the Works Branch

include: the construction of new buildings and the management of other capital

projects for government departments and government funded bodies; the provision

of space for government departments in government-owned buildings and leased

accommodations; the provision of centralized mail and messenger services for

government, which includes the processing and delivering of over 8.5 million

pieces of correspondence annually, and also the provision of telecommunication

services for all government departments.

Our Strategic and Corporate Services Branch is responsible for providing

financial services and human resources for the department. It also provides

policy planning, evaluation of services for our department, and last, but not

least, the Strategic and Corporate Services is responsible for the operation and

maintenance of government's fleet of ten aircraft for air ambulance and forest

fire suppression services.

The Department of Transportation and Works has the largest number of

employees within any government department. Currently, it is 1,777 staff located

across the Province. We operate from seven regional offices. We have sixteen

depots and sub-depots or units throughout the Province.

Our department has worked over the last ten years in making significant

investments to build and improve our major highways and roads, construct new

ferries, and refurbish and expand provincial buildings. We have spent and

invested approximately $1.6 billion. Also, our Sustainability Plan for the

coming years builds on that work that has already been done.

During 2012-2013, we invested more than $165 million in roads, bridges and

highways, with an additional $60 million in federal support, for a total

investment of $225 million.

In this year's Budget, Budget 2013-2014, it provides for $169 million, with

an additional $77 million through infrastructure agreements with the Government

of Canada, for a total investment of $249 million for roads, bridges and highway

construction in the Province.

We have made significant progress on the construction of the Trans-Labrador

Highway, with a total investment of $450 million to date. This year we will

substantially complete Phase I. It will be the last full construction season for

Phase I, and we will begin to start the widening and paving of Phases II and

III. We look forward to celebrating, and I know many of you do and many of the

people of Labrador look forward to celebrating the completion of Phase I.

Significant road construction projects recently completely include: the

Kenmount Road Overpass, that very famous overpass; the Torbay Bypass Road, which

has been a significant improvement to the transportation network on the

Northeast Avalon; the construction of a four-lane divided highway from Massey

Drive Interchange to the Corner Brook Industrial Access Road. That also helped

significantly to enhance the flow of traffic through that region.

We will see major Trans-Canada Highway rehabilitation projects undertaken

this year, including work near Stephenville and Gander. As well, this year we

will see the substantial completion of the Conception Bay South Bypass Road, and

construction will continue on the Team Gushue Highway.

Bridge work continues to be a priority. We are replacing bridges at Little

Barachois Brook, Robinson's River Bridge on the West Coast, and the E.S. Spencer

Bridge which spans the Terra Nova River. Construction will soon be underway on

the Sir Robert Bond Bridge. There was some work completed last year on the Sir

Robert Bond Bridge in preparation for construction. We will have new tenders let

this year for that particular project. Also, work on the Placentia Lift Bridge,

we recently announced a tender for that project.

Mr. Chair, that concludes my opening remarks.

CHAIR: Okay, thank you, Minister.

Before we start, I will call for the subhead.

CLERK (Ms Barnes): Subhead 1.1.01.

CHAIR: Subhead 1.1.01.

What we will do, Eddie, is we will give each one fifteen minutes. If one runs

over, I am sure I will make it up to you. Like I said, we have three hours

allotted if we need to go there. If not, well that is fine. We can start with

you, Eddie.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. Minister, I will just ask you a general question at

first. You mentioned there are 1,777 people currently with the department. How

many was it before this Budget? How many were laid off?

MR. DAVIS: The number in our department is very fluid, greatly due to the

seasonal nature of our staffing requirements. As seasons change, our staffing

allotment changes from winter maintenance, especially in highways, and our road

maintenance, so it changes from winter to summer.

Through this Budget we have had a reduction of twenty-one through attrition,

and fifty-five staff through layoffs. We can probably I am sure get into that in

a little bit more detail a little bit later. It is fluid and it does change from

season to season.

MR. JOYCE: Minister, in 1.2.01, Executive Support, Salaries, last year it

was budgeted $1,192,000, this year it is $1,095,800. Why the decrease in the

Executive Support?

MR. DAVIS: A fair bit of that comes from the retirement of an ADM, and

severance and paid leave costs were associated with that. We have also had

change in Marine Services, which had an impact on that

MR. JOYCE: Change in what?

MR. DAVIS: Marine Services. We have a new ADM, and that offset that as

well. The retirement of an ADM in Corporate Services was a good part of that.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

General Administration, 1.2.02, Salaries: We see there was $1,411,000

budgeted for last year; this year it is $1,222,400.

MR. DAVIS: I am sorry, which tab

MR. JOYCE: Subhead 1.2.02, under General Administration, Salaries, 01.

MR. DAVIS: Okay, you are talking on the Administrative Support, which was

$1.4 million last year, and $1.2 million this year?

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, a significant part of that is the audit

section of

government departments now comes under the Finance budget.

MR. JOYCE: So most that decrease is because it moved the audit division

or audit part of it?

MR. DAVIS: Yes, that correct (inaudible) my deputy.

MR. CHIPPETT: Yes, $110,000 of that amount is the movement of positions

from our department into the Department of Finance to consolidate all the

internal audit function in government.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

Purchased Services, 06, Minister, there was $188,700, then again it went to

$275,000 in the revised budget last year, and it is back to $188,700 this year.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, there were a number of things at play there. One was

Placentia Lift Bridge closures. We had closures that we announced and published

during the that is the remediation of the Placentia Lift Bridge. There were a

number of times in the evening when we had to discontinue or no longer make

available the lift bridge had to be opened for the work to be done, so we went

through a number of notices in regard to that.

We also had increased cost, higher than anticipated advertising cost in

relation to moose-vehicle collision initiatives that we have done. Also, for

road closures on the Outer Ring Road, we did some road closures last year for

blasting operations in a pit, in an operation that is right alongside the Outer

Ring Road in the area of Paradise. Also, there were some announcements in regard

to Team Gushue Highway. Increased services were mostly on advertising and public

notices.

MR. JOYCE: Minister, you mentioned the moose advertisement. How is that

going, the sensor? You hear so many horror stories about it.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, there were a number of issues with the moose sensor

systems that really have not worked well. When we initially went through this

process to set up this pilot project, the tender specifications we used were the

same specifications that were used in Ontario, but we had a different successful

company. So it is a different company or a different service provider than they

had in Ontario.

The operation has not worked well; simply put, it has not worked well.

Officials have had meetings on an ongoing basis and discussions with the

company, with the provider. Our plan, the president of the company and myself,

is to meet in the near future to have a further discussion on this.

In January of this year, we put notice on it that it was not in operation. I

asked that we keep it not in operation until we knew there was significant work

done to repair it, so it was more dependable than what it was. The company is

looking through that. The company is working through that to make those

improvements. All of the work in repairs that have been required since they went

into operation have been warranty work and provided by the company.

MR. JOYCE: How much does that cost the department so far, the moose

sensor?

MR. DAVIS: It was essentially an initial capital cost. I will just have

to defer to officials to get the exact number. The $1.3 million, was that for

both sets?

OFFICIAL: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, so both sets, the one in Central, which is, I think, two

kilometres or 1.5 kilometres, two kilometres in Grand Falls; and 1.5 kilometres

on the East Coast. That is for both for them.

MR. JOYCE: The cost after the $1.3 million. Everything else was

maintenance. There was no increase in cost?

MR. DAVIS: That is correct. All of the maintenance issues and failure

problems of the system not working properly, all costs associated with that had

been warranty costs by the company.

MR. JOYCE: I did not mean to go off on this, but you mentioned it. Is

there any evaluation done where there is a moose fence put up?

MR. DAVIS: Where the moose fence is put up?

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, one of the initiatives, in addition to the sensor system

and also the fencing that has been done, is a new process for actually tracking

collisions. It is being partnered with the police who actually do GPS locations

as well as our staff who go out to collect carcasses and that kind of thing.

There is a better documentation now on exactly where locations have occurred.

I believe there have been two collisions where the moose fencing is, and

where the sensor systems are there have not been any. Now, bear in mind, sensors

span a total of 3.5 kilometres and the fencing span is almost 17 kilometres.

Where the fencing is there have been two collisions within that within or

outside the fencing, it depends how you term it. Some people say it is outside

the fencing, some people say the highway is inside the fencing.

MR. JOYCE: In 1.2.03, Policy, Planning and Evaluation, 01. There was

$533,000 budgeted last year, the revised is $562,000, but this year it is

$470,000. Is that a decrease?

MR. DAVIS: It is. That is part of our expenditure reduction process. That

is a senior policy, planning and research analyst position.

MR. JOYCE: Was one position not filled, or retired, or

MR. DAVIS: That is one position not filled. That is one position that has

been

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

In 1.2.04, Mail Services, General Administration; last year there was

$152,500 budgeted, only $90,000 used, but it is back to $152,500 again this

year. Was the money not used last year? If not, why was it put back up this

year?

MR. DAVIS: My understanding on the decrease for the revised budget from

last year was a decrease due to savings on leased equipment. In the mailroom

there is a fair bit of mechanical and electronic equipment, and there were some

savings there on leasing agreements.

MR. JOYCE: The savings last year, that is not there this year?

MR. DAVIS: That is my understanding, but I can that is correct?

MR. BOWDEN: (Inaudible) there was a lease renewal that was deferred last

year. It is anticipated to take place in the coming year.

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: A new lease comes with an anticipated increased cost?

MR. BOWDEN: Yes.

MR. JOYCE: In 1.2.05, Administrative Support, last year there was nothing

budgeted.

MR. DAVIS: 1.2

MR. JOYCE: Yes, 1.2.05.05, Professional Services. Last year there was

nothing budgeted, the revised is $139,800, and this year there is nothing. Can

you explain what that money was for?

MR. DAVIS: In the Professional Services, just a moment. I know this

relates to our it is a new system on bridge management. Maybe I will let the

deputy explain the difference of it.

MR. CHIPPETT: This is the last series of expenditures on our new bridge

management system. It is a new risk-based system for bridge inspections. What

that actually reflects is a reallocation of funding from Property, Furnishings

and Equipment to Professional Services. Professional Services was used,

obviously, to put that system in place. It is actually a more accurate

reflection of where the funding was used last year.

MR. GOSSE: (Inaudible).

MR. CHIPPETT: Gary is telling me there is a training component as well,

and obviously we used an outside company. The consultant who procured the system

also provided the training for staff.

MR. JOYCE: Is the system up and running now?

OFFICIAL: (Inaudible).

MR. JOYCE: Okay. I do not know if you want me, that is fifteen minutes,

do you want me to I am just trying to be fair, as usual.

OFFICIAL: I think we started at 6:13.

CHAIR: At 6:14 we started.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. I will keep going, sorry. Two nights

MR. DAVIS: We are trying to be fair, too.

CHAIR: The only thing I was any good at in school was math.

MR. JOYCE: I got fifty.

Road Maintenance, Mr. Minister, 2.1.01.06, there was no money budgeted for

Professional Services.

OFFICIAL: 05.

MR. JOYCE: Sorry, 05. There was no money for Professional Services but

there was $23,000 spent and this year there is $30,000 allocated.

MR. DAVIS: I mentioned a few minutes ago on our GIS mapping system, and

that is where that $23,600 was utilized. It was for a consultant cost on getting

that project up and running. It is our accident reporting system, as I

mentioned. That is mapping a number of things, including those accidents. It was

a consultant cost to get that started. The system is now operating. We are now

putting data into the system.

MR. JOYCE: Okay, thank you.

Purchased Services, 06, $553,000 budgeted, it went up to $721,000, and it is

back again to $523,000. Can you explain the increase last year? Why it was

increased by almost $200,000, about $180,000, and back down again lower this

year? In 06 Purchased Services.

MR. DAVIS: I can just a moment.

