Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, you know, I think it's safe to say that, you know, $11.9 million of additional money is good but when you have an over $200 million deficit, you know, it's real long way to go.

I was hoping I could just get a brief summary of what the main drivers of the deficit are. I know a number of years ago there was a report; I think it was overtime was a big one. I believe reliance on locums was another one. Out-of-territory services. But perhaps if someone can educate me as to what the main drivers are and if you have, you know, kind of how much of a percentage those drivers contribute to the additional unbudgeted spending each year. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Member for Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, the new health funding is not in this budget. What the government has proposed is $11.9 million in new funding and that comprises $2 million one-time only increase to the CHT, which is to pay for surgeries and backlogs; $7 million in tailored bilateral agreements in four priority areas; and $2.9 million in incremental funding for the territorial health investment fund. There's been no amount yet identified for personal support workers' wages. But that is also one of the commitments that Canada made. So the detail on the spending and how it's going to be allocated will be developed through action plans that match the indicators that we're able to provide and Canada has requested. So there's still some work to be done before we can say definitively how the tailored bilaterals are going to be sorted out. Thank you.

Thank you. Minister of Health and Social Services.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm not sure where exactly, or if, in this budget that the new federal money that we've got under the territorial health transfer shows up. But can someone just -- I remember the Minister saying, you know, it's not as -- well, the Minister and every single premier across the country is saying there's not as much as we'd hoped. Can the Minister just confirm whether that money is in this current budget and perhaps one more explanation of exactly how much money we got from the federal government. There was some confusion they were trying to, you know, say there was some existing funding we knew we already had wrapped into the announcement. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Member for Yellowknife North.

Thank you. Deputy minister.

Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. We have a sustainability -- health system sustainability office that is working with a health sustainability plan. There are three major work streams to the plan, internal controls and cost containment, operational review and quality improvement, and funding and service levels. So this work has been ongoing for a couple of years. I think the end goal is to ensure that the deficit doesn't grow or grows more slowly so that we can contain those costs. There have been a lot of different initiatives within this area. And for more detail, I'll ask the chair if the deputy minister could provide that detail.

Thank you. Minister of Health and Social Services.

Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. So I think it's safe to say we're going to surpass the $200 million mark on our health system deficit.

You know, I get part of that is, you know, being dealt with through -- or looking for efficiencies and part of that is that we just need some more funding for health in general. Can the Minister speak to the extent the budget we're dealing with for the next fiscal, whether we anticipate that's going to curb the deficit at all? You know, clearly, we're still going to run one but perhaps at least it could plateau instead of increasing every year. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Member for Yellowknife North.

Yes, thank you. For the last fiscal year, the deficit was $33.7 million for a total of $189.7 million. So we don't have a firm figure for this year. But given the pattern of the last few years, I'm anticipating it'll be in the same ballpark.

Thank you. Minister of Health and Social Services.