Mr. Speaker, this whole event was probably uncomfortable for a lot of people. It has been resolved satisfactorily. As I said, I do not know what I would be making a formal apology for. I think the person is happy where she is. Without knowing what the apology would be for, I would have to say that in my mind things are settled well and I wish her success in a new position she has taken on. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services. Let me be clear right up front. I am not speaking only about the intensive care unit. This is a broad question.

Mr. Speaker, we have been hearing from health care workers, from doctors to nurses to physical therapists, that there is a real problem. Part of the problem is workload. I hear from constituents that they cannot get in to see a physiotherapist, for instance, for more than six months.

The Minister on Thursday, in answer to a question I asked, mentioned that Stanton had a surplus in their budget this year. Will he direct Stanton to consider using part of that surplus, or all of that surplus, to try to increase the staffing for some of the specialities where they are running with one instead of what are supposed to be three-person departments? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, once we resolve the outstanding debt issues, if there is extra money, I am sure the authority will consider that. Should the system as a whole be left with extra money, I can assure you that it will be spent. In fact, I know it will be spent, as we have already come back for supplementary appropriations and will be coming back for more. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, when the authority is running short of staff, and it is not just this authority but all authorities seem to be running short of staff, why has the Minister chosen the arbitrary figure of 60/40 as the split of the deficit? Why are we not looking at letting the authorities use the funds that they need to hire adequate staff?

Thank you, Mr. Dent. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it was not totally an arbitrary figure. It was an issue that was outstanding, that was not being moved to resolution, that had been caught up in debate between staff, the department and authorities. It required resolution so that we could move forward. We are doing that and we are proceeding to deal with this issue among many others. We have done it in a way that was agreeable to the authorities as well as to the department. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister tell this House, if it was not an arbitrary figure, how did they establish the 60/40 breakdown?

Thank you, Mr. Dent. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the figure was arrived at after some discussion when I became Minister. In discussions with Joint Leadership Council, we tried to bring some resolution to this. It was on a trip to Inuvik where I met with the Inuvik chair, some of her staff and a board member to come to an agreement on how we are going to move ahead on this. There was some frustration that the protracted debate and discussion had not come to any resolution in terms of how we were going to deal with the deficit and the accumulated debt.

There was agreement that this was a shared responsibility and should not just be the onus of authorities or just the onus of the department. Discussions in that particular forum resulted in that figure.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Final supplementary, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, that still sounds very arbitrary to me. There were no facts on the table. Will the Minister tell me, how can he possibly say that the deficit experienced by the Hay River health board met the exact same ratio as the deficit from Stanton? How can 60/40 just happen to apply all across the Territories and not be an arbitrary figure?

Thank you, Mr. Dent. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we can debate whether the decision was arbitrary or whether in fact we made a good decision to resolve a thorny, outstanding issue so that we can move ahead as a system. I prefer to think of it as an agreement that was reached after discussion in briefings and was subsequently agreed to by the other authorities.

We are dealing with the issue. We have done our rebasing as well. We are hopefully not going to be plagued with the issue of debt and deficits again. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. The time for question period has ended. Item 7, written questions. The honourable Member for the Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to go back to item 6.

The honourable Member is seeking unanimous consent to return to item 6, oral questions. Are there any nays? There are no nays. We will return to oral questions. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for North Slave, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Premier, Mr. Kakfwi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we stand for a good, open, accountable, responsible government that tries to include everyone in every decision we make. However, we are also not afraid to exercise our responsibility to make decisions on a timely basis when it is necessary to do so. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Premier. Supplementary, Mr. Lafferty.