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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - As MLAs were on the verge of removing the government on Feb. 6, the ink was drying on the finalized agreement for the government's $34 million bailout of Discovery Air.

Questions continue to fly about the deal in the legislative assembly and why the government loaned the money so quickly without completing a market disruption analysis, and from a fund that hadn't previously been used for active investment.

In completing the agreement, the government may have launched a precedent for using the Opportunities Fund to invest in Northern businesses. Industry, Tourism and Investment Minister Bob McLeod said MLAs will soon begin drafting guidelines for future applications for the fund.

He said there was about $128 million in the fund before the $34 million was given to Discovery Air and the government could potentially invest another $60 million from the Opportunities Fund to support Northern industry during tough economic times.

No formal application process is in place to allow struggling businesses to apply for the funds. McLeod said this will be specified in the near future.

"We'll be working with the standing committee to look at how we all agree the fund should work," he said.

The fund has recently seen "a few expressions of interest," he said.

A $60 million request was rumoured to have been rejected by MLAs.

McLeod acknowledged the government will have to make sure it puts its money into sound investments.

"That was always the thing that we wanted to keep in the back of our minds," he said.

McLeod said the government will keep a base amount in the fund to allow it to pay off its dues to the federal government each year.

"You have to take into account the risk, the security, the rate of return and the value added (from investments)," McLeod said.

"We feel a need to keep a base of $30 million because the way the fund works is we receive money through the federal immigrant investment program - $400,000 per individual - so we have to pay it back within five years," the minister said.

The fund was established in 2003. McLeod said the GNWT will have to pay back a portion this year.

He said the Opportunities Fund is not a revamped Aurora Fund, but a different fund that is similar in nature.

The Aurora Funds I and II were GNWT coffers derived from the Immigrant Investor's program and were loaned to Northern businesses, in the mid-1990s.

Peter Vician is the chair of the fund's board of directors, which is responsible for managing, administering, dispersing the fund and reporting its activities. The Financial Management Board Secretariat - and its minister, Michael Miltenberger - has the final say on deciding where the money goes.

Of the $400,000 the government receives from each immigrant investor, the federal government takes a one-time seven per cent brokerage fee, said Vician.

"What we have to do is make up that seven per cent," said Vician. "We have to earn that seven per cent back and then anything else goes into earned income."

Vician said the territorial government cannot extend loans for too long when lending money.

"Anything we do with this fund has a short window. So we have to plan for the repayment within the five-year period," he explained.

"You couldn't make a 20-year loan."

Vician did not say what was being paid back to the federal government every month for the fund, but added the territorial government began paying back the feds last fall.