May I suggest that getting a doctor to go to Hay River would also be inexpensive? I mean it would be expensive and cost prohibitive; sorry.

I was in Alaska once and had a medical test done, which was then beamed to a doctor at his house in Texas and who responded right back on what the answer was. I mean, we are only 100 miles away between Hay River and Yellowknife. Surely there’s a way that, okay, the guy doing the surgery, the doctor doing the surgery on the Monday morning wants certain tests done and lab work done. Why can those requisitions for lab work not be sent to Hay River, have the work done there, communicate the results to the surgeon that’s going to do the operation on Monday morning, and save the patient all this wear and tear and expense?

As I indicated, the decision is made by the doctor that’s doing the surgery. If we could go back to discuss the change here, I think we would be prepared to do that as a department, to discuss with the doctor why he makes those decisions on how he has the persons tested up here and then the individual doesn’t actually get the operation until Monday. We can, as a department, go to the doctors and find out why that occurs and get back to the Member.

This is 2012. This is the day and age of modern communications and quick communications. It is hard to believe that we as a medical system cannot come up with a better communication system from one health authority, one medical institution to another that could allow this to be done. This is this organization at its worst. This is a subject that has been brought to me on more than one occasion by many constituents. We have to come to Yellowknife. If you want to have a baby, come to Yellowknife. If you want to have surgery, come to Yellowknife. Well then, let’s find ways as a government to make this more affordable and easier for those who are living outside of the capital. Thank you.

Sorry; there was no question there. I’d like to ask the Minister if he could describe for us what communication channel is currently available between the health authority in Hay River and the Stanton Territorial Hospital that would allow the transmission of lab results or requisitions.

The Department of Health or the health authorities have recently improved the electronic health records. Electronic health records can be used and transmitted from community to community electronically.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister if he would commit to considering the surgery schedule for NWT residents from outside of the capital that would allow them, if necessary, to have their lab work done the same week as they’re having their surgery done, to prevent that travel, and if he would also investigate if somehow we could enhance the transmission of requisitions and results from lab procedures between health authorities.

It would be difficult for me to commit on the work of doctors. However, I will promise the Member that we will have a full discussion to ask the doctors why there is surgery on a different week than when the tests are done, so that the tests are done in the same week. We have no problem whatsoever to having that full discussion with the doctors and get back to the Member with those results.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up on my statement regarding the Municipal and Community Affairs land swap deal with the City of Yellowknife and the developer. As I mentioned, MACA played a highly unusual role here setting up a deal directly with a developer, without city involvement. Typically the land is conveyed to the city and then the city sells the land and uses their income or revenue from that to manage the development. The city’s interest in this deal should have been obvious from the first moment swap negotiations began.

My first question is: Why did MACA not insist that the city be involved from the start of these negotiations? I ask that knowing that they passed legislation to try and stop this deal or frustrate it because they had been not involved. Why did MACA not insist that the city be involved from the start?

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Minister responsible for Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Robert McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe the city was involved with this deal right from the beginning. In April 2010 they had applied to MACA for two parcels of land. One was one that they could turn over to Homes North, that Mr. Bromley references. There was a second parcel of land that they had kept for their own use. So we try working with the city as much as possible. We don’t get into direct competition with the city for the disposal of land because we would then become the seller of choice if we dealt directly with

developers. The city was involved in the disposal of this property right from the start.

I want to say that very strictly speaking the Minister was correct; but, as I mentioned, the Minister did this deal and forced the city to accept it. They even passed legislation to try and frustrate it and had to eventually pass additional legislation to reverse that. The main concern here, other than the irregularity and the kafuffles that this has caused, is we have 0.6 percent vacancy in the city of Yellowknife. If you’re a young person trying to get a start, you need access to housing, and reasonably cost housing as a start. It’s the residents who suffer the consequences of such irregular deals. Given MACA’s role, and to some degree – we can argue about the degree – but to some degree, responsibility in creating this situation now confronting the city and the developer, what is the department prepared to do to assist in resolving the situation and to help the city alleviate the chronic lack of housing in Yellowknife?

