Thank you, Mr. Chair. We would like to continue consideration of Tabled Document 115-17(5), Northwest Territories Capital Estimates 2015-2016, continuing on with Health and Social Services and then, time permitting, Justice and Industry, Tourism and Investment.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Does committee agree?

Thank you, committee. We’ll commence after a short break.

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I’d like to call Committee of the Whole to order. I’ll go to the Minister of Health. Do you have any witnesses to bring into the Chamber?

Yes, Mr. Chair.

Does committee agree?

Sergeant-at-Arms, please escort the guests into the Chamber.

Mr. Minister, can you introduce your guests, please?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. On my left, Debbie DeLancey, deputy minister of Health and Social Services; and on my right, Perry Heath, director of infrastructure. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. On my list I have Mr. Dolynny.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Again, welcome to the Minister and to the department today. At the risk of not repeating much of what has already been said by Members, I would like to narrow my concerns to what I consider the areas of concern with the current Health infrastructure budget before us, and I’d like to shed some light on some of the practices that I believe are preventing efficient solutions from emerging or at least provide a transparent process for them to be achieved.

At first glance, given the amount of this budget and comparing this to the operational side of Health, I can attest that we have a very disproportionate budget before us when you look at that comparison to what I consider our overall fiscal framework. When we spend more for one kilometre of new road than we do for lifesaving programs, nurses or elders, I believe we have a problem of values, which puts into question our desire for a prosperous north.

I’d like to narrow my three areas of comments under three broader categories, the first of which is I’d like to kind of call it aging in place or the Aging in Place Strategy. As the government, this is a means to save money. I’m in full support of this initiative. I think it has merit, and we all know that it will reduce the amount of facilities or beds required. But when you look at this process of wanting people to age in their own homes and provide a support network, there’s nothing in this budget as to how and by what means this will happen. We have seniors today who would benefit from some form what I like to call transitional living or at least transitional living options, yet look at what we have for overall inventory to meet this demand and it’s not there. I can tell you, it’s getting worse with every passing day. We are getting older. This department really does not have any firm framework or plan to deal with what I consider a crisis that’s looming.

Clearly, we could be or should be establishing partnerships with the private sector and providing incentives for strategic investments and development. One only has to look south of the border to see that other governments have been doing so for decades and with much success. Again, I challenge this department and this Minister to find incentives, whatever they are, so that developers will see the benefit in partnering with the GNWT in mitigating our backlog of seniors waiting

for viable options and for this type of transitional living.

Next I’d like to talk a little bit on the subject of Avens. I believe the Minister is dedicated in wanting to find a solution for the current Avens project to proceed on course. However, like many, including myself, what we’ve heard in the last day or so, I’m still perplexed why this department still is putting up what I consider roadblocks. I believe, in its basic form, this organization is merely looking for a memorandum of support so they can secure their funding, and I believe this is not a complex ask. It does not require three or four attempts to come forward with different proposals. I believe that the proposals have been genuine and I believe that the offer has been genuine, but the receipt and the opportunity for government to live up to its obligation has not been. I’m seeing nothing in this budget that will send the right message forward for the project designers of Avens, and I fear that we are continuously providing roadblocks that will delay which I consider probably a very critical and important piece of infrastructure not only for Yellowknife but for all Northerners and their families.

Finally, I would like to touch on Stanton and the current P3 initiatives. I believe the Minister recalls not that many days ago he and I were at the Stanton Hospital AGM, and he even reminded residents that were in attendance that this would come back on the floor of the House, so I’m here now not to disappoint the Minister. I know the Minister is not the lead on this project, but clearly the Minister must agree what he has heard thus far should concern him. If not, I’d like to remind him today in the House, and with all my colleagues present, at this AGM, every stakeholder that was there reminded this Minister there was absolutely no dialogue, no public meeting, there was no public substantiation or rationale for proceeding with the Stanton renovation project under the guise of what we now know as a P3 model. Nothing. So we must ask, why? Why did the government proceed in this way? Why the secrecy from public not to have a voice in what the Minister reminded us yesterday was being one of the largest and most expensive projects ever to hit our ledger in the GNWT?

I would like to remind the Minister we have a P3 policy and not P3 legislation in place, and I can assure the Minister that our current P3 policy has not withstood the rigors of success as being touted by our Finance Minister. For the sake of time, I will not table numerous examples of where our P3 has failed this government in the last 10 years or more.