The Purchased Services on this I believe relates to electrical costs. I

believe it was on the lift bridge. I will just defer to Gary Gosse.

MR. GOSSE: In the Purchased Services there, the electrical cost for

running the lift bridge in Placentia comes out of this account.

MR. JOYCE: Last year it was budgeted $553,000, it went up to $721,000,

and it is back to $523,000. There was a sharp increase and it back down again

below what was estimated last year.

MR. DAVIS: On the reduction, there was a re-profiling of some of the

Purchased Services to Professional Services, so that was a small amount. That

accounts for the $30,000 reduction.

As for the increase from budgeted from $553,000 to $721,000, it is the

electrical cost for the lift bridge and also some training there as well that is

involved with that.

MR. JOYCE: It was the lift bridge, mainly?

MR. DAVIS: Yes.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

Property, Furnishings and Equipment, 07, an increase of $7,000, was something

purchased?

MR. DAVIS: There was.

MR. JOYCE: The budget was $5,000, it went up to $13,000, and it is back

down to $5,000.

MR. GOSSE: Are you able to identify that?

OFFICIAL: (Inaudible).

MR. GOSSE: I cannot identify the specifics there. It is a small amount of

money. Our requirements for different things go up and down on an annual basis.

It is not a constant. Frequently somebody will come up where you need to acquire

I do not know what the specifics are for that $7,000.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. If you can find out just for the record, but if not

Grants and Subsidies; what type of grants is that, Minister, of $60,000?

MR. DAVIS: Local road grants come in there. There are times when we may

have a small piece of work to do on a road in a small municipality and sometimes

we provide a grant to the municipality to carry out the work.

MR. JOYCE: I can see my time is up, and I am not sure if this is the

right time to bring this up with a minute.

Last year, Minister well, you were not the minister. Just one minute, and I

will go up and get it after.

CHAIR: That is okay.

MR. JOYCE: I tried last year with Grants and Subsidies to try to get a

grant for a small town or put it on tender. Do you remember Frenchman's Cove,

four houses with the four seniors in Frenchman's Cove? I brought it up in the

Estimates last year.

What happened I will get the Freedom of Information if I have to get it

was the department of highways had a culvert that was running, and they changed

the direction of the water back in the 1980s and they got flooded out about four

or five times. They did not get it this year because the melting was slow, but

last year the four houses got flooded again. I brought it up last year and asked

the department to look at it.

What happened, I had to apply under the Freedom of Information and I do

have the report from the regional office to show that there is a dry culvert

that the department used to use, but they ran the water behind the four houses.

They ditched it out in the 1980s, they ditched it out again in the 1990s, but

last year they said no, it is private property. It is not; it is Crown land. I

have the map and I have the information done.

I do not know if anybody there can explain why last year I knew there was a

report done and I knew there was a dry culvert because I walked through it and

now I had to get the Freedom of Information. If you divert water, shouldn't you

be responsible for it, especially where it was done twice prior, it is in the

report, and also it shows where there was a dry culvert. I see it now in grants

and subsidies, I think the estimate last year to do it was $1,500, and four

seniors were flooded out.

MR. DAVIS: I know, because you have talked to me about that one yourself

and I know that Mr. Gosse is knowledgeable about it, so I will defer to Gary on

that.

MR. GOSSE: We supposedly put the ditch around the back of those houses

back in the 1980s sometime. There is some memory, some dispute, about who

actually did it. We do not normally go onto private property to do any type of

work. We stick within our right-of-way on the ditches and the culverts that we

have control of.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

I do not mean to bring this up, but seeing it was brought up, that is part of

the funding last year I was trying to get. I asked last year it is not private

property, it is Crown land, where they diverted the water, and who diverted the

water was Transportation and Works in the 1980s. I will show you the map; I will

go up and get it when I get a break to show you where the report from Corner

Brook shows the dry culvert where the water used to go. It is a shame to have

these four seniors flooded out.

It was done twice prior by the department and for some reason now everybody

thinks it is Crown land when it is not Crown land. Everybody is saying well,

someone diverted it. Well, I do not know anybody down there who is going to

divert water about 250 behind their properties and put it into another culvert.

MR. DAVIS: Mr. Chair, just a point of explanation before we move off

Grants and Subsidies, under that heading. Just by way of clarification, just

some further information that may be important for you.

MR. CHIPPETT: The grants and subsidies there are based on the Local Road

Boards Act and it is based on population in the communities. They bring forward

a work plan to the minister, so those grants, that full amount provided the

municipality or the community apply for them. It is not a general granting pot;

it is for communities covered under Local Road Boards Act, which tend to be the

isolated communities like McCallum and so on and so forth.

CHAIR: I have a feeling that Eddie might want to pick this up again when

we come back.

MR. JOYCE: Oh, I am going to go up and get it.

CHAIR: In all fairness to George down there and, George, you can pick

up the extra couple of minutes, not to worry.

We will go to you now, Sir.

MR. MURPHY: Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, Minister, for coming out here tonight. Thank you very

much to your staff for the hard work that they do. I can appreciate that

sometimes they are under some stress with some of the things that they have to

go through, either be it with handling the aircraft or government's own fleet or

even having to put up with the ferry replacement program and the various

problems that they are putting up with. I want to thank you for your efforts in

advance. Thanks as well to your staff that are working under you for the rope

that they are pulling on and hopefully everybody will pull on that in the same

direction as they always have been.

I just wanted to come back, just to lead things off, to one particular

section. I have a question on

section 1.2.02, General Administration. Line 02,

Employee Benefits Salaries dropped or pretty much stayed the same between your

revised and your budgeted last year; Employee Benefits were about $336,000 in

the difference.

I would like to get an explanation as to line 02, what happened there between

the budgeted and the revised for last year. I would take it that the Estimates

for this year are down as a result of a drop in Salaries, but just a difference

there between the budgeted and the revised.

MR. DAVIS: Certainly, and I know that Mr. Joyce asked about this earlier.

I am just reviewing my notes; I want to be clear on this.

On the Employee Benefits there were two things that have effected a change in

that. The increase that you see there was primarily due to a higher than

anticipated payment on workers' compensation. That varies in our department from

year to year. It depends on, again, the number of staff, how long they work, the

work they are doing and that type of thing, how they are categorized, so that

changes.

As well, there was also and I think I mentioned that; I think he asked a

question on salaries earlier than that and I have not given you full

information, Mr. Joyce, so I will expand on that a little bit further. The

second part on the reduction this year is the move of the audit section, which

has an impact on our salaries. I should also point out on our salaries, and I

neglected to do this earlier, the transferred audit positions, there were two

Auditors and an Audit Manager, which moves from the Department to Finance. I

know I did mention that earlier, but not to that much detail.

MR. MURPHY: Your workers' compensation costs have obviously risen, but

you have pretty much the same amount of employees for that whole year, right?

That is what I am getting out of that.

Did workers' compensation give you a reason as to why they were coming after

the department for more money? This is the first time I have ever seen this in

one of these line items.

MR. DAVIS: I know I can get our staff to speak to it in more detail, but

they do change from year to year depending on staffing, the nature of the work

they are doing, and classification. I will let the deputy minister comment on it

further.

MR. CHIPPETT: That is actually based on claims, so it would be out of our

control. It is based on a number of claims in a given year, and obviously the

number of claims would be influenced by the number employees and so on. That is

actual payout. At the beginning of year, this is one of those line items in our

budget that is very difficult to pinpoint exactly the number of claims or

whatever in advance.

MR. MURPHY: So that would be all employees covered under Transportation

and Works, or all employees under government altogether? Is that what we are

dealing with here?

MR. CHIPPETT: Our workers' compensation numbers would just be for our

department.

MR. MURPHY: Just for Transportation and Works? Just for your department?

MR. CHIPPETT: Yes.

MR. MURPHY: Is your department actually running an investigation right

now to find out about these injury claims to see how the employees are being

injured? It seems to be a bit of a concern there.

MR. CHIPPETT: We would follow up on a case-by-case basis, obviously, and

we have an individual in our Human Resources Branch who works with workers'

compensation on those issues.

MR. MURPHY: So we do know that there is somebody looking at that one,

obviously. I had a bit of a concern there when it came to that.

Do we know when they might be ready to come forward with a report on that, on

what is happening here?

MR. CHIPPETT: I think generally speaking it would just be whatever

particular claims arose in a given year. There would not necessarily be a

pattern or a reason for all of them. It would just be based on when claims in

this case, it may have even been when claims were paid out.

MR. MURPHY: Great, thanks for that. Now I am a little bit clearer on that

one.

I want to come back to 2.1.01, Administration and Support Services for Road

Maintenance. I noticed a bit of a drop here in Salaries and I just wanted to get

this one straightened away; $7.895 million was the actual revised number for

2012-2013, and $7,594,800 for this year.

MR. DAVIS: I am sorry, Mr. Murphy, that is?

MR. MURPHY: It is 2.1.01, line item 01 under Salaries, the difference in

Salaries. There is about a $300,000 difference.

MR. DAVIS: Yes. The $300,000 difference from the revised budget to the

current budget you are referring to?

MR. MURPHY: From the revised to the current Estimates, yes.

MR. DAVIS: There were some expenditure reductions that were included in

our Salaries. We have a payroll clerk that has not been filled yet, but will be

recruited. So there are some savings there.

There is a Director of Highway Maintenance Support Division, a Clerk III, a

buyer, a maintenance engineer analyst, and also a Regional Director. Also, as

part of those calculations, are changes in payroll steps which offset some of

that.

MR. MURPHY: Okay. I wanted to come down to 06 again under Purchased

Services. I think we were getting an explanation earlier about some electrical

costs that might have been as regards to the bridge, the $721,700.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, it is a lift bridge that operates on electricity. That is

where that is.

MR. MURPHY: Yes, we know that, but the bridge being shut down for

maintenance and everything, I was curious as to why the electricity costs were

so high on that?

MR. DAVIS: The bridge continued to operate for primarily the year, with

the exception of some short times that it was shut down. When we went into the

remediation, it was being shut down during the nighttime. For an extended period

of time during when the work was done it actually had to be opened and then left

open. So, it continued to operate. When the maintenance was being done, like I

said, a lot of it was done in the nighttime where it was open and left up.

MR. MURPHY: Okay. All right, it is good there.

MR. DAVIS: I think there was also some training costs with that as well,

Mr. Murphy.

MR. MURPHY: All right.

Down to 2.1.02 Sign Shop, Salaries, you have probably about a $33,000

position, I guess, or $33,000

MR. DAVIS: Yes, Sir. That is the elimination of one sign production

worker position.

MR. MURPHY: Okay.

Over to Road Maintenance, 2.1.03 Maintenance and Repairs, line 01 under

Salaries again, about a $3 million difference. How many people are we losing

here under Maintenance and Repairs?

MR. DAVIS: This particular piece refers to our summer maintenance of our

highways. Part of our expenditure reduction process, we had two part-time

positions which were operational supervisors for paint crews that had been

reduced; but, having said that, we were looking for efficiencies in our summer

maintenance and also our winter maintenance. We were going down a road of

reviewing and looking at reducing our summer maintenance staff.

When we carefully considered all the factors, one of the factors we reflected

upon and we understand is that the people who do these jobs and these particular

operators and labours, are positions that are in high demand in our Province

today. As a matter of fact, quite regularly we will have requests for leaves of

absence and also indications from staff that they are leaving public service to

either go into private service or retirements or in other ways would leave their

roles.

Right now, today, just in one region I think we have fifteen, is the last

count I saw fifteen who are primarily heavy equipment operators have indicated

to us that they have a plan to leave the public service in the foreseeable

future. So instead of laying off staff, we have decided not to lay off staff but

follow a process of attrition. Also knowing that if we were to lay off staff and

we have a large number of our staff leave, then we have to recruit again.

