Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, to the issue of doctors as is related in Hay River, for a number of years now we have not had delivery for babies available in Hay River. So expectant moms are required to travel south or travel north and spend at least three weeks out of Hay River, sometimes away from their families and other children, in order to await the arrival of their newborn. This is something that different patients deal with in different ways. Some do go south where they have family they can stay with. Some do come north. Some are able to stay at the boarding home in N'dilo and have a place to stay there for three weeks. Others are kind of falling between the cracks, so to speak. I know some companies have made arrangements for staff that are on their payroll, or on maternity leave, to have accommodation here in Yellowknife. It's kind of all over the map. Given the number of births originating from Hay River and, like I said, this kind of hit-and-miss approach to their accommodations while they're here in Yellowknife, I would like to ask the Minister if he would support the Hay River Community Health Board in securing or renting, perhaps, a townhouse or three-bedroom apartment or some place that would be fairly economical where expectant mothers, families, could stay when they're in Yellowknife awaiting the arrival of a baby? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I am interested in working with Hay River, as I have indicated this in the past as well, to provide them the sufficient comfort where they would be prepared firstly to entertain the alternatives that are out there to have birthing in Hay River. That being the use of

midwifery to tie into a birthing team that would be there with midwives, nurses and doctors that would deal with what are characterized or determined to be normal births, which would probably be about half or more of the babies born in Hay River. We're fully prepared to look at getting the resources in there to do that, to make use of all the protocols and all the regulatory issues that were already hashed out in Fort Smith to allow that to happen. If that was done, it would put, I believe, a different complexion on the issue of having to come to Yellowknife and those circumstances would be a lot less. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, I know there were some obstacles to getting the midwifery program off the ground in Hay River and that is, in my opinion, unfortunate. But I don't speak for the health board or the physicians or however that decision was arrived at, and I don't want to second guess their reasons. I'm sure they had their reasons. Right now, under the assistance that is provided to expectant mothers, unless you're staying in the boarding home, I believe the rate that they can receive for their accommodation and meals and so on here in Yellowknife is $50 a day, which, obviously, isn't enough. It would just be a lot more efficient and a lot more economical if there was a place designated that could be used for people that are waiting. I'm thinking that if the health board did come forward with a proposal -- and it's probably something that's already identified in the Hay River health board budget -- would the Minister be supportive of such a proposal? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, we'll, of course, look at any proposal that's brought forward, but I would indicate here that I will engage in the initial discussion of the clear way to deal with this initially is to try to provide the comfort and support necessary to get the alternative services there for birthing so they can have the majority of their babies born in the community. We will look at what is being proposed by Hay River Health and Social Services Authority, but I will continue to make my best case to the board and community that birthing services involving midwifery is a very, very good service that they should access themselves, too. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. I don't have anybody further for general comments. General comments. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Well, thank you. I didn't get all the way through my list, Mr. Chairman, so I appreciate this. I understand what the Minister is saying with respect to getting birthing services available in Hay River, but it has been a number of years now since that has been available. So in the interim and in the short term, I do think we need to find some way to make it easier for the young moms or, for that matter, any mom that needs to spend three weeks or more in Yellowknife waiting for the arrival of a baby.

Mr. Chairman, there's been a case recently in the media quite extensively, it's actually happening in British Columbia, where a child in foster care, a toddler, lost their life. They had been placed in the care of relatives and I understand that the principle behind this was to consider it a priority to place a child with family, even extended family, rather than in a home who didn't know the child or was not culturally similar to the home that the child had been apprehended from. I'm sure that we have, in the Northwest Territories, a family reunification program and probably a priority that would be placed on relatives who would be willing to take a child into care, as opposed to any others that would be in a group of foster homes. It raises the question, though, Mr. Chairman, as to the kind of home study that takes place when people apply to be foster parents. My question is, when a child is placed in the home of a relative, is the same due diligence undertaken in terms of assessing that home as they would assess any other home, or is that process somewhat circumvented because of the fact that the receiving home would be relatives to the child being apprehended? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the process of home assessments has to have the same rigour in all circumstances that once a child is, for due reasons, deemed to be in need of protection or not being able to stay in their family home, that it should be checked out. Every potential placement should be checked out with the same thoroughness. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So that is the stated policy of this government? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, there is no double standard that I'm aware of, that there is one standard for assessments and that social workers and child welfare workers are to follow. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That is good to hear because that is certainly an unfortunate set of circumstances which lead to the death of this child in care in British Columbia.

Mr. Chairman, I'd like to just touch, for a moment, on the volunteer fire and ambulance service in Hay River. I know I raised this with the Minister last week in the House here.

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But I just wanted to say again, I didn't get a chance to say it then, that I think that the fire and ambulance volunteer service in Hay River is of extraordinary value to not only Hay River, but to the surrounding area. If the Government of the Northwest Territories had to pay for those services at realistic cost, we would be looking at a very considerable amount of money. That being said, the Minister is aware that the Hay River volunteer fire department and ambulance service does receive a

$25,000 contribution through the Hay River Community Health Board for their operations. The rest of the costs are absorbed by the Town of Hay River. So this service has been provided for quite a number of years. We need some assistance to assess the service, what's available now, what's going to be anticipated to be needed for the future, and I had asked the Minister about some funding in order to put together a document identifying the relevant details with respect to what is needed going forward. I got a sort of a favourable response, but I didn't really get an answer. I wanted to put it in the context of what that service is worth and what we'd have to pay for it if that was not being done by volunteers. So I think the request of the Hay River fire department for $10,000 in order to do this good work that needs to be done anyway is a very small amount of money and I wanted to put it in the context of what they do. So I don't know if the Minister wants to respond to that again, or if he's had a chance even since last week to give this any more thought. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I don't disagree at all with the Member's assessment of the value of the volunteer firefighting and ambulance services in Hay River. The same can be said in every community that has volunteers, that without volunteers, we would be unable to provide many services. I will honour the commitment I made in the House, which is we will sit down and we will look with the other departments that the Member mentioned in her statement, it was being MACA I believe, and ITI, and we will work with community of Hay River and volunteer firefighting and ambulance services to get that information put together in a way that will allow planning to be done. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One last thing that I have on my list, and I don't know if I will think of anything else or not, but the last thing I have on my list is, I'd like to ask the Minister to update the House and me on where we are in terms of bringing the Hay River health board employees and operations into the fold, so to speak, so that we're not a one-off in Hay River in terms of pay and benefits, union, and so on. When this initial discussion started, the request of the workers in Hay River was that they would be on par and have equity with their counterparts who work for every other health board in the Northwest Territories. I'm not sure how much we've actually closed that gap or what any of the obstacles are now to standardizing that, but I'd like to ask the Minister for an update because we haven't talked about it for a while. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, this is an outstanding issue, as the Member has noted, and we have engaged the services of the HR department as it's newly structured. They've had one of their senior people who came over, in fact, from Health and Social Services, spearheading the work. I understand that we're expecting a document to be available for our review by about the middle of next month. Thank you.