Mr. Speaker, I bring this motion forward at the request of the community of Fort McPherson, who has tabled in this Legislature a petition of almost 140 names and information that has been provided by way of the motion I have just presented from the Hamlet of Fort McPherson supporting this initiative.

To have 123 elders over the age of 60 shows that there is a very high percentage of elders in Fort McPherson. At the present time a lot of our elders have to leave their home communities to go into Aklavik, Inuvik, Yellowknife, and even Dawson City and Whitehorse. I think it’s about time that we as a government try to accommodate communities with high pockets of elders and provide this type of care for those elders so they can remain in their home communities and close to family members and friends.

Elders play an important role in the development of our communities by providing knowledge, guidance, and the support that a lot of elders give to the community leaders, schools, cultural groups, and youth groups. Fort McPherson has a very vibrant elders organization, the Elders Council of Fort McPherson, which is associated with the Youth Council of Fort McPherson. I think it’s critical that we start to find ways to work with the youth supported by the elders to direct our young people to making the right decisions and choices going forward. I think this is something this government has to seriously consider by looking at the whole area of health care. Not only health care, but housing in general. How do we house and sustain our healthy communities whether it’s a single family unit or how people age in our communities? I think often we simply look at elders as a segment of our population who eventually will find their way into our care facilities. But it seems like a lot of these facilities are designed and constructed in large urban centres like Fort Smith, Hay River, Yellowknife, and Inuvik. We have to facilitate those communities that show and demonstrate high pockets of elderly people in their communities and accommodate that segment of our population.

I would request support from my colleagues in the House. I think this is not unique to Fort McPherson and that elsewhere in the Northwest Territories we have to find programs and services to assist elders in our communities and provide them the care they need and show them the respect that they deserve.

With that, I look forward to the debate of other colleagues in the House and I would like to ask the Members to support this motion going forward.