We are reducing our budget and we are looking for efficiencies. We also

realize there may be an imbalance between depot to depot, depending on how that

occurs, and we are going to manage that as these applications for leaves of

absence and other requests for leave come in. That is the difference in it.

MR. MURPHY: These people are leaving for higher salaried positions

elsewhere, and just by consequence your budget is reduced. Does that mean we are

going to see less maintenance done on our roads now as a result of less people

working there? That is the number one question. The second question to that: Is

government going to be contracting out in order to get some of the work done?

MR. DAVIS: On your first question, yes. Do we see that this will result

in an overall reduction of our maintenance staff? It will, based on the previous

experience we have had with attrition and people requesting to leave the public

service for long-term temporary, one year leaves, and these types of things.

It will, but what we see that is going to happen here this is coming clear

to us. Again, you have to understand that the department is a large department.

It has numerous operations throughout the Province and these processes will

affect different areas in different ways.

As I said, we reflected on the public servants that we will need to keep in

the system. We reflected on the challenges we may face in recruitment because of

the big demand for these types of skills in the Province, but we also realized

that it will result in a reduction. How big those reductions will be, will

depend on how these requests for leave come in to us and where they come from.

MR. MURPHY: When it comes to the retention of employees here I am a

little bit curious, I guess, now that you brought it up. Obviously, there is a

difference between probably winter snow clearing and summer maintenance, that

sort of thing, but a lot of these truck drivers who are out there, for example,

snowplow operators, I imagine they are also driving the dump trucks too, are

they not? So these are still the same people we are losing.

Are we losing, as well, when it comes to snow-clearing operations? Is there

consequence there?

MR. DAVIS: What you have to understand is the human resources skills that

we need for our winter maintenance versus our summer maintenance is different.

We have a bigger demand for heavy equipment operators in the wintertime. We have

a larger number of heavy equipment operators in the winter and a small number of

labourers. In the summertime that number essentially reverses, where we have a

higher demand for labourers and a smaller demand for heavy equipment operators.

A lot of these people that do this work, and sometimes very challenging and

difficult work, will quite often see that they get laid off. We will have

operators who will get laid off in the winter and do not come back until the

next winter. We have operators who are operators in the winter and continue to

be operators during the summer months. We will have operators who are operators

in the winter but come summer, they become labourers.

We have a whole combination of those types of inputs that occur, and because

the workforce is so large it varies from year to year. Sometimes you will call

people back to work for their season, whether it is a labourer in the

summertime, and they say: No, I am not coming back because I have work

elsewhere. The same thing can happen during the wintertime.

MR. MURPHY: Okay. Government has a problem here now recruiting, I guess,

based on that. Is government competitive enough in its salaries to meet the same

needs as the private contractors out there? Because what I am wondering is that

if we end up turning over to a private contractor, for example, to get some

roadwork done, these same people who are leaving the government jobs are

obviously ending up getting paid by the private sector. I suppose we are still

getting our road paved, but at the same time as that government is losing a

cache of employees, if you will.

I am just wondering: Has your department been looking at any kind of a

retention program to keep these employees on there, be it if it is going to be

blending of winter and summer employees into one department, if you will?

Because it sounds like they are kept totally separate from each other, and I do

not know if that is the right thing to do.

MR. DAVIS: As I understand it, we have always been able to fill the

positions as need be, but what I am trying to express to you is that we would

not want to lay off a number of operators and then have another group of

operators who come in and put in a request to leave the employment for a short

term or a longer period of time, and then be faced with a recruitment problem.

What we have done is retained the employees as planned, as we have done in

previous years for summer maintenance, knowing that some are going to leave, a

lot of them temporary, a lot of them put in a leave of absence to go for a year

or go for a construction season. We do not want to be short. We knew that there

was going to be an impact here, but we wanted to still be able to carry on

maintenance work in the summer that we need to do.

MR. MURPHY: You are not anticipating any shortfalls, for example, in this

summer's paving season or road construction season?

MR. DAVIS: No. Paving is primarily done, when it comes to paving

projects, through contracts. Our maintenance workers carry out the maintenance

of our highways, so that is fixing guiderails, and repairing the potholes, paint

crews, and those types of summer maintenance. When it comes to actual paving,

that is done by contract.

MR. MURPHY: Okay.

I will carry on, I think I was probably a little bit long at that, but if you

need any more, I will ask you a few questions in the House.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, no problem. I expect the same.

MR. MURPHY: Under line 09, Allowances and Assistance, $100,000

anticipated, $60,000 spent, up to $100,000 this year.

MR. DAVIS: What part of it did you want me to ?

MR. MURPHY: Sorry, just a bit of an explanation on that line. In this

particular case it was down to $60,000. What didn't you allow for or you

obviously did not spend some money here that was anticipated to be spent?

MR. DAVIS: We quite often will have matters pertaining to property damage

or trying to resolve issues regarding property damage and this reduction was a

decrease due to the reduced cost of one of those circumstances.

MR. MURPHY: Perfect

CHAIR: Probably that would be a good place to stop, right on that one

there.

MR. MURPHY: I have another two minutes.

CHAIR: Well, actually, no, you only have one, but you can go with it, if

you want.

MR. MURPHY: Just line 06, under Purchased Services, about a $316,000

difference between what was actually spent and the revised of 2012-2013, and

then 2013-2014 back down to the same amount that you initially budgeted for.

MR. DAVIS: Okay. I am glad you went to that one, Mr. Murphy, because you

mentioned contracts

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: and going to contractors. In Labrador, we use contractors

for some of the work that takes place up there. We had an increased cost on

summer maintenance contracts for the Trans-Labrador Highway last year, and also

we had an increase sometimes we will rent equipment for utilization by our own

forces and there was an increase in machine rentals.

MR. MURPHY: Okay.

Mr. Forsey, carry on.

CHAIR: Okay, now we will try to get back on the fifteen minutes; it is a

lot easier that way.

MR. JOYCE: Not a problem.

CHAIR: Nobody will get gypped their time, let me assure you. I will make

sure you get your one minute back, George, if you lose it, my dear.

Eddie, back to you, Sir.

MR. JOYCE: I go back to the thing because I just got the Freedom of

Information stuff on Frenchman's Cove. Is anybody allowed to put culverts under

Transportation and Works' roads? Like, can you put a culvert under a highway?

MR. DAVIS: People do work on our roads with permits. This is also the

circumstance where people put in a driveway, for example, and you may require

culverts because of how the driveway is put in and where it is. Or people hook

up water and sewer services, they dig it out and put it in, actually have to dig

out into the public roadway to do that. So, without checking with these

gentlemen, I would say the answer is yes, if you have a permit and what you are

doing is

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

My question is, because I asked this, I do not know if it was last year it

probably was last year under the highway, my understanding, there is no one

allowed to put any culverts underneath the highway. I use Route 450, for

example, out in Frenchman's Cove, let us say Frenchman's Cove.

MR. DAVIS: I will defer to Mr. Gosse on that.

MR. GOSSE: We would not want someone to put a culvert under our road if

it is going to negatively impact our road. We have to be very careful what

happens and who is impacted in the area, and how it impacts on our roads. We do

not want anybody to do anything there that creates a problem for us maintaining

something in the future.

MR. JOYCE: So, is it common occurrence to put a culvert underneath the

road of a highway?

MR. GOSSE: For somebody else to do it

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. GOSSE: It is not common, no.

MR. JOYCE: Okay, perfect.

Under the freedom of Information that I have and I will give it to you and

I know, Minister, I am putting you on the spot here because you have not seen

this. Under the Freedom of Information, the dry culvert that was put there,

there were two culverts put underneath the highway. There is no individual

allowed to put it underneath the highway, only highway officials.

With the information that the department of highways put in the report, that

it was done well before I was ever elected in the 1980s, and it was cleaned out

in the 1980s before I was elected. With two culverts put underneath the road the

only people who could have done that was Transportation and Works and it shows

the water.

As I mentioned last year, these four seniors which really bothers me

because it is not a lot to fix one, they just cannot afford it or they would do

it themselves. With two culverts going underneath the road, the only people who

could have done it were Transportation and Works.

MR. DAVIS: I do not know if it is fair to put anyone on the spot here and

ask what the policy was in the 1980s. Policies do change. I think what Mr. Gosse

said it is not normal for that to happen; it does not frequently happen. I think

with permits and under certain circumstances it could happen. You are right in

your first comment.

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: I cannot answer that tonight.

MR. JOYCE: Can I ask you to revisit this again? It is a thing, when I

went through it last year with Estimates, this information said no, it is a

public road; no, we did not move the road. It took me to go through Freedom of

Information and appeal it to get it. Then again I asked last year to show me

where it is private land. Because I went up to Crown lands; it is Crown land

where this berm is running.

MR. DAVIS: If I can suggest you provide a copy of that to me and then I

will (inaudible).

MR. JOYCE: Yes, this is why I am asking to do that. It really bothered me

when I went down and the four seniors were flooded out. Thank you for that.

When we are on that 2.1.04 snow and ice removal for the highways, can I ask

and I will not go through the Salaries part the criteria for twenty-four hour

snow clearing, can you explain? I will use Botwood. From the Trans-Canada

Highway to Botwood, there is twenty-four hour snow clearing. From Port aux

Basques to Stephenville with 500 cars getting off the ferry, it does not have

it.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, I can tell you that this was done some years ago. It was

done primarily on traffic counts that were conducted at that time. The frequency

of traffic, time of traffic and so on was actually counted by the department.

That was a significant part of the assessment that was done when the twenty-four

hour snow clearing was implemented.

MR. JOYCE: Can I get a copy of the count?

MR. DAVIS: Actually, we are in the process of doing new counts. We do

counts for any number of reasons, but this year we are updating our information

to have another look at it. So if you want to wait until that is done, and then

we can have a look at it.

MR. JOYCE: Okay, sure. Yes.

Building, Maintenance, Operations; look at Salaries, $4,564,000 last year,

this year it is

MR. DAVIS: I am sorry, what tab are you on?

MR. JOYCE: I am sorry, Minister. It is 2.2.01, Salaries, there is a

decrease there of about $231,000.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, I spoke to this one just a few moments ago. This is an

expenditure reduction. On attrition management we have a Clerk III, a Clerk

Typist III, and a Drafting Technician III. For expenditure reductions we have a

Regional Administrator, three Engineers, a Word Processing Equipment Operator,

Regional Administrator, and an Information Technician.

MR. JOYCE: It says here: administration of the building maintenance,

2.2.01. Is that this building here or?

MR. DAVIS: All buildings.

MR. JOYCE: All buildings?

MR. DAVIS: Yes.

MR. JOYCE: I know there was a lot of temporary staff in Corner Brook. Are

they still with the department? Are they included in the layoffs, if they were

laid off? I think some got their layoff notices.

MR. DAVIS: There is a Regional Administrator position eliminated in

Western. From the rest of these do you know offhand which ones are, or which

areas for Corner Brook. I cannot comment in more detail on those from Corner

Brook. I do not know if Cory can give us further

MR. GRANDY: There were various engineering positions that were reduced.

Again, this is Province-wide. It is not specific to any particular area.

Province-wide there were some engineering-type positions that were reduced. That

fluctuates based on the number of projects we are doing at any given time as

well. So that is an influence.

The minister referenced a Regional Administrator position, two in fact, one

in Gander and one in Corner Brook that were reduced.

MR. JOYCE: How about the building maintenance in Corner Brook? There were

a lot of temporary employees there. I am assuming that is under here somewhere.

There was a lot on maintenance.

MR. DAVIS: I am sorry, on maintenance?

MR. JOYCE: Maintenance, yes.

MR. DAVIS: Are you talking about the Sir Richard Squires Building,

primarily?

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: Cory.

