BAKER LAKE - Tom Faess may not be the only one with some explaining to do when he appeals the Nunavut government's decision to revoke his TT Enterprises outfitter licence.

Among the issues Economic Development and Transportation (ED&T) cited as reasons to revoke Faess' licence was a wilderness camp he ran in Arviat in 2009.

ED&T claims to have independently confirmed Faess left numerous debts in Arviat.

That confirmation shouldn't have been difficult for ED&T, considering it approved a $10,000 grant to Faess to pay most of that debt shortly after the Arviat camp.

Another reason ED&T gave for the suspension was the area of operation listed on Faess' licence didn't cover the Arviat area and, therefore, he was in contravention of the outfitter regulations. Faess, however, claims ED&T was aware of his presence in Arviat and granted him permission to do so under certain conditions. A claim the $10,000 grant seems to confirm.

"We communicated with ED&T's Robert Connelly while we were stuck in Arviat in July of 2009, and he told us we could operate there "one time" if we used local operators," said Faess.

"Thus, we did virtually everything through Ryan St. John of Henik Lake Outfitters and Peter Mikeeneak of Ukamaktit Touring and Guiding.

"The government was also fully aware the contribution was for paying bills accumulated in Arviat in late July and early August.

"We accumulated that debt by meeting ED&T's stipulations for being there, and everyone in Arviat we owed money to knew about the government grant and were waiting for it to get paid."

Assistant Deputy Minister Gordon MacKay said ED&T is justified in the way it handled the situation.

MacKay said ED&T received a formal complaint against TT Enterprises in August that was both serious and credible.

He said ED&T was also informally aware of other problems with different clients earlier in the summer.

"It seemed there was more to it than what we were aware of, so we acted quickly to suspend the licence and then initiated an investigation which resulted in his licence being revoked," said MacKay.

"As we conducted our investigation, it became quite apparent this incident was one part of a fairly substantial series in the way he was running his tourism operations in Nunavut and, previously, the Northwest Territories.

"Our investigation was quite thorough and absolutely convinced us the complaints were accurate."

MacKay said ED&T realizes some people had good experiences on Faess tours, but the number of cases where people had trips they paid for changed at the last minute, postponed or cancelled, showed systematic poor service.

He said he wasn't aware of the details surrounding the $10,000 grant approved for Faess, but would look into the matter.

"I can only assume that would have been done through one of our business support programs.

"Tourism is certainly a sector where we work with our clients to provide them with support to be able to run viable quality businesses."

MacKay could not respond to why the area restrictions on Faess' licence weren't noted during the application process.

He said it's part of a series of Faess misadventures.

"In our investigation, we were able to find actual media reports from the NWT, some of them using an alias of Barrenland Bob, and some of them more directly relating to his operations.

"Those cases were very similar to what happened to the clients in Nunavut."

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