Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Health and Social Services. It gets back to the six and a

half months that the government allowed Stanton Territorial Hospital to not pay FMBS back in the amount of $2 million every two weeks for a total of over $26 million. I’d like to ask the Minister why this has been allowed to continue for the past six and a half months.

Thank you, Mr.

Ramsay. The

honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As indicated earlier in answering questions on the same topic, it’s a generally accepted practice. For all health authorities and the departments, FMBS pays the payroll. It becomes accounts payable to authorities or departments on the day the payroll goes out. It really is strictly a cash-flow issue. The outstanding payroll does not have any direct relationship to the deficit situation at Stanton.

Up until six and a half months ago Stanton did pay back that $2 million FMBS paid in terms of payroll. I’m sure the other authorities also pay it back.

The Minister didn’t answer the question. I want to know why this has been allowed to happen and why this debt has been allowed to build up to $26 million over the past six and a half months.

I just want to make it clear for the record that when the Member is talking about accumulated deficit, he should not be adding $11.5

million accumulated deficit with the

outstanding payroll amount. The accumulated deficit of $11.5 million takes into consideration all of the outstanding receivables and payroll.

In terms of the question about why we’re letting this happen, nobody’s letting anything happen. The important question is that the government and the authority and everybody interested wants to know is what is causing the deficit situation, whether or not the organization is being underfunded, where there’s a need for rebasing, or whether we should be looking at different ways of delivering programs and doing a cost-in-program review, which is precisely what the authority and myself and the Cabinet are engaged in.

The $11.5 million of accrued deficit has happened at Stanton over the past three years. The $26 million that I’m talking about is the payroll over the past six and a half months that Stanton hasn’t been able to pay back to FMBS.

Again, I would like to ask the Minister: if Stanton is not paying the $2 million back to FMBS every two weeks, what are they spending that $2 million on? They’ve got to be spending it somewhere. Are things so messed up there at that hospital that they can’t pay this money back? Somebody’s got some

explaining to do. I’d like the Minister to explain that to me.

The important situation is that Stanton has been accumulating a more significant deficit over the last three years. It has had a past operating deficit and surplus going back and forth, with the information I have going back to ’99. But it was in the last three years that there was a significant deficit accumulating, and it was incumbent on this government.... And I was sitting on the other side. I was asking the same questions, wanting to know why that is.

We are trying to figure out what it is so that we can take more clear and decisive action, and the public administrator who’s in place now is in the process of doing that. Then, of course, as soon as we can give a final report on that, I will be working with the Members on that. It’s a complex situation that we are looking into very rigorously.

Thank you, Ms.

Lee. Final

supplementary, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Minister for that. The interesting thing in this is that the hospital went out and did a zero-base review just last spring. It came back with some recommendations. I find it really interesting that having gone through that zero–base review, they’ve had FMBS pay their payroll the last six and a half months. To me, there’s something wrong there.

I want to ask the Minister: will the Minister commit today to sitting down with Regular Members — if it’s the Social Programs Committee, so be it — and explaining to us what exactly is happening at Stanton and what exactly are the plans of the government to address this situation?

Mr. Speaker, from day one I’ve made it my operating principle that I consult with the Standing Committee on Social Programs on all that is going on, and especially with respect to Stanton.

Mr. Speaker, I have to make it clear that the zero-base review was not initiated by Stanton territorial authority. It was a joint effort on the part of Stanton territorial authority, the department and FMBS to get together and review all 53 programs to get to the bottom of what is the driver that is causing this deficit, understanding all of the environmental factors and the rising health costs and the demand-driven services that a hospital like Stanton territorial authority is offering. We have some very good data on that zero-base review.

The government has chosen not to address the financial issues until we get the answers. We’re very close to getting them. I have committed to the Standing Committee on Social Programs to go back to the findings of the zero–base review. I’d be

happy to give a full briefing on that and work with the committee and the Members as to the steps going forward.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question today for the Premier of this House, and it has to do with my Member’s statement. I raised the issue of the fact that I have at least one Minister who’s not responding. I should also, at the same time, point out that I haven’t seemed to have any other problems with any other Minister about getting back to either e-mails or written letters.

The fact is that this is an issue, and I’d like to know what the Premier has as an expectation of a Minister getting back to a Member. My question for the Premier is: does he have any rules on this? Or does he have any sort of expectations regarding how long a Minister can allow e-mails or written letters to be outstanding?

Thank you, Mr.

Hawkins. The

Hon. Premier, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr.

Speaker.

There’s no set guideline rule on timing to get back. We try and get back as soon as we’ve got all the information. It depends on the complexity of the file or the question, the details being required. If we have to work with health or educational authorities on those, that can take additional time. So it depends on what’s actually coming forward.

If there’s concern about a Minister’s conduct or dealings with Members, I would be glad to deal with the subject matter with the particular Member and Minister. If it means a joint meeting in my office, we can arrange something like that.

Mr. Speaker, I’d like to hear if the Premier thinks it’s reasonable that I had to wait nine weeks to find out what the NHIB number was. It only took me one day to go down to the principal secretary’s office to say that if I don’t get this answer, I’ll call a press conference to ask about what’s going on, on that side of the House. Does the Premier find that a reasonable time period to wait — nine weeks?

Again, it depends on who you work with. If you have to go to the federal government to get that particular information.… The case may have been that the Member has gone down the hall, and that information may have been just provided to the Minister. The Minister could have provided that to the Member. I’m not sure of the particulars, when that information was actually

available. But as I said, if there are issues with the performance of a Minister with Members, I would gladly sit down with them and discuss the issue.

We can go through this all day, but the bottom line — what I want to hear from the Premier — is: will he highlight this as a significant issue, that Ministers do their utmost to get back to Members in a timely way? I mean, we look terrible in front of a family that we want to get a simple answer for. We make this government look horrible when they want to find out what drug coverage there is for them for their family when they’re in trouble. Will the Premier make that clear to his Cabinet, that if there is a problem, they communicate that with Members immediately?

Mr. Speaker, the fact is that with our relationship with Members in this format, we work cooperatively with them. Again, it depends on the complexity, if we have to make requests to other levels of government or boards and agencies. This particular case may be a little different. I would be glad to look into it. Again, the fact is that we try to work with Members on the information we get and to provide that as soon as we can. So with this particular case, I’d be happy to sit down with the Member and try to get more details and look into this.

Final supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Mr. Speaker, that $100 million NHIB number was actually floating around out there. It’s in this building. There are discussions about it. So I don’t know about the lengthy research required to get it.

The fact is that it keeps coming back to this point. All I’m asking for is that the Premier will, first, maybe not come up with a hard, steadfast rule but communicate to his Cabinet that they are to respond as quickly as possible. If there are any problems there, they are to contact the Member’s office to make it clear that there are some hiccups, but they’re working on the problem. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I’m prepared to talk to my Cabinet Ministers regarding timely responses. Again, if there are issues with any one of us on timely responses, I’d gladly sit down with them and go over the details and try to get to the bottom of it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Roland. The

honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

The Hon. Premier, Mr. Roland.