MR. GRANDY: We had the reduction of some security at the Sir Richard

Squires Building. There is often a trickle-down effect and that may have

impacted some of the temporary. Maybe you are referring to some labourer

positions.

MR. JOYCE: Labour and maintenance.

MR. GRANDY: Yes. Because those types of positions are broad in their

skill level there is often a trickle-down effect when you reduce in one area and

then someone

MR. JOYCE: Do you know how many were let go from the Corner Brook area?

MR. GRANDY: Specifically, no. I do not have that here in terms of

specifically what would have been reduced from the Squires Building.

MR. JOYCE: Can you give that to me?

MR. GRANDY: We can follow up.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

MR. DAVIS: I think I can give you some of that information. There are six

in Corner Brook in total: Tradesworker II, Tradesworker I, a Painter/Plasterer,

an Engineer III, and two Security Guards.

MR. JOYCE: Is that permanent?

MR. DAVIS: Yes.

MR. JOYCE: How about the temporary employees?

MR. DAVIS: Any of those could be temporary. Yes, that is the total

number.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. I think you should check it because I know three or four

temporary who have none of those qualifications, who are classified as

maintenance and labourer (inaudible) fourteen weeks.

MR. DAVIS: There is a Painter/Plasterer. Could that be what you are

referring to? I would not want to get into specifics.

MR. JOYCE: No, that is fine, just if you could get back of how many

temporary employees, because I know of three for sure.

MR. DAVIS: When I say specifics, I would not want to get into you naming

names.

MR. JOYCE: No, I would not do that. There is one I might, though. I know

a couple.

Minister, 2.2.02, Technical Support Services; the Budget was $1,032,700 last

year, it went down to $853,000, and this year it is $672,600, in 01 Salaries.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, Sir. We had three funded vacant positions in that

division. They were held vacant until the end of the year, and that reduced the

Salaries.

MR. JOYCE: Will this slow down any of the projects that are needed to go

to tender, or engineering, or contracts?

MR. DAVIS: No. No, it should not.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. Building, Maintenance, Operations and Accommodations

continued; Supplies, Minister, went to $33,000. In 2.2.03.04 it was $33,800,

there was $2,000 used and it went back to $33,800. Can you explain that?

MR. DAVIS: In 2.2.03, on Supplies you say?

MR. JOYCE: Yes, 04.

MR. DAVIS: I cannot specifically tell you. This particular budget area is

for Building Utilities and Maintenance for operations of government-owned

buildings. Other than the fact that there were supplies that were anticipated to

be needed that were not, I cannot give you I do not know if Cory can give us

more specifics.

MR. GRANDY: When you are budgeting these low dollar amounts, like

$33,000, it is hard to nail it down in any given year. I do not have specifics

in terms of why it went down to $2,100. It is a bit of an anomaly. We are

anticipating that in 2013-2014 we will be back up at a normal level again.

MR. JOYCE: Yes. In Salaries again sorry I missed that, Minister it

was $9,985,300 and it went down to $8 million. How many positions were in

2.2.03.01?

MR. DAVIS: On 2.2.03.01, the number of positions here that include I

can run through them if you want.

MR. JOYCE: Just the positions, yes.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, I will run through the positions.

MR. JOYCE: Please.

MR. DAVIS: Under attrition management: Tradesworker II, Custodial Worker,

Tradesworker I, Labourer II, and Mechanical Controls Repairer. We also have a

reduction of three Painter/Plasterers; Labourer II; Custodial Worker; a

Gardener, two part-time or half-time positions; a plumber; a carpenter; two

tradesworkers; three maintenance repairers; two tradesworkers; and three

security workers. That is the majority of it, Mr. Joyce.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. Thank you, Sir, again.

Again, Administration, Equipment Maintenance, 2.3.01, Salaries again went

down by $100,000; $1,481,000 to $1,363,000. Were there positions vacant?

MR. DAVIS: Can I just go back to 2.2.03, just to give clarification on

positions here?

MR. JOYCE: Sure.

MR. DAVIS: Part of this line item here as well was security at the former

Abitibi mill in Grand Falls so the persons, there were twenty-seven individuals

who were providing security there, many of them received no hours, some of them

very limited hours, but we kept those people on a casual call-in basis. They did

more than security. They also did some maintenance work there, some cleanup, and

some maintenance of perimeter fencing.

MR. JOYCE: Can we get a breakdown or a total cost of what it cost for

security for that building since the department started, and are you still doing

the security?

MR. DAVIS: We are not doing security any more now, but we still have

those people retained because we use them, as I said, for other things,

environmental stuff, and cleanup, and now and then you have stuff that is

blowing around on the site, that type of thing.

MR. JOYCE: Can we get a total cost of the security that Transportation

and Works paid out for the Abitibi?

MR. DAVIS: Yes, we can get that.

MR. JOYCE: One last question.

CHAIR: Okay, go for it.

MR. JOYCE: That would not take long to get that to us, I assume. Who is

doing the security now?

MR. DAVIS: As I said, the people who were there for, quote unquote,

security did more than just security, but they had a

schedule for after-hours

security which has been eliminated in this Budget year. There is on-site

presence by Nalcor, there are also regular reviews or drive-bys, if you like, by

TW officials, but there is no dedicated security on site as there was before or

after hours.

MR. JOYCE: There is no one on site now; it is just drive-bys or drop-ins?

MR. DAVIS: Nalcor has a presence on site, but for the defined security

purpose only, no.

MR. JOYCE: What did Transportation and Works pay out in wages to the

Abitibi site?

MR. DAVIS: Yes, because they did more than security.

MR. JOYCE: Yes, that is fine.

CHAIR: Thank you, Eddie.

George.

MR. MURPHY: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Minister, I wanted to come back to the Abitibi mill while the topic is

there. I had it on my agenda to ask you about the fire safety that the fire

commissioner in Central Newfoundland was talking about, Fire Chief Vince as

everybody refers to him as.

I just wanted to ask you about that. He has some direct concerns over I guess

you could say the permeability of the premises when it comes to the danger that

mill associates. What is government's plan for that?

MR. DAVIS: We actually had a meeting with he is not the fire

commissioner; he is a fire chief. There is only one fire commissioner for the

Province. He is a chief and I actually had a meeting with him and my officials

late last week to have some discussions.

We had a security presence there. I do not know if you ever toured the site

or not, but it is an enormous site. There has been work done there over the last

couple of years to clean up the site, to remove items that could be a fire

hazard, like loose materials, that type of thing. There has been over twenty I

forget the exact number and I am sure Cory could probably fill me in, but there

are over twenty high voltage electrical sites on the site itself that have all

been de-energized. So, they have all been shut down. There has been a lot of

work done to reduce any fire risk on the premises and on the site there.

Fencing has been beefed up, lock secured, that type of thing. As well, Nalcor

does have a presence there. They have round-the-clock presence because they have

the power generation facility that they operate and we also have our people from

our department who visit the site from time to time.

MR. MURPHY: Are there any on-site storage chemicals or anything that we

might be worried about inside the building, ammonias, and that sort of thing? Do

we have an inventory of ?

MR. DAVIS: There was a number of that cleaned up caustic materials

removed, those types of things have taken place there as well. Now, is it fully

remediated? No, but there is a fair bit that has been taken out of there. Stuff

that was at risk, stuff that we were concerned that could be flammable or fire

risk, that type of thing.

MR. MURPHY: We are looking forward one day to see $110 million line item

in the budget one of these days for the cleanup of the site.

Thank you for that.

Under 2.3.01, Equipment Maintenance, "Appropriations provide for the

management and administration of the equipment maintenance function, vehicle

fleet policy, and the cost of insurance premiums for the vehicle fleet."

There is a bit of a drop here in Salaries. I wonder if I can get an

explanation on that line; and a second question to that at the same time: When

we are talking the administration end of things, I guess maybe if you could give

me a breakdown probably of 2.3.01 and 2.3.02. I am worried about maintenance of

equipment in general that government has if we are talking about the layoff of

mechanics and what these positions might be, but an obvious difference in

Salaries between 2.3.01 and 2.3.02, and I am worried about that impact.

MR. DAVIS: Okay, on both of those let me talk about some of the

reductions and then what remains.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: On the first one under 2.3.01, this is for management and

administration of the equipment maintenance function. That is our vehicle fleet,

cost of insurance for the fleet, and that type of thing. We have a reduction of

two Equipment Repair Supervisors. Also, there is a Heavy Equipment Repair

Supervisor, which was vacant for a period of time. That was a delayed

recruitment circumstance there, Mr. Murphy.

On the next one under 2.3.02, we had vacancies in three Heavy Equipment

Technicians and an Automotive Body Repairer. Also, we had an Automotive

Technician, three storekeepers, an Equipment Operator, and nine Heavy Equipment

Technicians. That is on the other one.

You are asking what the input is. The first thing I would like to tell you a

little bit about is just to mention about our fleet. We have 567 vehicles

currently in our fleet. That includes

MR. MURPHY: How many again?

MR. DAVIS: Five hundred and sixty-seven.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: That is 567, heavy equipment.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: Of those, we have 307 plow trucks or flyers as we call them.

One-third of those, 101, are new within the last four years. We have made

significant investments and updating of the fleet.

We also have a number of light vehicles: 1,125 government light vehicles in

the fleet in total. We have added eighty-two of those since 2011. There have

been some renewing and updating of the fleet.

If I can use as an example the Heavy Equipment Technicians, while we had a

reduction of nine through our expenditure process and we had three vacancies, we

still have 110 Heavy Equipment Technicians throughout the Province. We still

have a very strong Heavy Equipment Technician staffing.

MR. MURPHY: You are not worried about maintenance levels, if there is

going to be equipment parked for a long time to get repaired, or anything like

that?

MR. DAVIS: No, and the hard thing about this is that a lot of that will

come. If you have a heavy snow event, you will have a demand to get out and

repair things. Once that event is over and you get those repairs corrected, the

equipment gets back on the road again. Then they will work to make improvements

to the fleet in the between times, and also during the summertime as well. So we

still have 110 heavy equipment technicians throughout the Province.

MR. MURPHY: Understandable.

When it comes to your trucks, one of the items I had written down here is

side guards on government vehicles. I know in 2008 the then Premier, I think,

announced I think Trevor Taylor might have been the minister at the time

vehicle safety side guards. Is government still carrying on that policy for both

sides of the vehicle? I know that they

MR. DAVIS: On the curbside.

MR. MURPHY: Curbside only?

MR. DAVIS: On the curbside, yes.

MR. MURPHY: That is still ongoing, even with the purchase of new vehicles

as well? I noticed a couple of trucks down here in back that did not have the

side guards on it. I am wondering about the trucks directly down here in the

back that are used. Are they just being applied, in other words on the basis as

vehicles get replaced, or what is the policy here?

MR. DAVIS: What I am being told here is the vehicles you are referring

to, we believe are contractor vehicles.

MR. MURPHY: Contractor vehicles with the government maintenance stickers

on them, government Transportation and Works stickers on them?

MR. DAVIS: You can go ahead, Mr. Gosse.

MR. GOSSE: I am not sure what heavy equipment we would have parked here

at the building.

MR. MURPHY: Two trucks down there and a white boom truck down in the

back. I saw them there yesterday.

MR. GOSSE: That one was purchased before we started installing side

guards. That is the bridge inspection unit.

MR. MURPHY: Okay. Will they be getting side guards or are you just going

to wait until those vehicles it comes time for them to be replaced?

MR. GOSSE: We have not retrofit trucks, but as we have replaced them we

have had the side guards on the curbside.

MR. MURPHY: Okay. So that is where the program is ongoing. Any older

vehicles probably will not have them, but they will be taken out of the fleet

shortly anyway?

MR. GOSSE: Correct.

MR. MURPHY: Perfect. Okay, that is what we were wondering.