Again back to the issue. When will this Minister take it upon himself to reach out to residents, to patients, to the frontline workers of our health facilities and to the general public to have a frank and open

discussion on the Stanton P3 process and to those affected?

I know the Minister has been very frank on the other aspect of the privatization question. This was a huge question of concern for many residents. But as we heard yesterday in the House, and I quote from the Minister, “We will not privatize the delivery of health services in the Northwest Territories. We will not do it.” Those are his very words. Because, clearly, I have to represent eight very concerned Range Lake residents who are on pins and needles not knowing if their facility services jobs are going to be there tomorrow, I have to bring this question forward. I am there for them and I’m there for all the workers of the hospital system and their families.

Again, those are my general opening comments on this infrastructure budget for health.

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the Member’s comments. With respect to the comment about a disproportionate budget, I do have to just remind Members, yet again, that Stanton is part of this budget, the Stanton renovation and renewal is part of this budget. It’s a $350 million budget and it’s the largest individual capital project that the Government of the Northwest Territories has ever undertaken. Granted, there is $40 million in this year, but it is part of a larger project, so we will be investing significant money in social infrastructure in the Northwest Territories.

The Member started off by talking about aging in place. Just to be clear, the Aging in Place Strategy is not about saving money but providing a full range of services to the people throughout the Northwest Territories who have told us time and time again they would like to stay in their homes and in their communities for as long as possible. This is about providing supports and programs to individuals to help them stay in their homes where they have clearly told us they would like to stay, and stay in their communities if they are unable to stay in their homes. To that end, we could talk about the partnerships we already have with organizations like the NWT Housing Corporation who has been very proactive and has moved forward on the construction of five independent living homes in communities throughout the Northwest Territories. Those have been mentioned several times, and those are in the communities of Whati, Fort McPherson, and I am actually blanking on the other three, but there are five communities.

When individuals are no longer able to stay in independent living units in their communities or stay in their homes, they move into long-term care beds throughout the Northwest Territories. Yes, there is a challenge. There are shortages of beds. We want to keep moving forward with the construction of beds,

and to that end, we have. Shortly, we will have eight new beds opening up in Behchoko, eight new long-term care beds available to NWT residents. Then we will also be opening 18 new beds in Norman Wells, 18 long-term care beds that don’t currently exist within the system. We are also working with Avens to find a way to move forward and develop additional beds in the Avens complex. We have provided Avens with $25,000 to begin work on the development of a concrete business case. This is obviously the first step to move forward with a plan for the construction of additional beds in Avens. The goal of the joint working group, which is the Avens group as well as the department, is to develop a real concrete plan for how to move forward in the capital planning process if they choose to seek GNWT dollars to construct that building.

We have had a number of proposals come in from Avens, as many as four. They have asked us to look at financing through revenues on bed rates and possible inclusion in the extended care unit at Stanton. We did have a discussion with them as part of the Stanton renewal, building or constructing the extended care complex on their compound and make it available for long-term care for seniors in the Northwest Territories. There was money available for that project. It was something we were prepared to move forward, but to their credit, they stuck true to their mandate, which is seniors, and they were uninterested in moving forward. We are exploring lots of options and trying to be creative. They’ve also made formal requests to the department to lift the cap on bed fees. We’ve agreed to explore that option for extended care, to explore that option with them. They’ve come forward with a number of proposals and the Members that were talking yesterday highlighted a couple of those.

The key point is that the change in nature to these proposals has made it difficult for Health and Social Services to respond, and that’s why we set up this joint steering committee, so that we can work together and fully understand and develop a workable proposal. We will continue to work with Avens because we believe this facility is important. We believe these 29 new beds to the Northwest Territories are a step in the right direction. We will continue to work with them until we find a viable and functional plan that will allow us to make that happen. So, we are committed to long-term care beds in the Northwest Territories.

The Member also talks about the P3 project at Stanton, and I’ll say it again, we aren’t and we won’t be privatizing the delivery of health care services in the Northwest Territories. Moving forward, the GNWT does have a public P3 policy that requires all projects over $50 million to be renewed for delivery as a public/private partnership. As a result, a detailed feasibility analysis and business case

was completed that clearly showed that delivery in Stanton under P3 would be the most cost-effective project delivery method. Delivering Stanton as a PC is anticipated to deliver significant value for money to the Northwest Territories and Canada, to be clear, is a mature P3 market with a robust P3 model that has been proven to safeguard the public interest and project delivery.

The Member talked about the eight positions. The eight positions are maintenance staff within the facility. It was suggested that those positions would become affected as early as June and I just want to be clear that that is not the case. There is still a giant ‘if’ around those positions whether or not maintenance services do become part of the P3 moving forward. That hasn’t been determined in any way, shape or form. Out of courtesy to the union, the GNWT gave them a heads-up that this was a possibility. We indicated that we may indeed conclude negotiations as soon as next summer, at which point we’d be in a better position to begin the discussion about how we will implement. The build is a six-year project. I imagine we won’t be done for six years, which means if, and I stress again, if positions are affected, it could be as far away as six years.

In a hypothetical scenario, if those positions are indeed affected and become part of the delivery model for the new facility, we will work with our staff and cooperate with the Union of Northern Workers to make sure that all of our terms and conditions of employment are applied and those positions and those individuals are working, or we work with those individuals to find them meaningful similar types of employment within the Government of the Northwest Territories. There has also been a suggestion that if, and I stress again, if those positions or those functions become part of the new delivery model that those individuals might be interested in working with the provider, we can’t guarantee that they’d be able to get placed with those, but we would certainly be willing to work with our employees and the provider to find ways to make sure that our employees, our most valuable resource, are protected and accommodated accordingly.

But I’ll also go to Minister Miltenberger to talk a little bit more about P3s. The Department of Finance is the lead on this project. As the Minister of Health and Social Services, my priority is making sure that we have a building that meets our clinical and functional need to provide services to the residents of the Northwest Territories while at the same time ensuring that our health and social services are protected and maintained. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. We’ll go to Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Unless there are specific questions

further to the fairly comprehensive response from Minister Abernethy, a lot of mine would just be a repetition. So, we could have that discussion. We do have the policy and we are setting up the P3 corporation. A P3 approach is recognized and encouraged in most jurisdictions, and in this case they’ve done the work, they’ve set a business case, we submitted that last March to committee and that says that the P3 approach is viable and makes sense. As Minister Abernethy said, we’re proceeding down that path. No final determination has been made and no contracts have been signed, but we’re definitely working down the path to that P3 approach. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Member, in his comments, also questioned or had some questions around communication. We do have a communications plan in place; we do have a website that individuals can go to, to get additional information. As we move down the individual steps, the lead department will be making sure that that information is public and made aware, and we will continue to work with our partners like the UNW if indeed any positions are affected.

Just in closing on this project, we know this is a massive project, the largest individual build that we’ve ever participated or led in the Northwest Territories. It’s the largest capital project. It’s going to bring significant dollars to the Northwest Territories for construction and operation. We anticipate that this facility, recognizing that it’s going to be bigger, that it’s going to have different infection control standards, that we are going to be improving the ability to provide emergency services and basically all clinical services. It’s a facility that’s going to be state-of-the-art. We also anticipate that we could have anywhere from a couple dozen to several dozen additional UNW positions required in order to operate and provide health services in that building, so more positions will likely, will definitely be coming as a result of this construction. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. General comments. Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I won’t really get into the whole seniors and long-term care facilities in too much detail; we heard quite a bit over the last little while. But I think in terms of just looking for beds, a lot of discussions have been around beds. You’ve got to take it into consideration that we’re talking about beds, but we’re also talking about a safety issue for our elders, especially the ones in the small communities that might be enduring or experiencing things like neglect, elder abuse, financial abuse that we don’t see at the forefront. I think in some cases

when we don’t have those facilities in the small communities, we do need to find them somewhere. Not only that, we do have a long-term care facility in Inuvik and it’s been fully utilized. What we don’t have is a dementia facility. So when we put our senior citizens into such a facility where now they’re dealing with people with dementia or other areas of mental illness, it does have an effect on these individuals that do try to live a more independent lifestyle. To have those beds or areas such as Avens, if they opened it up to more beds territorially, then that’s something we can look into supporting.

Just further on, there’s a lot of talk here around senior citizens, but something that I’ve always been pushing for and have a strong interest, obviously, is in the treatment area. I’ve made comments to the Minister about trying to find something pan-territorially that we can either use some kind of existing infrastructure to provide those programs and services not only to the Northwest Territories but to Nunavut and to Yukon as well. Within those treatment centres or even within the hospital that we have, detox beds are also, I think, very important to have in terms of helping people with those medical conditions when they’re coming off some very strong addictions.

We did get a tour of Hay River not too long ago and looked at their planning studies in the hospital there, and it was brought to my attention that they’re going to have two seclusion rooms in the hospital, which was great to hear. I know we were looking at getting one in Inuvik. I’m not too sure where that is, so maybe I could get an update on that seclusion room in Inuvik and whether or not that was something that was put in place.

One thing that hasn’t really been brought to our attention, but just in terms of our medical equipment, we send a lot of people down south for screening, for tests. I don’t know if the Minister did an inventory or looked at what kind of equipment we have here in Yellowknife or in the communities and looking at what we can do to modernize some of our equipment, whether it’s for screening, whether it’s for other medical purposes and trying to get those up to date, and that way maybe we would save on some costs on sending people down south. That’s something that’s more common.

He did mention infection control standards. Obviously, we have a dental office in the school in Inuvik that’s out of commission because of the new standards that were developed. I don’t know if you want to provide a list or look at the list of the standards that have been changing and doing an inventory across the territory to see how that’s affecting other areas of service that we do provide, whether it’s in the communities, regional centres or even here in Yellowknife, and whether that was

addressed in this capital budget in terms of having to fix buildings up.

Lastly, just the sanitation components are something… I know the hospital was shut down for operations a couple of years ago for a lengthy period of time and people were put on long waiting lists. So just when we’re looking at infrastructure, whether we are building it or not, that it be taken into consideration.

One of my colleagues tabled some photos earlier today of a health centre, and I think that as we look at these standards, this government take a hard look at our sanitary practices in our health centres and in our regions and even here in Yellowknife. The Minister talks about giving the best care and treatment to our residents and, obviously, it looks like we are failing in one community already, and I think that’s something that needs to be addressed. Obviously, it would lead to more illnesses and sicknesses and something that we need to take into consideration when we’re thinking about our patients here and residents.

Just a few comments. I really don’t want to get too much into the seniors homes, but it’s a bigger issue than just beds. It is safety; it is neglect; it is abuse; and when we are looking at best care and services for residents of the NWT, we don’t look at it as a building, we don’t look at it as a room or a bed, we look at it as a resident, the person itself. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I agree with the Member; it is about safety; it is about quality; and that’s the type of things we are addressing or attempting to address in our Aging in Place Strategy. It isn’t just about beds but it’s about providing services and programs that meet the needs of our residents through their transition from being an individual who is living in their home, to needing supports, to having to go into independent living, to having to go into a long-term care facility where they need additional support and making sure their journey through that aging process is safe and that the programs they are receiving are quality services and our buildings, when they do have to utilize our building, meet the needs.

I’m going to bounce around a little bit.

I saw the pictures that were tabled today as well. Clearly, we know that the Tulita health centre is one of the health centres that need to be updated. It’s actually on the top of our priority list. We have already done a bunch of planning on that facility and we will be moving forward through the capital process to make sure that we have a state-of-the-art facility in that community. We do have a design standard that we utilize for communities of different

sizes, B, C, B/C, whichever the community is eligible for. So, we are moving forward.

In time, as facilities age, we will do our best to keep them up and running and they will reach a point where they need to be replaced, and Tulita has reached that point where it needs to be replaced.

We have standards of infection control and other aspects that need to be incorporated with all of our builds. All new buildings must meet the current standards. If we were to do a major retrofit or changes on existing buildings, we would have to make sure they come up to those standards as well.

Treatment facilities in the Northwest Territories, we’ve had a number of discussions around that. We continue to move forward with our mobile treatment option, which will allow us to use multiple facilities throughout the Northwest Territories and give us the ability to move treatment programs, 48-day type programs to where the people are, in case people aren’t interested in going to our southern facilities or they are not interested in the on-the-land programs. It will give us the opportunity to work with different Aboriginal governments throughout the Northwest Territories, the Gwich’in, the Inuvialuit, Sahtu, Tlicho, as an example. We’re going to continue to move forward in that way.

