Ms. Meade.

Mr. Menicoche.

I’m pleased to see that at least the facilities will be addressed and looked at. What is the timeline to begin this work for the Fort Simpson Health Centre?

Ms. Lee.

I appreciate that really the detailed discussion we’re having is for this fiscal year, but as I stated to the public of Simpson residents who showed up at our meeting when we visited with the Member, the Fort Simpson facility needs significant work on its foundation and renovation. It will be out for planning study up next, the Simpson facility.

Next I have Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to weigh in, I guess, on the fact that the Stanton Master Development Plan is not included in the capital plan again this year, to my great disappointment. That was an item that appeared in the capital plan for a number of years running. It was taken out for whatever reason that was given at the time. I think it was to study things a little bit

further, analyze this or look at that. Some excuse was given why that was taken out. The bottom line is that decisions are being made on a day-to-day basis, operational decisions at that hospital, which is the flagship of our health care system in the Northwest Territories. In the absence of any grand master plan and how those decisions ultimately would fit into that plan, and obviously it’s not done and isn’t appearing anywhere in the capital plan or on the horizon, I guess I just wanted to make that point again this year. I know the Minister has already answered the question that Mr. Abernethy has asked her about the master plan. She doesn’t have to answer it again, because I heard the answer.

The other thing I wanted to talk about -- and this defies any logic, really, when you think about it -- the renovation to the health centre in Fort Smith and the replacement of the facility in Hay River, two communities that are very close together and service the same area. We’re basically replicating the level of service in each one of those communities. I’d like to ask the Minister maybe if she could, for the record, explain how it is or why it is that these scarce capital dollars are being used to replicate the provision of services in those two communities to the same degree within a short period of time from one another.

Minister of Health, Ms. Lee.

In many ways the Member’s question about Smith and Hay River is related to the work that we are doing in Stanton. Going forward what we need to do not only in programming but especially in the capital plan that’s before us, is that we need to have a system-wide plan and work on facilities, because facilities are built to support the services. What we need to do is make sure that Stanton becomes a true territorial hospital; a true acute care, tertiary, the only acute care facility. Inuvik will be the secondary, second level, high-level care facility. Sort of the hub-and-spoke model is the picture that we want to imagine. In that picture, Hay River, Fort Simpson, Fort Smith and Norman Wells will become regional health centres to support Stanton. All those facilities have a role to play.

We hear daily from Alberta and nationally that the health care system is under pressure. We need to be able to respond to demands that are going to be placed on our system, because as Alberta is under pressure, we’ll be asked to take on patients on short notice.

It’s really important that our regions have facility and system support to support our patients who don’t have to be at Stanton. In order to do that, we need to upgrade and modernize the facilities that we have in Hay River, Simpson, Smith and Norman Wells, along with Inuvik. We are working to make

sure they all flow. It’s not necessarily duplication, it’s necessity to make sure we have these places in our regions so that we don’t send everybody to Stanton and we rely less on southern facilities.

I’m just wondering -- I was listening to the Minister’s response -- what region does she consider Fort Smith to be in. If they’re building up or maintaining the same level of service as the facility in Hay River, they’re in the same region the last time I looked at a map. They’re pretty close together. About an hour and a half to two hours on the highway. Is the intention of the facility in Fort Smith to service any communities in northern Alberta? What are we doing there?

I’m going to invite the deputy minister to add more to what I have to say. The Fort Smith centre is being renovated to meet the needs of the residents that it serves. The way it is designed now -- it was a hospital many, many years ago -- it is designed and being renovated to reflect the ISDM model and integrated services that we need to provide. We’re putting emphasis on the midwifery program there, which is serving the community well. There are residents from outside that are coming in to use that facility. We also want to be able to do other services. I don’t want to get into technical terms. Ms. Meade can add to that.

We will be building to fit the residents who we serve there as we would for Hay River. There’s a little bit of future projection required, because we want these facilities to be there to serve our residents for the next 10 to 20 years.

If the Member is worried about overbuilding, that will not happen. We are working very hard to make sure that all our facilities work at its maximum and that they work efficiently. A lot of renovations had to do with upgrading to meet the standards of the day to make sure we could do the scope work and focusing on aftercare when they come from more acute care facilities. Ms. Meade can add more to that.

Ms. Meade.

Mr. Ramsay.

Maybe if the Minister could, I’m just having trouble understanding which of those two facilities is going to be considered the regional health care centre in the South Slave. Is it going to be Fort Smith or is it going to be Hay River?

Ms. Lee.

As I stated, we are designing a prototype that would go into, well, Smith is a little different because we’re renovating an existing facility. As I mentioned numerous times, we’re looking at a prototype for Level B-C health centre. That’s what’s going to go into Simpson. Well, that will be a renovation too. The functions that are going to be delivered in these programs are similar. So I don’t think it helps to say we don’t look at it as a region. We look at it as a community, we look at it as a health facility that’s going to serve residents in that area. We also look at these health facilities as part of the whole territorial system.

We want to be able to find or make sure that any services that are currently being delivered at Stanton, if they can be delivered elsewhere, we want to be able to do that there. We’ve already done that in Hay River. We’ve done our scope work there. We need to be focused on using all of our facilities better, because over a number of years a lot of stuff got done at Stanton that could be done elsewhere if properties support it.

The other part of the work that we’re doing is to have the long-term care facilities in all these regional centres. We’re enhancing that service in Smith and we are going to be incorporating that in Hay River. We have enhanced that in Simpson and we will have that in Norman Wells. It’s to serve the community and the surrounding area. I don’t think that anybody is saying that either Smith or Hay River Health Centre will become the regional health centre for the entire South Slave area.

Next on the list I have Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a couple of questions with regard to this page. I’m a little confused. I want to follow up on Mr. Abernethy’s question about the expense for the GNWT office and records centre warehouse tenant improvements. When I read the justification for the expense, it sounded to me as though the tenant improvements were going to be in the Semmler

Building, which I gather is where this particular program is now. So are the tenant improvements for this new building, which I kind of don’t think is built yet, or is it for the building that the division is currently in?

Ms. Meade.

Thanks for that clarification. I have a general question regarding facilities and capital expenditures and so on. I presume this is the right place to make it.

Mr. Chairman, if you want me to wait until the summary comes up, I can, but I wanted to ask a question about the 20-year facilities needs study that the Minister mentioned earlier today and that has been mentioned in other conversations prior to today. I’d like to know if that study is complete. If so, when can Members get a copy of it? If it’s not complete, when is it expected to be done?

Ms. Lee.