Carrying on in 2.3.01, under Purchased Services, if I can get an explanation

on this line, $1.055 million budgeted for, $835,900 was spent. You did not spend

all your allocation, but your allocation has gone up to the 2012-2013 budgeted

figure for 2013-2014.

MR. DAVIS: Purchased Services for that line item relate to fleet

insurance policy. Because of just the nature of the business, it can have a

tendency to fluctuate. They were savings this past year on insurance costs.

MR. MURPHY: Okay. The number of vehicles, by the way, while we are on the

topic: Has the number of vehicles gone up for government or stayed the same, or

up or down from last year?

MR. DAVIS: I do not think it is up, but I will check with Gary again.

MR. GOSSE: It is pretty constant this year. There was an increase last

year because we did away with the long-term rentals because it was more

cost-effective to purchase than rent.

MR. MURPHY: Perfect; okay.

MR. GOSSE: We are pretty stable this year.

MR. MURPHY: There is a bit of savings there for government at the same

time rather than do that, okay.

Down to 2.3.02, under line 02, Revenue Provincial, if I could just get a

breakdown of that line. Maybe you can explain the big difference here between

the $350,000 and the $25,000.

MR. DAVIS: On this particular line it deals with equipment maintenance of

government vehicles. As I understand it, there is revenue received from other

departments when we conduct vehicle repairs. It would depend on the amount of

repairs and how much is billed to other departments. That was the reduction

there. There is a lot less repairs done for other vehicles, vehicles from other

departments.

MR. MURPHY: Government's policy on vehicle replacement, is that actually

ending up in some sort of a saving here for taxpayers or are we just seeing more

MR. DAVIS: This line on revenue was related to repairs.

MR. MURPHY: Yes. Okay, that is great.

Line 2.3.03, Equipment Acquisitions, there is a big difference here in the

numbers. Property, Furnishings and Equipment, $8.5 million was budgeted for,

that was also your revised number, but this year you are only anticipating $4.1

million, a difference of $4.3 million, roughly. I wonder if you can give us a

breakdown on what is happening here in this line.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, this is a reduction in acquisition of new vehicles. Bear

in mind, as I think I alluded to during previous comments, we have done very

well in updating and renewing the fleet. Being cognizant of our budget

reductions in our efforts to reduce our costs this year, we are making a

reduction for this year in the purchase of new vehicles.

MR. MURPHY: How does government keep track of its vehicles when it is

time to replace them? Do they have any sort of a mileage requirement? Like, for

example, Royal Newfoundland Constabulary vehicles, they would probably have a

mileage requirement of 120,000 kilometres 130,000, I think it was, the last

time that I seen it.

MR. DAVIS: 130,000?

MR. MURPHY: I think it was about 130,000.

MR. DAVIS: It has come down since I left there.

MR. MURPHY: I am just wondering if they have a set program, where they

are reading mileage on cars or what the actual program works like.

MR. DAVIS: It is 200,000 kilometres for vehicles and also consideration

is given to age, depending on the vehicle.

MR. MURPHY: Yes, okay. That happens, of course, on down the line with

every vehicle.

MR. DAVIS: Yes.

MR. MURPHY: All right. Thank you for that.

Under 3.1.01, Administrative Support and Design.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, 3.1.01.

MR. MURPHY: Yes. Line 01, $957,000 was budgeted; $1,314,000 was spent

against a projected $1,046,200 for 2013-2014.

MR. DAVIS: A fair bit of this is attributed to what we refer to as salary

recharges. I can explain that if you like.

MR. MURPHY: If you would.

MR. DAVIS: It is charges to capital and road projects. If we have a

specific project, than the value of those salaries are recharged out to that

project.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: If we have specific funding for a project, then it moves to

there. It is a timing issue as well. There are times when we can have a project

where we do work on a cost-shared project, as an example. The expenditure occurs

and then there is a process that takes place to recharge that. Sometimes the

timing will make a difference in the budget line for the end of the year.

MR. MURPHY: Okay, that is great.

Down to line 06, Purchased Services, $39,800 was budgeted and $93,800 was the

actual revised for 2012-2013.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, that was an increase in costs for repairs to equipment.

That equipment primarily relates to our soils lab. We actually have a soils

laboratory located here in the greater St. John's area. There is a fair bit of

equipment there. There were some repairs to equipment was the major part of that

cost.

I will just defer now to the deputy.

OFFICIAL: Or Gary.

MR. DAVIS: Or Gary.

MR. MURPHY: What do they do in the soils division? Maybe you can explain

that. It is one I never heard of.

MR. DAVIS: It is an interesting place, I can tell you. Whenever we do

roadwork, we have people on site who supervise the processes being used and also

materials that are being dispersed to the site.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: There are samples of those materials that are taken, and then

they are analyzed at a lab. We have a lab that on an ongoing basis is analyzing

material.

MR. MURPHY: It is part of the engineering process then, having to do with

construction of the roads and everything like that?

MR. DAVIS: Yes.

MR. MURPHY: Okay.

MR. DAVIS: Well contracts require a certain formula for asphalt, as an

example.

MR. MURPHY: Right, yes.

MR. DAVIS: We actually take samples of that. The laboratory does an

analysis on it to ensure that it is within the contract requirements.

MR. MURPHY: All right. I kind of had a mental picture of that one already

but I am glad you explained it anyway and straightened me out on it.

Down to 3.1.02, Project Management and Design, line 01 Salaries, maybe you

can give us a break down there. It looks like there was a bit of an addition

here.

MR. DAVIS: This relates to recharges to capital projects in other

government departments, and also to TW and maintenance projects. The value of

the salary recharge was lower than had been anticipated. They were lower than

what was anticipated earlier in the year.

MR. MURPHY: That is great.

I wonder if I can ask you a few things about your road planning, now that we

are coming up to the end of this

section in another page or so. How do you

determine when a road has to be replaced or which road is going to be next? Do

you have a strategic plan for roads?

MR. DAVIS: There are a number of things that take place. As you know, we

have a desire for a greater plan and we work towards that. We know in each year

there are a number of things that take place as far as we have jointly funded

projects, depending on the project and the progress of them. If you use the

Trans-Labrador Highway as an example, that is a project all to itself and a plan

all to itself.

When it comes to provincial roads, we expend funds on a yearly basis on a

roads program, on current and also capital. Those are applied. Quite often we

know exactly where our own crews in each of the regions identify quite often

roads need to be done. Sometimes then it is a work of sitting down and working

through which ones we are able to do.

CHAIR: Thank you.

You will have lots of time, George.

MR. MURPHY: I will pick up there after.

CHAIR: Eddie.

MR. JOYCE: Minister, in the construction, I will go back to the design

work.

MR. DAVIS: Which paragraph?

MR. JOYCE: I am just going on general, just in the design for the general

Administrative Support and Design. Does the department design for other

departments, also?

MR. DAVIS: For roads?

MR. JOYCE: No, not just roads, Department of Education, say, or Health?

MR. DAVIS: There are many occasions when we work with other departments.

Our involvement, level of involvement, and who leads it would depend on the

department, the project, the level of expertise that department may have in the

area, and that type of thing.

MR. JOYCE: For example, the hospital in Corner Brook.

MR. DAVIS: The hospital in Corner Brook; I think I have heard of that.

MR. JOYCE: Is Transportation and Works involved with any of the design

work now that they finally feel they have something they are going to put forth?

Is the department involved with the design work?

MR. DAVIS: The stage we have gotten to now is to get through what is

referred to as program. The next stage then will be design and that will be done

through an RFP.

MR. JOYCE: There is an RFP coming out from your department or the

Department of Health?

MR. DAVIS: It would come from my department.

MR. JOYCE: Is the Request for Proposals for the design or to design

build?

MR. DAVIS: There are a number of steps in process. The full scope of the

next RFP and maybe I will let the deputy give you the full scope of the RFP.

MR. CHIPPETT: RFP, as was stated at the time of the announcement, should

be out in early to mid summer. The process right now is to determine exactly

whether that is design or design build, or there are also a whole series of

other project delivery options that you could chose. So, that is the process

that we are going through right now.

At bare minimum, at one end of the scale is just design, part way along the

scales is design build, and then there are other approaches such as construction

management which enables you to advance construction as well. The RFP could be

for any mix of those services.

MR. JOYCE: Whoever gets the RFP, will they do design your department,

will you be doing the design work now or this RFP, or it is not determined yet?

MR. CHIPPETT: The RFP would select a consultant, the actual composition

of the consultant, and their team would be determined based on the project

delivery mechanism that we would choose. A consulting firm would be responsible

for doing design. Depending on how far you went towards design build or as I

said something we call construction management, you would also have people on

that team who could be responsible to oversee construction and so on and so

forth.

MR. JOYCE: I am just making sure I am correct, because I may speak about

it sometime. Am I correct when I say that the design is not complete yet for the

hospital?

MR. CHIPPETT: Design will start with the RFP.

MR. JOYCE: Can I ask

MR. DAVIS: Design is not complete.

MR. JOYCE: No, it is not.

What was the $2.3 million paid to Hatch Mott MacDonald? That was for the

design work and

MR. DAVIS: That was programming and pre-design work.

Before you get to design, you have to grasp: What is it you are designing? To

do that you have to do a significant amount of work to determine exactly what it

is that the project will include

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: what kinds of services will be provided at this facility,

how extensive are those services, and then there is how much space you are going

to need for it. All those types of very high-level work is done, but it is an

intensive amount of study and review and understanding of what is provided in

Western Newfoundland, how it is delivered, ways that it can be delivered

differently.

So those types of programming, which is lead primarily by Department of

Health, that is the work that they do, and once they get to that concept where

they say, we know what it is and you have seen that yourself this is what

the program has come up with, then we take that and move it to a design phase.

MR. JOYCE: I understand the process, but I just have to get it straight

so if I am ever asked a question or something, especially with the department

involved with it last year as I mentioned a couple of times before, last year

when I was asking questions on it also, I found it was in the pre-design. So now

the pre-design is complete, we are going into the design stage?

MR. DAVIS: Pre-design and program.

MR. JOYCE: Pre-design and program is complete.

How can the department spend, I think it is $79 million on it this year if it

is just going to RFPs, and next year $131 million or $237 million?

MR. DAVIS: It is $7 million this year, but

MR. JOYCE: $237 million next year?

MR. DAVIS: No, it will not be that much next year.

MR. JOYCE: Oh, well, that was in the press release.

MR. DAVIS: It is $7 million this year, so it is $227 million over three

years. So it is $7 million this year the enormity of these projects can be

staggering to try to understand it.

MR. JOYCE: So, if it is going to the pre-design and you pick someone to

do the design and I do not mean to put anybody on the spot. If, for example,

you have what you just said you have done

MR. DAVIS: The program.

MR. JOYCE: You have the conceptual done, programming done, and the

pre-design done, if you go putting RFPs out now, is it going to cost $7 million

to put the RFP, say, from August, it is going to take two of three months to get

someone approved, I would assume, so we are looking at August, September, and

October. So we are going to spend $7 million this year on the design phase, and

then how much again next year, $127 million or

MR. CHIPPETT: It is $227 million over the entire first three years of the

project. Cory, I do not know if you remember cash flows over the three years?

MR. JOYCE: Can anybody explain to me if it is still in the design stage,

what is the money going to be spent on next year?

MR. CHIPPETT: Depending on the project delivery mechanism so the

further you go towards a design build-type approach, or construction management,

or slight variations on a theme for some of these things, you can do elements of

construction, site work, all that kind of stuff while you are designing. That is

the notion of a design build or a construction management type project. The cash

flows allow for any of those project delivery mechanisms.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. I will not beat it to death because there is already $23

million worth of site already prepared. I am just amazed what they are going to

spend $100-something million on next year if the design is not complete.

