Money slowly trickling back from the failed $36.3-million asset-backed commercial paper (ABCP) investment is not coming fast enough for Liberal Leader Arthur Mitchell, who used $38,000 worth of deferred interest payments to keep the issue alive in the legislature last week.

On Thursday, Mitchell again attacked Premier Dennis Fentie for the botched investment. He reiterated Auditor General Sheila Fraser's findings a year ago: that it violated the government's Financial Administration Act.

"Will the premier confirm that we received less interest than we were supposed to last week?" Mitchell asked.

On April 22, the government received $1,200 (less than five per cent of anticipated quarterly interest) on the new notes, the product of a lengthy restructuring plan hammered out at the beginning of the year.

Like the withheld payment for the new notes, Fentie deferred acknowledgment of this point. He preferred to highlight the comparably enormous interest it will receive on the old ABCP notes.

To date, the government has been paid $1.15 million in interest on the old ABCP investment and expects another payment worth $423,000 this month.

It is a far cry from the $150,000 the government expected to make on the multimillion-dollar investment that was frozen in August 2007 following the U.S. sub prime mortgage market collapse. Then, the government had gambled $36.3 million on a four-week turnaround pay out.

Twenty months later, the money remains in limbo. Large interest payments on the old notes will be replaced by significantly lower quarterly payments until the entire sum is repaid Jan. 22, 2017.

This morning, Clarke LaPrairie, the deputy finance minister noted the "dramatic drop in rates from the old notes to the new notes." He blamed that on the three per cent drop in bankers' acceptance rates since the original ABCP investment went bust.

"We were aware the new notes would be a bit cash-constrained at the beginning," LaPrairie explained. "And there's the fact (interest rates are at) historic lows and in some cases the lowest ever."

Bankers' acceptance is a floating interest rate tied to and generally half a per cent below prime interest rates.

Because of this, LaPrairie is unable to say how much the government will stand to make over the next eight years.

On Thursday in the legislature, Mitchell said the government would eventually have to change its tact and admit it lost money.

"The chairman of Baffinland Iron Mines recently told the National Post many companies, including his own, "have already written down the value of their (ABCP) by 50 per cent,'" Mitchell said. "We know the premier will be forced to do much the same this fall."

In February 2008, Fraser said the government broke the law with its ABCP investment because it was not guaranteed by federal or provincial governments, or by a bank.

While Finance officials argued they had a guarantee by the firm offering the notes, Fraser concluded that was insufficient.

"When we reviewed the information memorandum for each of the two trusts, we noted that, while there is no reference to liquidity agreements, each included the following clause that stipulated there is no guarantee of payments from the parties," reported the Office of the Auditor General.

Since the report, Liberal MLAs, including Mitchell, have been angling for public hearings into the failed investment.

In March 2008, Mitchell attempted to resign from chairing the public accounts committee (PAC), charging its Yukon Party government members were stonewalling efforts to conduct them.

The PAC's Yukon Party members recently boycotted the committee, displeased that Mitchell and his Liberal colleagues were again attempting to initiate a hearing into the investments.