N.W.T. finance minister reacts to the 2024 federal budget

218,000,000 is what we’re hearing for Arctic hubs. That’s not a lot of money. That’s across the North for five across. That’s right. So that’s not really a lot of money unless you’re actually looking elsewhere to say, OK, if that’s just for a hub, but you’re going to provide surrounding infrastructure spends to actually bring communities up to a place where they can host a hub effectively, that’s going to be meaningful in terms of delivering true security for the Arctic. So, you know, then I look to what, you know, not a lot there in terms of horizontal infrastructure. So what are we going to actually get people? To these hubs, how are we going to move people around the north? This is a vast expanse of territory and it’s challenging to get around. So, you know, elsewhere in the budget, there’s the there’s AI think it’s called infrastructure for growing communities, but we would really like to be growing communities in the Northwest Territories, but that is focused on rail and focused on passenger rail. So, you know, again, just a bit of concerns into how how we’re going to move folks around to these hubs. Wozniak says she’s glad that support hubs are planned for the North. But she says. Foundational infrastructure is needed first for any hub to be effective.