MR. DAVIS: It is pretty amazing in the enormity of these projects to

actually be able to grasp how large and how much of the technical the specific

technical work is so large in these projects. Yes, you are right; it is big.

MR. JOYCE: There may be construction started before the design is

complete? Last year, and I am just going on memory, the pre-design stage well,

actually I have them here; the pre-design took almost two years to do. The

design work itself is going to take that amount. It may start next year but the

pre-design took two-and-a-half years.

MR. DAVIS: In the concept that you saw with multiple buildings, some of

those buildings can be designed much faster than others.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

MR. DAVIS: It is quite conceivable that construction on those buildings,

which can be designed quicker, can start before the design is finished on other

parts on other buildings.

MR. JOYCE: Hatch Mott MacDonald, $2,362,000, took two-and-a-half years to

do the pre-design work. Now once that is complete, you go into the design work.

Did your department have any involvement with Stantec with the design or the due

diligence review plan of the Corner Brook hospital?

MR. CHIPPETT: TW selects consultants on behalf of government. We were

involved with Stantec in commissioning that work. The work was primarily on

health care-related issues in terms of programming and so on.

MR. JOYCE: If I happen to mention it sometime about the hospital that is

still waiting to be designed, I would not be wrong. I would not be putting

anybody on the spot if I said we are waiting for it to be

MR. DAVIS: The RFP that will be out later this year, depending on the

process taken, then we will conclude the design.

MR. JOYCE: I will not belabour it, but it amazes me how they could commit

to spend money next year on the building that is not going to be designed.

MR. DAVIS: I do not know if you caught what I said or not, but you saw

the concept for this site. It is multiple buildings. So there are some of these

buildings like, an acute care facility is an enormous amount of design and

takes a long time to design just by the very significant amount of technical

work and what has to go into an acute care facility versus a long-term care

facility that has much less of that type of it is not as highly technical as

the system where you are putting in operating rooms and acute care beds.

One building can be designed and construction could essentially be underway,

when the design of another

part is not finished yet.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. I cannot wait. It is going to be interesting.

Heading 3.2.03, Provincial Roads, 05, Professional Services, it went from

$450,000, the budget, revised to $200,000 and down to $34,700 this year.

MR. DAVIS: The decrease last year was lower than anticipated consulting

services that were related to the completion of road maintenance projects, and

essentially the same is again for this year. It reflects the anticipated

professional service requirements which would really be consultants associated

road maintenance projects in this coming year.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. Thank you.

Heading 06, Purchased Services, it went from $40 million budgeted, $45

million revised, down to $34,847,000 this year. Can you explain what that is,

Minister, please?

MR. DAVIS: I certainly will, Sir.

Each year the department receives a $10 million pre-commitment on the

provincial roads program, a combination of current and capital. That allows for

the department to tender and commit work for the coming year ahead of time on a

pre-commitment.

What happened last year, if you recall, we had an amazing summer as far as

the weather. When weather is good and the rain, temperature conditions, and

weather conditions co-operate there was much more work done last year than was

anticipated. The season was longer than it has been in recent years, and the

unusual warm weather allowed for contractors to complete more work than they had

anticipated. Early in the year, work that was done that we would expect to be

carried over into the following year, that work was completed last year.

MR. JOYCE: How much roadwork that was tendered out last year is going to

be carried over into this year?

MR. DAVIS: There is not very much because, as I just said, the weather

was so good and the construction season was so long last year.

MR. JOYCE: Usually there is a certain amount, I am sure.

MR. DAVIS: Right; and that is what I am referring to. There is a lot of

it that quite often will come forward. There was very low carry over. If you

want Gary to comment further on it, I am sure he would not mind.

MR. GOSSE: Why we budget for $10 million in carry over or pre-commitment

into following years is because we have normally seen about $10 million in

carry-over projects. Last year, as the minister said, because of the summer and

the weather we had, work went on and there were no delays for weather. As a

consequence, we have about between $2 million and $2.5 million in carry over

this year, as opposed to $10 million.

MR. JOYCE: How much is budgeted this year for roads, pavement, and

repairs to roads?

MR. DAVIS: The total on capital and current is $59 million this year.

CHAIR: Okay, Eddie, that is a good place to stop, maybe, there.

MR. JOYCE: Yes, that is fine.

MR. DAVIS: Bear in mind, we have less of carry over from last year to

this year. So normally we would have more work left from last year this year,

but we still have $59 million for this year.

MR. JOYCE: So $59 million new money for this year.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, that is right. There is another tab there that deals with

capital that you have not gotten to yet.

MR. JOYCE: Thank you.

CHAIR: George.

MR. MURPHY: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Minister, I just wanted to clue up a couple of things in that particular

section. I did have a couple of questions on it.

MR. DAVIS: On 3.2.03?

MR. MURPHY: Well, I guess overall, the road

section in general, but yes,

in 3.2.03, again, having to do with the carry over. I noticed with the carry

over here, the difference between the $40 million and $45 million is obviously

part of the explanation of that, but it does not climb up to the pre-budget of

$40 million in this year. It stays down at $34.8 million, roughly.

So I am just wondering, because we got the work done last year, we are not

going to get the same amount done as what was originally budgeted for in

2012-2013? I guess I am explaining that right.

MR. DAVIS: You are.

MR. MURPHY: There is a bit of a shortfall overall. About $6 million, I

guess, overall.

MR. DAVIS: No, if I can get you to flip over to 3.2.08.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: You see on Purchased Services here an increase. It was $11.8

million last year, it was actually $9.6 million, and this year it is $15.6

million.

MR. MURPHY: Right.

MR. DAVIS: That one is capital. That is an increase in capital. Capital

expenditure versus current refers to structures. Essentially, bridges, culverts

and that type of thing, where current pertains to asphalt and repairs. What you

see there is we have a lower amount of current this year and a higher amount of

capital. If you add the two of them together

MR. MURPHY: That is where your rollover is.

MR. DAVIS: - you will find your difference.

MR. MURPHY: Okay. Is that number set then every year, roughly about $40

million?

MR. DAVIS: It is a budget item. It can change from year to year. On the

$40 million the $34 million, again, that is current, but the overall roads

budget is a budget set.

MR. MURPHY: I am just wondering about the determination of that. The

reason I ask that is because through the Provincial Gas Tax, I know that money

goes towards general revenue, but the impression around drivers is that a lot of

this money would be sunk into roads and everything, $176 million collected, and

they are anticipated to be collected under the gas tax to go into general

revenue.

I am just wondering: does the department have a policy by which they would

take so much money from that gas tax revenue provincial revenue, now, I am

referring to and sink into provincial roads? Is there a dedicated amount they

give towards that?

MR. DAVIS: My understanding is it actually goes into general revenue,

like most revenue items do. Then the roads budget is done as an expenditure.

While it does contribute to that, in theory it contributes to that roadwork, is

that actual money taken and specifically put there? No, that is not how the

financial operations operate.

MR. MURPHY: Government does not have a dedicated amount from that gas tax

revenue to go directly towards roads. I am just thinking it may be an idea for

government probably to give the consumer out there a bit of a flavour, if you

will, of what they are paying for their gas tax.

MR. DAVIS: How much gas tax do you say has been collected?

MR. MURPHY: About $176 million, I think, is projected for this year. I

think the actual last year was $173 million. Every year it has shown growth and

everything.

MR. DAVIS: That is roughly the same amount of money we have actually that

we are expending on our transportation investments for this year.

MR. MURPHY: Yes, okay. All right, perfect.

I guess we can get

MR. DAVIS: I am sorry, just to add to that.

Those funds also allow us to leverage other federal funding. So when you

combine the two together we are up around $249 million, $250 million.

MR. MURPHY: Okay, great. That was the next part.

The other

part I was going to ask you, I do not think it was a line item

yes it was. In 3.2.04 Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund, anticipated Salaries

of $1,158,200.

MR. DAVIS: That is anticipated salary requirements to complete the CSIF,

or Canadian Strategic Infrastructure Fund, and maintenance projects for this

year.

MR. MURPHY: All right.

In 3.2.05, Canada/Newfoundland and Labrador Infrastructure Framework

Agreement, Salaries again are through the roof I guess on this one, $207,000 was

the actual that was spent last year against $998,000 for this year.

MR. DAVIS: The salaries on these change with again, a lot of this is

timing, and timing on approvals. If you look at the bottom line on this you will

see the difference in the overall funding allotment, as you referenced. A lot of

it has to do with the timing of approvals and then the actual expenditure of the

funds. When we expend the funds, the return does not occur until there is an

audit process that takes place as well.

We can actually spend the money in 2012, by the time we charge it out and the

federal government goes through an audit process and the funds are recouped, it

could be a different budget year.

MR. MURPHY: What are you anticipating spending the money on this year,

the $15,600,000?

MR. DAVIS: There is one current project that is approved which is the

rehabilitation of the Trans-Canada Highway from Corner Brook Stream to Pinchgut

Lake. I think Mr. Joyce knows where that is

MR. JOYCE: Yes, I do.

MR. DAVIS: - and the other ones are in the application process.

MR. MURPHY: Okay, all right. You say the application process?

MR. DAVIS: Yes. Part of the rules with the application process under

federal funding is that until projects are approved and announced we are not at

liberty to disclose it.

MR. MURPHY: You are not at liberty to say until the time comes to

specially announce them at inauspicious occasions. Good for you. Thank you for

that.

I had some questions here as regards to government policy. I had a question

here on road signs. I had a question actually on road painting, line painting.

Does government have any concrete plans now in the next couple of weeks to start

getting the paint crews out?

MR. DAVIS: Well, it is asphalt, not concrete, for the most part that we

paint.

Yes, we have an annual program. We have paint crews that are essentially

seasonal employees who get on to work on May 1. It is when the paint crews and

summer maintenance programs essentially begin.

If there is anything specific to that, I can answer, or if you want me to

defer to Mr. Gosse to give you a quick overview on it, I could do that for you

as well.

MR. MURPHY: Sure. I am just wondering about the longevity of the paint

and everything too at the same time, Mr. Gosse. I do not know if there are going

to be any concrete answers as regards to that. What is government looking at?

MR. GOSSE: Actually, right now with the paint trucks that we use, we do

all of our own line painting ourselves. The paint trucks are ready to go.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. GOSSE: What we need to wait for is some of the salt that has been on

the asphalt over the winter now to wear off. You need, dare I say, a good dose

of rain to get the salt off the asphalt so the paint will stay.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. GOSSE: As far as longevity of the paint is concerned, we use all

latex-based paints now, water-based paints. That is mandated by Environment

Canada. We had to get rid of the volatile organic compounds in the oil paints.

They are not allowed any more. We use all latex-based paints, as does every

other jurisdiction in the country.

We are using the same CGSB Canadian General Standards Board specification

for traffic paint that everybody else in the country uses. Of course, around

here we have pretty severe conditions with salting and sanding, plowing and that

in the wintertime. It is like taking a belt sander to the traffic lines. It does

wear off, but every other jurisdiction in the country is seeing the same thing.

MR. DAVIS: I would just like to add for Mr. Murphy as well, is that paint

is one of those things in many areas we are always keeping an eye on

processes, or changes, or improvements, or efficiencies that occur that other

provinces look at, sometimes new technologies. The same as other provinces

sometimes look to us if we try something different or something new.

We have good communications with our counterparts across the country with the

federal government. We are always looking for new ways to make improvements.

What we do here, contrary to what some people may think, is very similar and

consistent with what happens in other jurisdictions.

MR. MURPHY: Is government considering any installations of cat's eyes? I

asked last year, I do not think there were any plans then.

MR. GOSSE: We have looked at cat's eyes. The problem with cat's eyes of

course is if you recess them into the asphalt in the wintertime they get buried

with snow and ice.

MR. MURPHY: Yes.

MR. GOSSE: If you leave them above the asphalt, the first time a plow

passes over them they are gone.

