Table the Capital Planing Process - Question Period

CLAUDIA CHENDER « » : I also have a question for the Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development, and it's also about an invisible process.

School capital planning is one of the areas covered in the Auditor General's recent follow-up report on 2015 and 2016 recommendations. The AG found that there was little importance placed on capital planning within the department and recommended that the department establish and follow a consistent and clear process for evaluating capital project requests to support long-term capital planning. This recommendation from 2016, like many others, remains incomplete.

Mr. Speaker, will the minister tell this House when he will be able to table the department's clear and transparent process for evaluating school capital requests?

HON. ZACH CHURCHILL « » : We have been working on this for a while. We do want to get this right. The Auditor General's Report is helping inform how we move forward, also transitioning from the former governance structure, understanding how we're going to receive the operational priorities that come from the regions, and categorize them. We're in the process of finalizing that, so I do hope it's sooner rather than later. That is something we've been working on for a bit of time now.

CLAUDIA CHENDER « » : I thank the minister for that answer and look forward to the process being tabled in the House when it's complete.

In the same report, the AG found that the department had failed to appropriately manage decisions related to P3 schools. The AG recommended that the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development develop and implement a process to assess future P3 decisions that provides sufficient time for all parties to make decisions and incorporates a full assessment of factors including cost, projected enrolment, and actual future lease rates provided by the developer.

This work has been completed, Mr. Speaker, and we know that government is pursuing P3 projects in other departments. Will the minister table this process so that we can use it to inform ourselves about how the government is justifying its future P3 decisions?

ZACH CHURCHILL « » : Mr. Speaker, we did do a cost-benefit analysis of the P3 model. We also sought feedback from communities. Recognizing that the P3 schools that were built in the 1990s are some of the nicest, most well-kept learning spaces in the province, we are purchasing those from the developer. They will belong to the province and communities across this province, including in my own riding. The member for Sydney-Whitney Pier fought to have the P3 school in his riding kept. We'll continue to give great learning experiences to our students.