Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just for the record with respect to the health care system in the Northwest Territories, I agree with everything the Minister just said. I believe we have a fantastic health care system in the Northwest Territories. I also believe we are under significant challenges. Could we be better? Absolutely. Could we be doing

more in the small communities? Please, yes, let’s do that. But we have a pretty good health care system in the Northwest Territories when we compare it to other jurisdictions.

I think what you’re sensing here is some frustration in the fact that we, as Regular Members, are trying to get a sense and an understanding of how this department is going to move forward to control certain things. Yes, the Foundation for Change is underway. I believe the Foundation for Change is going to identify a lot of improvements that can be made to the system to help us retain or maximize the use of our money, but we’re talking here today about medical travel. Medical travel will be addressed under Foundation for Change. What we’re talking about is how we’re accounting for it. The department keeps coming back and asking us to approve a supp, approve a supp, approve a supp. To Ms. Bisaro’s point, we know the baseline budget for medical travel is more than we’re putting in the books. We know that. Do we have to increase the budget for medical travel by $3.6 million? No, because I think putting a cap on it and trying to control it as much as we can, you need to put a cap lower than what the department is telling us they need, so let’s increase the budget for medical travel; maybe not by $3.6 million, but maybe by $2.5 million. They are going to have to come back for a supp, but if we put a cap on it at a reasonable level, we can get the Minister to work on the department to control those costs.

I understand the Minister’s of Finance point about not putting a cap on it and leaving it at the amount we have on it and do the same thing. I think I’m saying the same thing, but I’m just saying it’s pretty clear that the budget we put in there is not even close. Let’s try to get it a little bit closer to where we need to be, and let’s continue to get the Minister to put pressure on the department to control those costs, and let’s get done with the Foundation for Change. Let’s get some results out of that thing.

My colleague is right; there’s a little frustration on this side about the pace. It’s a beast. It’s a beast. Health is a beast and we need to rein it in as much as we can and we need to see some results. Please expedite Foundation for Change, increase the budget in this section a bit; not the full $3.6 million, but a bit. That way we won’t be asking for as large a supp every year. It seems pretty simple to me.