Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I want to follow up today on my questions from yesterday. I want to speak to the unfair Supplementary Health Benefits Policy being implemented by the Minister of Health and Social Services.

The Minister has often mentioned the words “fair and equal” in relation to this policy, and no one disputes the need to put in place benefits for those who are currently left out. That we must do to make things fair. But I fail to understand how eliminating access to benefits for only some of our residents, which this policy will do, can be called fair. I fail to understand how making only some residents pay for their medical costs can be called equality.

Mr. Speaker, policy can be one of two things: good or bad. This Supplementary Health Benefits Policy is all bad. It is divisive and we’re seeing its effects already. NWT residents are breaking into camps and animosity is building.

For a very long time we in the NWT have all been Northerners, and by that I mean residents who happily lived, worked and played together, appreciative of our differences and respectful of each other no matter our ethnic origin. This policy

threatens to totally destroy that. Should we not be a Territory of many peoples living, working and playing together as equals? Certainly that is my vision. But I am hard pressed to believe that it will endure if this policy comes into effect.

I found a phrase yesterday that I want to share with you. It says our country is blessed by a very diverse cultural mosaic. That can easily be applied to our Territory, Mr. Speaker, but does the Cabinet across the House from me believe the NWT’s diverse cultural mosaic is a blessing? Their actions in relation to the Supp Health Benefits Policy force me to answer no.

In my conversations with constituents I’m often asked why is this policy being implemented, and I cannot answer them. I cannot determine the rationale for this divisive policy. My constituents ask me, why now? What is so pressing that this divisive policy must be put in place right now or even put in place at all? Why is this Cabinet adamant that this policy is so right? I cannot answer those questions, either. I can only conclude that our Executive Council has some nefarious purpose in mind and ask what are they trying to achieve. Is this the start of a regime of new taxes and fees called co-payments? I believe, as do many of my constituents, that the Minister and the Cabinet are solving one problem, the problem of the hard-done-by, desperately struggling families, as the Minister would say, who are currently left out.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

---Unanimous consent granted