MR. MURPHY: All right. Thanks for that.

MR. GOSSE: They work fine in warm, ice-free climates, but not so here.

MR. MURPHY: Minister, I will come back to some line items again under

3.2.06. Thanks for that answer, Mr. Gosse, by the way.

In 3.2.06 Canada/Newfoundland and Labrador Infrastructure Framework

Agreement, line 01, Salaries. There is a little bit of a difference between the

revised this year and the Estimates. Again, it was projected at $4 million

initially, but it has seen a massive cut here. I wonder if we could get a

breakdown as regards what we lost in Salaries.

MR. DAVIS: Again, this has quite to do with timing and the timing of the

commencement and the completion of capital projects. These are all capital

projects. These are projects that have been carried over to this fiscal year, so

there is timing on them. The current estimate for this year being lower than the

estimate for last year reflects the salary component for what we believe to be

the upcoming year.

MR. MURPHY: Why would there be a difference between what was actually

projected and the Salaries that were actually made there? It looks like stuff

was not done, but we had just talked about an excellent season for doing

infrastructure framework and that sort of thing, roads and bridges. I just

wonder why a drop in Salaries when it was actually a good time to be doing work?

MR. DAVIS: Well, it depends on where the project is. Some of these

projects include projects like the Team Gushue Highway, the E.S. Spencer Bridge,

the TCH Massey Drive Interchange to Watsons Pond, and Robinson's River Bridge;

it also refers to, I believe, the Ambrose Shea Lift Bridge. They are projects

that are in different stages. Some have not progressed.

Take the Placentia Lift Bridge, for example. We had hoped to be further ahead

in that process than where we are now. Therefore the salary would have been

expended last year, which has not taken place because the project is not where

we expected it to be, as an example. There are a number of those there,

depending on where they are and where they are in their billing cycles.

MR. MURPHY: Are we going to be dealing with a cost overrun then, if that

is the case, on the Placentia Lift Bridge?

MR. DAVIS: There is a contract in place for the Placentia Lift Bridge

right now. It was awarded recently for $42 million or $41 million, if I remember

correctly. I hear you reference cost overruns, but cost overruns from time to

time become a matter of the scope of work and how the work is done, so it

depends on the project.

You take a construction like a road project, for example. Phase I of the

Trans-Labrador Highway cost $300 million. The cost overrun, as you would put it,

totalled $3 million. So it was 1 per cent of the entire project. They are built

on units. So engineers go out, they look at a road, and they say we are going to

evaluate this, we know we need X number of loads of fill, as an example, and we

are going to need X number of tons of asphalt.

So if you get into an area where the survey did not show that there is more

digging out that you have to do than you expected, then you are into more units.

So if you look at a project like the Trans-Labrador Highway, I think our crews

did a very good job in their estimates when they did their tendering.

MR. MURPHY: Understandably so; it was 1 per cent.

I want to carry on with this section, 3.2.06, under line 03, Transportation

and Communications. Again, $600,000 budgeted for last year and this year but it

was only $136,500 spent.

MR. DAVIS: Right, and the very same again because that line item,

Transportation and Communications, includes staff that are supervising the

project, Transportation and Works crews and engineers who are actually on site

when projects commence. If I could use the Sir Ambrose Shea Lift Bridge again as

an example, if we are not on site doing the work and the contract was not

awarded until a later period of time, which was the case in this one, then we do

not have our crews on site doing supervision, and therefore they are not

expending transportation and communications.

MR. MURPHY: The same thing basically for this whole section, 3.2.06, I

think it is safe to say that because some things were delayed or it seems like

pretty much the numbers are on par with the rest

MR. DAVIS: That is correct.

MR. MURPHY: Of course we are talking federal revenue here in $47 million

and the $3 million would be again cancellation of a project or an allotment of

funds here by the looks of it and only $3 million spent.

MR. DAVIS: Right.

MR. MURPHY: So this would have been which project or different projects

altogether?

MR. DAVIS: Yes, there are a number of them as I just listed. These are

significant projects. If you look at, as I said, the Sir Ambrose Shea Lift

Bridge for this year, the budget for this year is just over $20 million. Team

Gushue Highway this year will be $11 million. Another big one there would be the

TCH out on the West Coast at $ 7 million. Some of these are big projects. If a

couple of these get delayed in awarding tenders or if there is a delay in

approval processes or engineering reviews, then you can move a lot of money from

one year to the next.

MR. MURPHY: Any chance that some of these monies might be lost if there

were time-sensitive agreements or anything like that? There is no expiration

date or anything on them that the money would have to be spent?

MR. DAVIS: No, we do not have any concerns in that regard.

MR. MURPHY: All right, perfect.

Down to 3.20.8, Improvement and Construction - Provincial Roads. I am not

sure, Eddie I think you touched off on this one.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, that is the capital portion. Remember, I brought us over

to that one.

MR. MURPHY: Yes, we will forgo that one.

Under 3.2.09, Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund, there is a difference

here in Salaries again.

MR. DAVIS: This one again is a capital CSIF funding and there was a lower

than expected staffing requirement on the construction projects for the work

that was done last year.

CHAIR: George, can you turn it over to Eddie.

Eddie, are you ready?

JOYCE: Oh yes.

CHAIR: Okay.

MR. JOYCE: I will just get back to the painting. I know it was discussed

earlier. What is the policy? Can I get a copy of the policy of what roads, for

example, when you are driving along a road when you see the outer part of each

side painted? Is there a policy ?

MR. DAVIS: Gary, can probably give you a quick overview on that.

MR. GOSSE: Any road that is designed with a paved shoulder has the white

painted line on the shoulder.

MR. JOYCE: I will use an example and it is Route 450. It used to have the

white paved on the lines, but the last number of years it is just not being

done. I was told that now and I am not saying it is correct by guys who work

with the department, any road that ends in 450 is a major highway and it is

usually supposed to be done. Port au Port is being done; Bay of Islands 450 is

not being done.

MR. GOSSE: If the road was designed with a paved shoulder then they are

being done. Route 450 may not have a paved shoulder the full distance; I cannot

speak to that right now.

MR. JOYCE: What do you mean by a paved shoulder? I am missing it.

MR. GOSSE: There are some road cross-sections that have the lane width,

plus it has a paved portion on the outside, it is a part of the shoulder being

paved.

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. GOSSE: If that is the case, then the white line separates the

shoulder from the travel lanes. Not all roads have a paved shoulder.

MR. JOYCE: No, this does not have a paved shoulder. No, definitely Route

450. When I look at

MR. GOSSE: If there is no paved shoulder, then it would not have the

white line.

MR. JOYCE: Would not?

MR. GOSSE: No.

MR. JOYCE: When I look at roads now if they do not have a paved shoulder

and they have a white line you do not mind me contacting you and saying why not

this one? I know it used to be done in the Bay of Islands but it is not being

done now.

MR. GOSSE: Yes, it may have been done before even though it did not have

a paved shoulder.

MR. JOYCE: It definitely does not have a paved shoulder, but it was done.

MR. GOSSE: Yes.

MR. JOYCE: Why is Port au Port being done? That does not have a paved

shoulder.

MR. GOSSE: It must. It has to. It should. That is where the white line

goes. It separates the paved shoulder portion from the drive lanes.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

MR. DAVIS: I will be sure to check on that for you, Mr. Joyce.

MR. JOYCE: Oh, I will check on it myself. Okay, thank you for that. I did

not know that. I always thought anything in the 450 is a major highway going

out.

Two things I was going to bring up, Minister, before we get off the roads, or

we are still on to it. One thing that the department is doing and I agree with

it totally; I think it is great is when you go in and do paving you do not do

this 100 feet, 200 feet. You do a kilometre, two or three kilometres and get it

done, instead of just patching parts to make them look good.

MR. DAVIS: There are places we still do that, to be fair.

MR. JOYCE: Well, I am sure there are places you have to do it, but a lot

of times like I know stretches going for two or three kilometres where you get

it done and it is completed and I am sure you get a better cost for doing it

that way also. Just to the department, good job, because you can see the

difference in the work that is being done.

MR. DAVIS: There are cost efficiencies to doing larger pieces instead of

doing a small piece and a small piece. There are cost efficiencies laying

kilometre and distance of laying.

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: However, having said that, when you do a larger piece with the

same amount of money then you are going to do fewer pieces. So it really depends

on the demands for that year, the priority for that year and where you can best

utilize your funding. Like I said, there are efficiencies by doing a bigger

piece. You can get more bang for your dollar.

MR. JOYCE: I have another question on the roads. I brought this up last

year, and, Minister, you were not the minister at the time. I brought it up, and

I know the DM and the ADM are aware of it, going through Frenchman's Cove in the

Bay of Islands. We brought it up last year. What happened, Minister, is about

two years ago there was a big water and sewer project that went right through a

part of Frenchman's Cove and it was all new pavement. Within six months, it was

torn up.

There was an issue then with Municipal Affairs, if they should get the

contractors to come back and do the work. My understanding is that

Transportation and Works would not take ownership of the road until Municipal

Affairs got it repaved. I do not know if the Department of Transportation has

taken that

section of the road because it should never have been taken over in

that state. I think they paved it in December, and come April there were

potholes in it. There are still now I rode on it and there is a big dip in the

road from that construction.

MR. DAVIS: Why was it torn up?

MR. JOYCE: Pardon me?

MR. DAVIS: You said in a short period of time it was torn up. Why was it

torn up?

MR. JOYCE: I just think it was done late in the year and the pavement was

not very thick. I brought it up last year. It was a Municipal Affairs job, water

and sewer.

MR. DAVIS: You said it was a few years ago?

MR. JOYCE: Two years ago, I guess.

MR. DAVIS: We do have a date now where we really try not to do any paving

after a certain date because of what you are just referencing. Late in the year

you get colder temperatures and that kind of thing, but I am not familiar with

the project myself.

MR. JOYCE: No, I know you would not.

MR. GOSSE: That was a water and sewer project at the time in Frenchman's

Cove (inaudible) in our road. They obviously had the road torn up and they

needed to pave it, to put some sort of a surface on it for the winter. They did

it and it broke up, as I think most people expected, and it was incumbent on the

contractor and the consultant who looked after that work for the town to go back

and correct the deficiencies that were there. I understand that was done.

MR. JOYCE: No, it is not done.

MR. GOSSE: Not done?

MR. JOYCE: Definitely not. That was the dispute last year when I brought

it up in Estimates, is that Transportation and Works would not take control of

that part of the road until it was brought up to the proper standards.

MR. GOSSE: It was our position, and would remain if it has not been

fixed, that the town and the consultant and the contractor need to fix that

deficient work that was done.

MR. JOYCE: It is definitely not done, as of last weekend.

MR. DAVIS: It will be done.

MR. JOYCE: Yes. Thank you for that, because we are trying to get that I

understand it is a Municipal Affairs project but it was a highways road. Okay,

thank you.

In 3.2.09, Salaries

MR. DAVIS: In 3.2.09, okay.

MR. JOYCE: In 01, Salaries; it is $1.6 million, it went down to $578,000,

and it is up to $1.157 million again this year. Why the decrease when it was

revised last year?

MR. DAVIS: They are ones that I just referred to a short time ago, lower

than expected staffing requirements for construction projects. They included the

CBS Bypass road and the Sir Robert Bond Bridge, some maintenance projects. The

CBS Bypass road was a major one there and the Sir Robert Bond Bridge. That is

because of where the projects were at the time, less staffing requirements than

we had anticipated.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

Transportation and Communications, the next one down, it was budgeted

$379,000, it was revised to $35,000, and it is back to $267,000.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, the same thing as the first one, because our staff are

not on the ground and doing the work. We have people on the ground supervising

work that is ongoing and doing our sampling, as I mentioned and referred to

earlier, with soils lab sampling and those types of things. That line

Transportation and Communications is their cost for actually transportation

(inaudible).

