Mr. Speaker, I’ll take that question as notice.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today I was raising the issue of finding ways to attract businesses to the North, to create investment opportunities for all. My questions will be directed to the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. Today I’d like to ask him, as my first question, what programs and services

does his department offer that target specifically to attracting businesses to relocate in the North, to be established in the North. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Bob McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This Member seems to want us to take on the provinces and he seems to think that the provinces are doing a great job. I agree that the provinces are doing a great job, but they have significantly more resources to work with.

The Province of Alberta, for example, has trade missions around the world. They have their own aircraft fleets that they can fly around to attract businesses. They have tax credit programs and tax initiatives. They have funding so that they can subsidize businesses to locate into their provinces.

The Member also mentioned Saskatchewan, where the Government of Saskatchewan is subsidizing student loans. I think what he’s suggesting is an approach that would wreck all of the programs that we’ve worked so hard to develop. I think he’s suggesting that we should get rid of the Business Incentive Program and I think that he’s suggesting that we should be funding Southerners to come and move up here.

Well, I’m really sorry that the Minister of ITI only heard that, because that’s not what I said. I suggested perhaps taxation is the right approach. I’m not necessarily sure. This government has foregone many taxes on the diamond mines as they were established and started producing. It’s not unusual for this government to find creative ways. What I’m really asking the Minister is if he can show me and explain to this House what programs we offer to attract business and investment in the Northwest Territories. If we don’t have a specific program targeted at that focus, would he consider establishing a program in a process that works for the Northwest Territories but doesn’t necessarily try to compete or look like Alberta in the sense of size?

Our focus has been mainly to invest in and help develop northern businesses and northern entrepreneurs. We also have funding to promote the Northwest Territories as a great place to invest in. We have limited resources, so as much as we can, we use the media to multiply the effects of the money that we spend in that regard. We do work with businesses that are interested in moving up here and I think that our predominant approach is to develop our northern workforce and our northern businesses.

The Minister knows I respect him very much, but I think he’s missing the point that I’m after. I don’t mean this in a mean way, but the reality of our funding agreements and our budget

are tied around federal grants. Those federal grants are tied specifically to population and growth. So 75 percent of our budget plus or minus is based on federal grants. At $22,000 per person, that’s a lot of money. A hundred people in the Northwest Territories could mean over $2 million of just federal money, not talking about tax, not talking about what they bring. I’m only asking the Minister if he would consider the approach of starting a program that could look at attracting new businesses to the Northwest Territories and that will bring new people as well.

If the Member is wanting to know what we were doing to attract people to move to the Northwest Territories, he should have asked that. The Minister of Finance did announce in the previous budget that we are undertaking a program to attract more people to come and work and live in the Northwest Territories. So we are working and signed an MOU with diamond mines, we have set targets to increase the number of workers that live in the South and getting them to move north. We have also signed on to immigrant nominee programs so we can get people who are moving to Canada to come and work in the Northwest Territories, recognizing what the Member has said, that for every person that moves to the Northwest Territories, that results in significant increases to our territorial formula financing.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister straying from the real point of the whole discussion here, which is the fact that we need a program to help attract business to invest in the Northwest Territories. That is where our population is sort of sprung off or where the opportunity lies. Would the Minister consider establishing some sort of task force program that reaches out into industry to bring industry here in the Northwest Territories as I talked about in my Member’s statement? Whether it’s call centres or attracting new business and whatnot, there are so many opportunities I don’t have the time here today to say them all. It’s about a program that reaches out and attracts business to the Northwest Territories. I think that really needs to be looked at. Would he commit to looking into that process?

The Member will be pleased to know that I do have a ministerial advisory panel made up of the leading figures of business and the leading associations in the Northwest Territories. I will pose that question to them.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Nunakput, Mr. Jacobson.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today my Member’s statement was regarding medical travel from the communities of Ulukhaktok and the surrounding communities that I represent. Will the Minister commit to working with the various departments and agencies and programs to implement changes to provide to the communities an improvement in the administration of medical travel to prevent future patients from having to wait in their communities or transient centres while in pain?

Thank you, Mr. Jacobson. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That is the first time that I’ve heard the specific facts that the Member has stated. I will be happy to work with the Member and see how we can improve that.

This is the second time I’ve brought it up. We can look at Hansard from last year. When a patient is in pain in our communities, they must be flown out on the next flight no questions asked and to the nearest hospital. There is no reason that is good enough to have patients suffer needlessly, especially when it is due to overbooked planes. How does the Minister expect people to wait in their home communities in severe pain before a medevac is warranted?

The Member is right; I am aware of the situation where the patients waiting were bumped off, but I was not aware that there are only two seats assigned. I was not aware that there were seat assignment situations. By and large we do move a lot of our residents around to receive the care that they need and obviously we can always do better, so I will undertake to review how we deliver that and where we can improve it, we will do that.

In the community of Ulukhaktok they have two airlines that fly in there: Aklak Air going into Inuvik and First Air that flies here into Yellowknife. Would the Minister let the patient have a choice regarding where they go for their hospitalization or checkups? A constituent told me a similar situation that at the time they had to wait due to cancellation because of lack of passengers. Will the Minister take the initiative to make coordinated alternative arrangements for scheduled medical travel flights had been cancelled?

Yes, if services can be provided either in Inuvik or Stanton, I will ask the staff to make sure that they consider both options. Also, yes, I agree with the Member that we do need to do more and better to have a more smooth transition of patients, that we need to keep better

track of what’s being cancelled. Just better coordination. That is something that my deputy minister and I are focusing on, because we are reviewing the Medical Travel Program. I hope to report back to the Member on how we can improve that.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The NIHB programs are set up and administered by the federal government. I understand they have a panel of people who review the program. I think some people might not be aware that their program guidelines are quite strict. There are lots of things that they do not cover and that we hear from all the time. If we were to consider any changes to that, it’s a completely different process and we would not have much say in that anyway.

I’m willing to convey and communicate any concerns that the Member might have. Any changes to the Metis health benefits are something that would have to be dealt with between our aboriginal and Metis governments.

I think what’s important for us to focus on is that we have the Extended Health Benefits Program for non-aboriginal residents of the Northwest Territories. I’m not sure if it is a Cadillac, but it is very generous, because we understand that it is an

important program and we do want to make sure that people who need it receive that.

The way it’s set up right now, there’s absolutely no regard for one’s capacity to pay. So we have a very strange situation where somebody making $150,000 with a private insurance coverage gets a top-up or dental plan and eye care plan and 20 percent covered, whereas we could have a situation of a 30-year-old mother with two kids just making enough money to not qualify for income support, no private insurance, and they have to struggle to pay for dental care and eye care for their children. What we are saying is let’s have a dialogue about this, keeping the benefits we have, but can we be more fair about the access that people could have to this program.