Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in response to the position shortage in Yellowknife, there have been negotiations ongoing with the clinic owners and the physicians to alternate payment schedules for positions which would give them, hopefully, a more attractive working environment. Also, it would provide the department and boards with a recruitment tool. It would be a comprehensive package which would be clearly spelled out. We feel it would be competitive enough to recruit physicians to the North, thus alleviating the pressure on the existing physicians who are now operating at less than a full complement here in Yellowknife.

Hopefully, that would then stabilize the number of physicians who are here. Under the current circumstances and sort of a side effect of all this, is not only are they working long and hard hours, but it is easy under these circumstances to become discouraged. We run the risk of further eroding the doctors that we do have committed here in Yellowknife at this time. That is one of the measures that we are taking.

The other was an agreement with the Alberta Medical Association to provide support by way of physicians who come in and do locums and that would again help, hopefully, to shore-up the shortages and take some of the pressure off local physicians so that we would not lose more of them. Those are a couple of initiatives that we have undertaken to try and address the situation of position shortages. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.