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Smokes, booze on the agenda for MLAs

Busy schedule ahead

Chris Woodall
Northern News Services

Iqaluit (Mar 03/03) - Forget the potential political leg wrestling between rivals premier Paul Okalik and MLA Jack Anawak when Nunavut's legislative assembly re-opens for business tomorrow.

There will be more than enough to keep MLAs busy on the order paper as they debate several pieces of new legislation.

The budget, for one thing, promises to keep growing.

The 2003/04 original budget estimate is $143 million, but already Finance Minister Kelvin Ng is hinting that it will be even more expensive to run government.

"There are always supplemental appropriations that come forward," Ng says.

He will be tabling a budget that will include that extra spending for the coming year, but he won't let the harp seal out of the bag about details until the assembly opens.

"You'll have to wait for the legislature to open," he says.

Government will continue to spend more than it brings in, Ng admitted.

"We have been using up our accumulated surplus," he says. "I don't expect that will change."

That surplus is rapidly disappearing.

"There's not much left," Ng says, refusing to say exactly how much is "not much."

The excitement over the millions of dollars coming from the recent federal-territorial health-care accord won't come into play.

"This is not money for the current year. The details won't be finalized until April 1," Ng explains.

Like Santa with a bag of new toys, the finance minister is reluctant to talk about details, but new legislation to watch for includes:

-A Nunavut-wide tobacco control act.

-Amendments to the liquor control act.

-Introduction of a new wildlife act.

-Formal creation of the Qulliq Energy Corporation in a Nunavut power utilities act.