Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, as the Minister responsible for MACA, I will try to gather all the required information and reply back to this House as soon as we can.

Thank you. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Range Lake, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my question today is for the Minister of Health and Social Services. It is regarding the recruitment and retention challenges of nurses. Mr. Speaker, on February 20 in the committee of the whole debate, the Minister stated that:

"Nurses and social workers are lumped in with all other public servants, which makes it difficult to accommodate their issues, and leads to recruitment and retention challenges"

Mr. Speaker, we have information from the union that states in fact that the fact the nurses are part of the Public Service Act does not have anything to do with the challenges we face with recruitment and retention. In fact, there are....

The Chair feels that the preamble is a bit too long. Question, please.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In light of this information, would the Minister not agree that this is not the reason why there are challenges in recruiting nurses? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in specific relation to some of the suggestions that have been made in order to address some of the recruitment and retention issues around health care professionals, which are in very short supply right now, the fact that they are all part of a collective agreement with many other workers in the public service does present a challenge. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Minister. Supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, would the Minister not agree that may be one factor, but there are a lot of other issues that are making it difficult for the nurses, such as burn out, because of the overtime they have to work and many other situations involved with the working conditions? Would she not agree?

Also, it is not just about money, which is what is addressed by market supplements...

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

That is not what the question is.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the issue of shortages of nurses and health care professionals nationally and internationally is a contributing factor. Working conditions is a contributing factor and the discussion around things such as housing in the remote communities is also a factor. We are not able to address the issue of housing for nurses in the small communities in isolation. We would have to address it for all public service employees. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Minister. Supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate that the Minister has agreed to my first question. I wonder if the Minister would look at all of the other conditions, besides the fact that they are a part of the public service, to see if we can address those issues. Would the Minister consider that, please?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we are continually looking at ways we can enhance our abilities to recruit and retain health care professionals in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Final supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to suggest that the one way for the Minister to find out what the situations are is to do an exit interview of all nurses who are leaving their jobs. Would the Minister consider looking into that?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I agree that the information that could be gathered from exit interviews would be very helpful in determining the kinds of things that have contributed to our high turnover.

The nurses are the employees of health boards and we would have to secure the cooperation and concurrence of boards to conduct these. It would be difficult for the department to track down these individuals, as when they are leaving, they may not always be passing through headquarters. We would have to work with the boards to ensure that exit interviews were conducted. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Minister. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for North Slave, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.