Thank you, Mr. Krutko. I understand you have a motion to move. Please proceed.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I move that the committee strongly recommend that the Department of Health and Social Services take immediate action to establish a full-time nurse in the charter community of Tsiigehtchic. Thank you Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The motion is being distributed. Next I will call for those who wish to speak to the motion. Mr. Krutko, would you like to speak to the motion?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The reason I am making this motion is, like I stated, this issue has come up year after year. It has come up at assemblies, it has come up in this House and I basically feel that this government has an obligation to provide secure services for communities. Among the essential services we depend on is health care and I think that we, as government, have to find ways of ensuring that those services are being provided fully, not part time or basically provided at random because of breakup and freeze-up.

I, for one, feel that this issue is almost touching on the grounds of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and under the Health Act of Canada. The Health Act of Canada makes it clear, you have to provide health care services as a health care provider and that means in communities that basically require that service.

So I would just like to ask my colleagues for support on this motion. I know I’ve raised this several times, but this government has to do more to find ways of ensuring that those services are there for small communities, like I stated. From the information that I have, I provided to other Members, we are getting expenditures by way of service expenditures in the smaller communities than what we were prior to division. We were better off then than we are today and with less people and more money, you’d think we would be able to do more and ensure those programs and services are being provided.

I believe that we have to ensure that the people, regardless of where they are, have at least some basic functioning service being provided in those communities. Health care is key to the health and well-being of the residents of those communities. I think this government has to do everything it can and we keep using the argument, well, sorry, you don’t have the numbers, you don’t have the facilities, you don’t have this, you don’t have that. Well, if we don’t start doing it, we’ll never have any of that stuff.

So I think it’s important to provide these communities full health care services and so if there is a will, there’s a way. I know the Minister made a comment that if we are committed to doing what we say to improve the quality of life in communities, let’s do it. Don’t just say it for the sake of saying it. Let’s improve the quality of life in communities by providing services that are adequate to the function of those communities, especially health care being a core program for community health and the residents of Tsiigehtchic. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. To the motion. Minister Lee. No comments?

Question is being called.

---Carried

Committee, we are on page 8-17. Agreed?

Page 8-18, activity summary, program delivery support, grants and contributions, contributions, $15.039 million. Mr. Yakeleya.

Mr. Chair, the telehealth coordinators were funded by the authority agencies. I was just doing some checking and I know my regional health centres, all the communities have telehealth technology. In terms of the coordinators and operations of telehealth, it would greatly be appreciated that at these four health centres and health station, Colville Lake, that if this telehealth would be used for the people. Is this something that the coordinators are going to work on? I am not too sure of their job descriptions in terms of ensuring that...if I’m right. I do apologize. They talked about telespeech in 14 sites. I made an error here. I know for sure that Deline has telehealth. I can talk clearly on Deline. Any of the other communities in the Sahtu, I am not aware of them having telehealth services. I want to ensure that this is not delayed any longer.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister Lee.

I’m going to try to tackle this and if there is any technical backup, my DM can jump in.

Mr. Chairman, first of all, telehealth and telespeech, we’re not talking about two different projects. It really is a communication machine. It’s about delivering health care and related services like speech therapy through a TV screen connected to a service provider, whether it be a speech language therapist or a radiologist or even a physician. It is a distance health care delivery method. I can tell you that, I know for a fact, I saw with my own eyes new machines sitting in Deline, Good Hope, even Colville Lake. Actually, I think they’re looking for… It’s a beautiful, big, huge flat screen with mobile legs but, you know, the important part of this machine is what’s on the screen and how you bring the services together.

We don’t envision that this is the kind of thing where you need to have a separate coordinator in every health...(inaudible)...in order to deliver this program. It’s about incorporating this new tool into our health centres and health clinics, and how much we deliver through that would depend on the support and training and coordination that would have to go into each of the clinics. So that’s the picture of that right now. I’m going to ask the DM to just add one more thing there. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Ms. Meade.

Thank you, Ms. Meade. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I would ask the Minister if she could provide to me a summary on the telehealth in terms of where that’s going in terms of the operations in the Sahtu. I

know there’s telehealth speech in 14 sites and all the five communities in the Sahtu are going to be supported through that. The telehealth coordinators, if these machines are in use and they’re going to be used in other communities it will be much appreciated from this MLA in terms of knowing that we certainly can cut down on having our people get on these aircrafts to fly to other locations to be checked in the hospitals. So I want to know if I can get some information from the department in terms of some sort of a status update and plans going forward on the telehealth issue. If she wants to include the telehealth speech, that would be much appreciated, Mr. Chair.

The other one I wanted to ask is in regard to this page here, the primary community service funding for the seniors 1-800 line. They had the seniors advisory council, the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, NWT Council for Persons with Disabilities, Senior Games and Rick Hansen Man in Motion. The seniors feel that they certainly need our support and I know that they are doing a lot of good work. I want to ask from this Minister as she’s responsible for the seniors also, in terms of recommendations that the Seniors’ Society had on the implementation of those recommendations. From my recollection of these recommendations, I’m not too sure if we had a status report as to where this department is in terms of implementing these recommendations that these seniors put together some time ago.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. I suspect there would be others interested in the regional updates on the telehealth and telespeech too, but… Ms. Lee.

Mr. Chairman, we launched that in a big way, I believe, last fall. So I would be happy to give an update to all the Members as to where we are on that and looking forward as to where we see going for the next year or so.

With respect to the support for seniors, as the Members are aware, the funding for the Senior Games came out of THAF funding and that funding is expiring. The NWT Seniors’ Society has submitted a proposal on how they would like to work with the government on providing support to seniors and creating an opportunity for the seniors to do healthy living. So we’re in the process of reviewing that and we will be making an announcement on that. Thank you.

My last comment would be directed to the Minister regarding the seniors in terms of future discussions. I know the seniors have been very active in a lot of the business of the GNWT. I make reference to the elders in the Sahtu region and the seniors in terms of their relationship to this government. Has this Minister, in terms of meeting with the seniors as her duties as the

Minister responsible for seniors, had some discussions with the seniors?

Seniors can be elevated almost to another level of authority such as a secretariat for the seniors. Right now they’re an advisory council. There is funding all over in different areas for the seniors. MACA has funding. Housing has funding for seniors. Different departments have funding and the Minister tries to draw everything to them and say, okay, this is the responsibly of the seniors. However, has that type of discussion with the NWT seniors been introduced with this Minister in terms of that type level of authority, more establishing a permanent spot in the government with the seniors? That’s it for my questions.

I can advise you that I have, on a number of occasions, been invited by the NWT Seniors’ Society and I have met with them. We share a meal and we, sort of, have a roundtable and they tell me all the things that they want me to work on in terms of seniors’ issues. The NWT Seniors’ Society has membership. The board of directors has membership from all regions of the Territories. They did bring up the issue of a seniors secretariat and they have told us and, in fact, they have written to us to say that they understand that the resources are limited. They understand that to create an infrastructure, a junior department of seniors, would involve money, and, if they had their choice, they would like those dollars to go to seniors programming rather than a secretariat. They have communicated that to me. So that is their position on that issue. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Lee. Next I have Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, just following up on the issues raised under the telehealth, understanding that we have 14 of the units out there, could I get some detail as to how many of the units have service operators and what type of training those individual service operators receive? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. I’ll call on Deputy Minister Meade.