Mr. Chair and members, thank you for inviting us here today to present our perspective on northern development.
By way of introduction, I am president of the Pan Arctic Inuit Logistics Corporation. It's a corporation that is 100% owned by the Inuit of the four land claim regions through their respective development corporations.
With government encouragement, PAIL was created 15 years ago with an early focus on a joint venture with ATCO Structures and Logistics to operate and manage the North Warning System radar throughout the north. Within the joint venture, PAIL has evolved from being a junior participant to being an equal shareholder, with ATCO, in our corporate agent, Nasittuq. I should mention that this equity position provides the Inuit in the north a source of capital, a source of funds, to invest in their communities and in their local businesses.
Today I would like to speak briefly to two items I see as challenges in northern development.
The first concerns the government's approach to an element of the bid evaluation process. Currently bidders' past performance in achieving their aboriginal benefits target is assessed solely on whether or not there is an outcome, not on whether the outcome was a success or a failure. One must only document the lessons learned. This approach encourages firms to make significant commitments when bidding, without any concern towards meeting those commitments, as failure will not affect future business opportunities with the federal government. Firms that invest time, money, and effort to meet or exceed their commitments are judged on an equal footing with firms that do not. This fact reduces the incentives for firms to invest in developing meaningful Inuit participation of lasting benefit.
There is a need for a graduated approach to evaluating past performance to account for degrees of success. There is also a need for a mechanism to evaluate not just the quantitative achievements of bidders but also their qualitative results.
Secondly, I wish to address the awareness of opportunities and the timing of that awareness. Within the procurement review process, program decisions made early in a project's development can limit the considerations for participation. This in turn minimizes the opportunities for meaningful levels of Inuit involvement. As some crown agencies and federal initiatives are not subject to the procurement review process, obligations under the land claims may not be considered or may be considered too late in the process.
With Inuit participation normally considered at the end of the approval process, participation is too often seen as nothing more than a tax on the projects, and like most taxes, people seek to avoid or reduce it. With meaningful consideration of Inuit participation delayed until the start of the bidding process, it is difficult for the Inuit to mount timely efforts to establish partnerships or joint ventures, meaning that Inuit communities are faced with addressing training and schooling requirements too late in the process, and opportunities for skilled employment are therefore reduced.
I believe long-term successful northern development can be achieved by having Inuit communities fully engaged in a meaningful fashion in the early stages of government plans and projects destined for the north. This involvement would allow for proper planning both to meet educational and training requirements and to provide the lead time to establish appropriate corporate capacity and capability.
I would like to end on one note. In 1998 my predecessor spoke to this committee on the same issues. While there has been progress, these issues are still present in the north.
Thank you.