Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to speak today on the way the mental health and addictions program is being rolled out in communities. Mr. Speaker, this is a program that I have supported and I believe it's a very good thing that the government has allocated new money and more money to put resources in this area. I believe, also, Mr. Speaker, that it is important that we do it in a way that meets the needs of our local communities and at the same time maximizes the local employment opportunities wherever possible.

Mr. Speaker, the information I have is that the GNWT contribution agreement that's been rolled out requires that the people who are hired for these positions have to have a minimum of Bachelor of Arts and Social Sciences with three years of relevant counselling experience or a diploma in Psychiatric Nursing with three years of relevant experience. Mr. Speaker, I totally appreciate and understand that we need to have people qualified for their jobs, whatever they may be, but we should also note that in this case these qualifications that the contribution agreement is asking for would most certainly exclude anybody who's in the community who might be interested in this job. Anybody who has these qualifications, I would submit to you, is already employed or, unless the new money being offered is very high, they're not going to be willing to transfer.

Mr. Speaker, I think it's important that whenever we roll out programs and put more resources we need to build capacity that goes with those resources. What I'm really concerned with is that there are currently no training programs in the department or within our school system that would be able to bring the people that we already have available who can qualify for this training program so they can be trained rather than setting up job requirements that we know to be either beyond, or we just don't have people to fill these jobs in communities. We have full employment or something close to full employment, and I can tell you that a psychiatric nurse with psychiatric training is hard to come by, even at Stanton Territorial Hospital.

So, Mr. Speaker, I would urge this government and the Minister of Health and Social Services to revisit the way in which he is introducing this program and rolling out this program because in the end, if there's no buy-in from the communities with respect to this program and they feel that they can't have their local people working on it, it is not going to result in success. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause