I also wanted to ask a question regarding medical travel. I believe that the policy currently states that an escort be provided for different reasons to people that are travelling south or travelling to the larger centres for medical treatment or evaluation. There is only provision for one person to travel with the person that is going for the health visit. What has happened on a number of occasions is that the person goes with an escort outside the immediate family for varying reasons and end up in a southern institution to find out that they have a terminal illness and may not have long to live.

Given that our communities are very low-income communities, usually there is no way for any of the family members to go and make their last visits or spend time with the person that is very sick. I am wondering if the Minister would consider looking at one-time assistance for people that are really in a dire situation on compassionate grounds. From my standpoint as a mayor and a resident of a small community, it is very difficult when people are in a situation where their mother, father, daughter or somebody is in hospital in Edmonton and they find out that they are dying and they cannot visit them because they do not have the resources, and the family cannot put together the funding. Sometimes people pass away without having visits. I would like to know if the Minister would consider some kind of assistance, be it one-time or partial?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the way the medical travel policy is currently structured, there is no compassionate travel allowance in there. However, as we just discussed a few minutes ago, we are doing a review for a number of reasons, and the medical travel policy is covered under that particular program area. It would be covered under the review. I am prepared to make sure that is considered as well, and I would anticipate that when we brief the committee and when we get feedback from the MLAs, we will get a very clear sense of what are some of the key priority areas that need revisiting in this particular very important program area. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the communities of Lutselk'e and Fort Resolution are working with the department and the Yellowknife Health and Social Services Board as we speak. There are working groups that have been struck after agreement of the political leadership in both communities to look at the issue of having both those community boards come in under the Yellowknife board as an interim service arrangement until the longer term arrangement with the Akaitcho leadership in terms of the motion and interest expressed in an Akaitcho territory health board or health and education board gets a chance to be examined.

In fact, there are people in the communities right now meeting today, I believe. I understand the meetings are going quite well. There is a lot of good work being done in terms of service levels and agreements in terms of how things will work. The plan is that both Lutselk'e and Fort Resolution, if the community governments agree or direct, will continue to have a health board at the community level, or a committee, however it is structured. They will oversee services at the community level, but the funding will flow through the Yellowknife Health and Social Services Board on an interim basis.

Both communities will each have a seat on the Yellowknife Health and Social Services Board and representation on the JLC will be through the chair of the Health and Social Services Board for Yellowknife.

We will ensure that arrangements are made to start with a clean slate in terms of outstanding issues that are there in both communities in terms of funding issues, deficits and other liabilities that we are trying to put to rest before we make these changes. We are also looking at some enhancements that can be provided by the benefit of being tied in with a larger board that has resources that are not currently available to Lutselk'e and Fort Resolution in terms of respite services and training and relief pools of skilled professionals.

There is a lot of work being done. We are still working for the date of conclusion signed off by the end of March, first of April. The information that I have from the people doing the work is that they are confident that the community and the Yellowknife Health and Social Services Board and the department will reach a satisfactory arrangement in that time. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, those issues are very important and were clearly identified in the terms of reference that were jointly drafted by the working groups in both communities.

If I may give a quick example of one of the issues being dealt with in Fort Resolution, the current board was set up under the Societies Act, which has a number of shortcomings to it. I understand the working group is looking at a different arrangement flowing out of the tri-council. It may give it greater flexibility to do the work that is necessary.

We are going through the same process in Lutselk'e. The understanding is that the working group is going to pull together a package to provide the maximum amount of community involvement possible. That work that is done will be initialled off by the working group, then it will be going to the political leadership at the community level as well as myself and Mr. Nitah to review and hopefully sign off, if there is consensus that it meets the needs and it is agreeable to the parties involved. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, that decision goes back to, I believe, almost 1995. My recollection is that there was a general sense that if we wanted to get away from the concept of welfare and move towards encouraging and supporting people to look for productive choices in terms of either school or work, that it would be better placed in a department that has the appropriate mandate and name -- Education, Culture and Employment. A piece was left behind to deal with special needs and some other very special, specific areas. The move was towards income support in Education, Culture and Employment, where the focus was on what was termed productive choices, to deal with the large segment of users of that program to help and assist them with the services, the money and the career counselling to get an education and possibly go back to work, to support them when they were between jobs and to look to making those kinds of improvements in their lives. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, this is a program within the departmental mandate of Education, Culture and Employment. It does have an impact and a tie with Health and Social Services in dealing with areas like the disabled and such.

I do agree with the Member that as we look at accountability frameworks as a government, programs that entail a shift of this magnitude that have run for six years would probably benefit from being looked at to see if the program, the way it was structured and instituted, if it met all the needs.

For example, in Health and Social Services, I know there are concerns from the disabled that there is a revision required. Are there concerns and revisions in other areas? That is very possible. I am sure when you have your discussions with the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment you can make your case with him.

I know that as the Minister for the Disabled, I am making a case with him in the area of the disabled for sure. We should be taking a look to see if there are other areas, I know the Minister is reasonable and always looking to improve his programs. He would be very accepting to that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, my question to the Minister is regarding the public inquiry that was held in Inuvik June 12th to the 14th, 2001, on the death of Effie Blake. This individual died of tuberculosis. She went to the hospital over a period of weeks with no diagnosis or no way of pinpointing her contracting tuberculosis until she came here to Yellowknife. She passed away a week later.

Mr. Chairman, there was a public inquiry that was held in Inuvik. Out of that inquiry, they recommended some 26 recommendations. Besides that, there was also a report issued by the chief coroner, which made some 13 recommendations. Every one of those recommendations was directed to the Department of Health and Social Services and also the Inuvik Regional Health Board.

I would like to ask the Minister, have they implemented those recommendations? What has happened since this public inquiry took place?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in addition to the public inquiry and the coroner's report, there was also an internal review done by the department. Based on that, there have been significant changes in terms of how we deal with the issue of tuberculosis. I believe there is about $320,000 in the budget this year to enhance the control and to help fill in the gaps in terms of policy and training in terms of dealing with tuberculosis, that all the communities and nurses and medical staff have been brought up to speed in terms of how to deal with this issue, in terms of diagnosis and response. I know, just in my own community, for example, there were a couple of cases identified and there was a very aggressive response. I understand that every time it does happen, Health and Social Services staff respond according to the protocols in a very aggressive way with medication and tracking down people who may have been influenced and infected. We have learned a hard lesson and we are making sure and taking the steps to make sure that we deliver and provide the service in a much more effective way. Thank you.