MR. JOYCE: This whole one is compared, the same thing

MR. DAVIS: Yes. Salaries are down because there was less of our staff

requirement, and then less staff requirement means less transportation costs.

MR. JOYCE: Trans-Labrador Highway, the Salaries on that, Minister, are

$2.2 million. It went down to $2,335,000. Is that the same? Then the revised

budget was $1 million.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, the same thing. It is timing, yes.

MR. JOYCE: The same thing, timing.

MR. DAVIS: The timing of the construction process, where you are when you

are there in the construction process.

MR. JOYCE: The same thing, the budget last year was $44 million, you

spent $42 million. Is that correct? Is that what was spent last year?

MR. DAVIS: Spent last year on Purchased Services?

MR. JOYCE: On 06.

MR. DAVIS: Yes, that is contractors. I should tell you as well, the

Salaries component, the reduction in that, part of that is offset by contractors

work, but the same thing in Purchased Services. It was anticipated to be $44

million and the actual was $42 million.

MR. JOYCE: Is that what was spent last year on the Trans-Labrador

Highway?

MR. DAVIS: It was $42 million last year.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. You are anticipating $55 million this year?

MR. DAVIS: Well, $51 million if you include all the other aspects of it.

MR. JOYCE: Okay.

MR. DAVIS: This year it is $43 million. This year, we have just announced

$85 million to start on Phase II and Phase III, but actual expenditures of that

$85 million this year should be in the range of $30 million, and $39 million to

finish Phase I.

So, Phase I should substantially be completed. In Phase I, the work is done

by widening and preparing for the asphalt. A lot of it has to do with widening

and levelling and that type of thing. All of that has been done in Phase I, and

now we have to finish the asphalt. It is about $39 million to finish the actual

paving, so it should substantially be completed this construction year. If we

have a good construction year, we will be pretty close to completion at the end

of this construction year.

MR. JOYCE: Land Acquisition, 3.2.11.07, Property, Furnishings and

Equipment. There was a

MR. DAVIS: That is an increase in land purchase requirements related to

construction projects.

MR. JOYCE: What furniture and equipment?

MR. DAVIS: Well, it is land. It comes under Property, Furnishings and

Equipment.

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. DAVIS: So it is property, being land acquisitions.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. It says there, Furnishings and Equipment.

MR. DAVIS: Right, Property, Furnishings and Equipment.

MR. JOYCE: All this money here is spent just for property?

MR. DAVIS: Yes, it is all property acquisitions for major projects.

MR. DINN: Property values are gone to hell, too, right. That did not

help.

MR. JOYCE: No, John, I was just confused where it says Furnishings and

Equipment. Usually if it is just property, it would be all property.

MR. DAVIS: It is Property, Furnishings and Equipment. That is the line.

It is categorized as Property, Furnishings and Equipment.

MR. JOYCE: Minister, where this land is acquired, is that all throughout

the Province or in Labrador?

MR. DAVIS: Yes, it is a capital expenditure. That is a number of

projects, road projects. I do not know if there is any one in particular that

are I will let the deputy respond.

MR. CHIPPETT: The majority of that would be things like Torbay Bypass,

Team Gushue Highway, Placentia lift bridge, Conception Bay South Bypass. The

reason the variance is as great as it is, is we do not always know when a

property owner is going to settle, because we try to avoid expropriation when we

can and reach a negotiated settlement. So, if they take longer you cannot

predict when somebody is going to say, yes, we are going to pass over our

property (inaudible).

MR. JOYCE: So even with the Placentia lift bridge, there may be some

property you have to purchase because of expense?

MR. DAVIS: With the new lift bridge, the current lift bridge will

continue to be in place. We have done a fair bit of work on that to keep that

operational for the next five years until the new bridge is completed. The

construction of a new bridge will take place next to that. That required land

acquisitions for the approaches on both sides to reroute the road to the new

bridge location.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. Thank you for that explanation.

Building Construction again on 3.3.01.05 Professional Services, it was

budgeted $6,925,000. It went down to $2.2 million the revised budget for last

year.

MR. DAVIS: Yes.

MR. JOYCE: This year it is back to $6.6 million.

MR. DAVIS: That is primarily a reduction in consulting fees on building

projects.

MR. JOYCE: On what?

MR. DAVIS: On building projects.

MR. JOYCE: Why such a reduction and back up again this year? Do you

anticipate the fees again this year or more buildings to be constructed?

MR. DAVIS: It depends on the work that is generally being done. Last year

this item included work like on you may have heard of this the windows

project here at Confederation Building.

MR. JOYCE: I have a question about that.

MR. DAVIS: Yes. That is those types of projects, mechanical and

electrical upgrades, and work being done on Sir Richard Squires Building. Also,

work on our Inclusion Strategy, which is making public buildings accessible.

MR. JOYCE: Before I get off that, Minister, what work is being done on

the Sir Richard Squires Building I ask?

MR. DAVIS: There are two floors. The space essentially that was the

former library is being remediated for future use.

MR. JOYCE: Okay. The cost for the courthouse and you may not have it

there. That is fine too. Can I get a copy, or a letter, or the cost when you had

to take the tiles off the courthouse because they were falling down, and the

cost of the tender to replace or fix the roof itself?

MR. DAVIS: Yes, and Cory can probably give you some of that information.

I know he knows it well. I do not know if he knows that well or not.

MR. GRANDY: I do not know the past history in terms of what it cost to

remove the tiles. We are currently out to tender now for the installation of a

new shingled roof.

MR. JOYCE: Yes.

MR. GRANDY: Sorry, I said currently out to tender, we just awarded that

contract. I do not have that value here. I think it was just under $600,000 in

value.

MR. JOYCE: Can you get that to me?

MR. GRANDY: Sure. Yes, okay.

MR. JOYCE: I am just curious because when it was built there were a lot

of eyebrows being raised. There were a lot of eyebrows being raised when they

saw the plate tile on the roof. Oh, that is not going to go over well. I know

they had to take them all off, store them, and wait for the tender to come out.

Back on the Confederation Building here; can you give me the cost to date

spent on the Confederation Building, please?

MR. DAVIS: I do not have cost to date. I can tell you last year's

expenses were about $13.5 million, but I cannot give you the total. I do not

know if the deputy or if one of the department officials might have that amount

in cost to date.

If you actually have a look at the project today, while they are looking for

that information, on this wing recently the scaffolding and the tarps were

removed. I do not know if you have had a chance to look at it or not, but you

can see significant sections where it is all new brick. One of the problems we

ran into with the building, and it depends on which

section of the building you

go to, is that the framing around the limestone around the framing of the

windows had to be replaced.

Then there was work where the brick was actually deteriorated because of

water, the failure of the systems and the water inside of the building. I

actually have video of workers who were with their jackhammers cutting out the

limestone and the brick around where the windows are located, the opening of the

windows. As they were cutting it, you can see water flowing out from behind the

building

A building of this size, it is a large, large building, and some of the work

we found out we had to do was not anticipated earlier in the project. You can

see where there is new brick now on the outside, especially this area on this

side over here.

MR. JOYCE: I am sure you might not have it now, but can I get, again,

later when you get that, the cost spent to date on the Confederation Building

here in St. John's?

MR. BOWDEN: The cost to date on the windows is about $30.5 million. That

is on the windows.

MR. JOYCE: I am talking about the whole renovations for Confederation

Building. It was even more than that just last year, when we asked questions.

MR. BOWDEN: The other piece would be the mechanical-electrical, and that

is about $6.6 million to date.

MR. JOYCE: That is $40 million. That is the total amount since the reno

started on the Confederation Building.

MR. BOWDEN: Just between $35 million and $40 million, $36 million or $37

million.

MR. JOYCE: On the Confederation Building. Are there any other projects

ongoing, or any other projects completed to date? I know you mentioned the renos

and the electrical. Last year, Minister, the amount was even higher than that

$36 million.

MR. DAVIS: There are two major projects: one is the windows, limestone,

and brick exterior project; the other one is the mechanical and electrical

upgrades that are happening with the building. Those are the main components,

the main systems within the building itself.

The mechanical and electrical systems throughout the building have not had a

significant upgrade since the building was constructed. We have failures from

time to time and we have issues that sometimes take a long time to sort out. If

you also consider what I just explained to you about the water actually being

inside of the building, that as well is taking a toll on some of those systems.

MR. JOYCE: Up to this date, $36 million is what has been spent on the

renovations?

MR. DAVIS: Again, I do not have it in front of me.

MR. GRANDY: There might be some confusion over cash flow versus committed

projects. So the numbers, maybe, that were discussed last year would have been

in reference to, if you want to talk about the window and exterior renovation

project, the total committed value of that project is in excess of $50 million.

The cost to date in terms of cash flow would be the $30 million number. I think

that is correct.

CHAIR: Okay, we are gone over a couple of minutes there, Eddie, boy. Are

you finished on that Confederation Building there?

MR. JOYCE: You go right ahead, yes. I will come back at some point.

CHAIR: All right, sorry about that, George. Do you want to pick it up?

MR. MURPHY: Sure. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to come back to 3.3.02. I guess not come back; it is the first time I

am in it. Line 01, for Salaries, there was $325,000 budgeted, $800,000 was the

figure they are looking for this year, the Estimate, and the actual was $51,500.

I wonder if you could fill us in on that.

MR. DAVIS: It is, again, just the lower than expected staffing

requirements on construction projects. That is essentially what it is.

MR. MURPHY: When you say lower than expected construction projects, are

we talking about delays to some of these projects because of the lack of

staffing? Maybe you can explain that a little bit more.

MR. DAVIS: Sure, I absolutely can. A couple of major projects that this

includes, projects we are looking at one of them are, for example, on depots

and gearing up for depot replacements. We have done some of that this year. We

want to do more. We have done design, or as one person put it to me, design and

all that jazz. It is design work in gearing up for that.

The other major project we are giving consideration to involves hangar space

and considering our options on hangar space. We have a fleet of aircraft, and

especially we have four new water bombers, CL-415s, and hangar space for those.

We are looking and considering our options, and best ways to proceed on those

projects.

MR. MURPHY: New hangar space where?

MR. DAVIS: Good question and that is part of the consideration.

MR. MURPHY: Still having to do with the same topic while it is there on

my list, I am just wondering about the movement of the water bomber from Lab

West. Why would you move the water bomber from Lab West?

MR. DAVIS: Well, we have not.

MR. MURPHY: You have not moved it?

MR. DAVIS: No.

MR. MURPHY: Well, somebody up in Labrador was telling me that it was

moved.

MR. DAVIS: I heard that report as well. We have two different models of

water bombers; we have CL-215s and CL-415s. The CL-215s are aging. They are

about forty years old. They run on what is called avgas, which is an older-used

type of aviation fuel not readily available any more in airports like it used to

be one time. As a matter of fact, in some places we would have to stock it at

the airport facility in order to have a supply of it. The CL-415s are four new

ones we have, an investment of about $120 million if memory serves me correctly.

They are new technologies, improvements from the CL-215s.

Our intention is, at the end of the firefighting season this year, to divest

one of the older CL-215s. This year and next year for that matter, we will have

water bomber services. We will have a CL-215 in Wabush. We will have a CL-415 in

Happy Valley-Goose Bay, one in Deer Lake, one in St. John's, and one in Gander.

Then the second CL-215, our intention right now is to put that in Gander.

What I have to add to all of that commentary is that it all depends because

water bomber fleets are utilized and managed as they are needed. It is not

unusual to have an event today which causes a shuffle and movement of those

services. So they can be moved as need be, and that is led by our friends in

forestry.

MR. MURPHY: A question on the CL-215s, and it is obvious that government

is going to be getting rid of this planes and you already explained that.

MR. DAVIS: Well, we