We can dispose of the land and the developers can then work on trying to alleviate the lack of housing in the city, but I can commit to the Member that we thought this was a very simple land swap deal and it seems to have gone off the tracks a bit.

I will commit to the Member that I will follow up on this immediately and see if we can get this transfer done, because the developer had made an application to turn this into a subdivision and that’s all up in the air right now. I will commit to the Member that I will follow up on it and we will see what role MACA can play in trying to get this deal that’s been going on for almost two years now, try to get this deal done as quickly as possible because it would probably benefit the city and would benefit the developer, and hopefully at the end of the day it would benefit MACA because we are trying to dispose of this land. We make no profit from it. The financial beneficiaries of any Commissioner’s land within the city should be to the city, so that’s what we try and work out.

I very much appreciate the Minister’s commitment there. That shows a real willingness. I think everybody has learned, and I say the responsibility is shared amongst the various parties here. I think this helps quite a bit. Obviously, we hope this won’t happen again, but a good approach to that would be the transfer of all remaining unencumbered Commissioner’s land within the city boundaries to city control. Is that something that the Minister is considering or a transfer that he would support?

I won’t make that commitment right now but what we do do is work with communities to try to ensure that they have first dibs on all Commissioner’s land within their

municipalities. We’ve had applications come in from communities on Commissioner’s land within their boundaries and we try to work with the communities as much as we can to ensure that they are the beneficiaries of it. I will again commit to the Member that I as Minister will have a look at how this issue played out and ensure that we don’t run into any further problems when we’re disposing of Commissioner’s land within municipalities in the future.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Very briefly, again I appreciate that commitment from the Minister. I appreciate his offer to see what can be done, because it’s taken two years and obviously under current economic conditions, costs have changed quite a bit. The city has been forced, really, to a more rigorous application of their cost recovery policies and so on, so that when we enter deals like this and the complexities that are involved, costs go up for all parties. I would appreciate it if the Minister could look into that situation, as well, that aspect of it, and see what might be done from our perspective.

I will follow up on how this all played out. This deal has taken longer than anticipated. We had hoped that all parties would be able to get together. We thought it was a very straightforward land swap but, unfortunately, it’s taken two years. I will follow up on all the details of the situation and see how we can prevent this from happening again in the future.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Deh Cho, Mr. Nadli.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Recently, of course, we were all elected to represent our constituents. Shortly after that we had an exercise that set the priorities and goals of trying to work together and trying to achieve some of the concerns and issues that our constituents have raised. Working together is a common survival instinct, especially for us here in the Northwest Territories. This government is founded on that very principle that we need to work together, we need to work out our differences. This process that we call consensus is a unique feature of this government. We pride ourselves that the system can work. I’d like to believe that this is a unique system that can, indeed, work in terms of sorting out our differences. My question is to the Premier today. I want to know in terms of what his vision is of building consensus with Aboriginal governments.

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess the approach that we’ve been taking is to reach out to all the Aboriginal governments to find a way to establish better working relationships by finding common ground. We think the best way to do that is to go out and meet with them and to identify what the basis of our relationship should be and how we should work together, and if there are any interests to formalize that arrangement, we’d be prepared to look at that as well.

I thank the Premier for that. Recently we witnessed two processes. One of them was the Aboriginal Summit in terms of bringing all the Aboriginal groups together from the Mackenzie Valley, at the same time ensuring that the governments were involved through the Intergovernmental Forum. That process basically put forth some key elements in terms of what we call devolution, at that time. What is different about this devolution process than that initial process back then?

I think the Aboriginal Summit and Intergovernmental Forum, I think both of those processes at the end were dismissed and disbanded because they weren’t fulfilling the objectives that they were set up for. We’re taking a much more careful approach this time.