Terry Halifax
Northern News Services

Inuvik (Sep 01/03) - Critics of changes to the Business Incentive Policy (BIP) say the new regulations came out of the blue and leave small business out in the cold.

Charles Dent, chair of the standing committee on accountability and oversight, said the changes to the BIP were premature and short-sighted.

"They are going ahead with changes, without having the background information as to what the problem is," Dent said.

"They have no way of knowing if this will solve the problem."

Dent said there were no real numbers to work from regarding the BIP to know if the costs outweighed the benefits, so they were supposed to complete a study before any decision was made.

Dent feels the biggest difference in the changes will come to the construction industry.

Bill Aho, president of the NWT Construction Association, said the new policy will benefit large contractors, and squeeze out small operators.

The current policy has no set limit to the application of the BIP, but the new policy limits that to $1 million.

"On a $10 million contract, if the BIP is limited to $1 million, the general contractor will utilize that entire million dollars and everybody else is left out in the cold," Aho said.

Aho said the new policy has also eliminated the word "supplier," which could have great impacts on Northern building supply stores.

"Now every contractor becomes a supplier, because his qualification allows him to do all of those things," he said. "So rather than buying from the local building supply stores, he can buy his supplies in Edmonton."