Medical detox beds you wouldn’t find in a treatment facility. They aren’t located in treatment facilities. They tend to be located in hospitals or health centres. In the Northwest Territories, we have the ability to provide medical detox in our hospitals, so Fort Smith, Hay River, Inuvik and Yellowknife. We don’t have dedicated beds, per se, but we are capable and we will provide medical detox when it is required. If we were to dedicate a bed, we would only be able to use that bed for that purpose, which means it may sit empty for periods of time, so it’s better to make sure that the service is available so that we can provide medical detox in any of our facilities at any time when it is needed by a resident of the Northwest Territories than, say, dedicating that this bed shall only be used for medical detox. We do do medical detox in those facilities that I have mentioned.

I am going to get the deputy minister to talk a little bit about the Inuvik dental situation and then we’ll come back to me, if the chair doesn’t mind.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Ms. DeLancey.

Thank you, Deputy DeLancey. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Member also talked a little bit about the isolation room in the Beaufort-Delta Health and Social Services Health Centre. The program design is currently underway. We anticipate construction of that isolation room, or renovation of that isolation room to begin no later than March, with conclusion early in the new fiscal year. It will be part this fiscal year, part next fiscal year.

The Member also talked about our need to plan and have a plan for long-term care beds in the Northwest Territories. I can confirm for you today, and I believe we have mentioned it in committee in the past, we are doing a comprehensive plan to determine our long-term needs, our short-term needs and our mid-term needs. We are putting together a plan that will identify where beds will be constructed throughout the Northwest Territories. It is long term in the fact that we know that at some point the need for dementia is going to exceed our capacity, as well, and we will have to look at expansion and/or creation of additional facilities to meet those needs.

We are doing that work. We are doing a needs analysis. We are doing a long-term plan that will identify where we are going to expand and/or create new long-term care beds throughout the Northwest Territories that will meet our long-term need that is consistent with the report on needs that was actually already done. We are currently in the process of developing a long-term plan that will identify where these beds need to be. When that plan is done, we will absolutely share it with committee and then we can all work together on the

creation and continue to move forward on long-term care beds here in the Northwest Territories.

There is one more thing that I would like to talk about, and it is the previous Member who was talking, Mr. Dolynny, asked about or suggested that we pursue other alternatives, not just government but private organizations that might be interested in providing long-term care services in the Northwest Territories. In every jurisdiction in the country, this happens. There are private homes all over the country. I’ve already asked the department to begin the research and develop a report on different options that are available to us that we can utilize to help encourage private business to pursue independent or privately owned long-term care type facilities that will be an option for residents of the Northwest Territories. I’ve heard many people say, “I don’t want to stay in one of the GNWT facilities, I am happy to pay my way,” but there are no options for them today. So we’re interested and we’re hoping that we’ll be able to put something together that can create some incentives for individuals to pursue some privately owned long-term care facilities here in the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. If there are no further general comments, does committee agree to proceed with detail?

Thank you, committee. We are on page 31 of the NWT Capital Estimates 2015-2016 under Health and Social Services. We will defer consideration of that detail. I’d ask to turn your attention to page 32, Health and Social Services, community programs, infrastructure investments, $7.006. Does committee agree? Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I wanted to ask a couple of questions here. First of all, the Child and Family Information System. I agree, totally needed. It was called for in the 16th Assembly. I

know the Minister is aware. Just looking at the layout of this, considerable funds are available in this fiscal year. We’re proposing considerable funds in the year under consideration, that’s ’15-16, and then they extend into the following year, so that’s a three-year implementation of what seems like a fairly straightforward system that I know every jurisdiction in Canada must have. This is started in the 16th ; it’s going to extend into the 18th Assembly

before it’s in place. Could I get some idea of what we’re getting done this year versus what’s planned for the fiscal year under consideration here?

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just to be clear, this isn’t a simple project. There

are different projects, different tools, different resources out there, but every resource is going to have to be tailored to meet the particular programs and services that we have in place. Every program is going to have to be tailored, so we’re going to have to go out there and do some analysis of the different programs to see if any of them meet our needs and which one is going to be the simplest to actually modify to suit our needs. But for actually what’s happening in this fiscal year, I will go to Deputy Minister DeLancey.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. Deputy Minister DeLancey.

Thank you, Ms. DeLancey. Mr. Bromley.

Thanks for that information. I assume the last year is just patching up things that need to be patched up and might deal with things that might come up, but I’d welcome any further information on that. Actually, that’s really it.

Like I said, I would welcome any more comments there. I did want to appreciate that the Hay River facility is happening. I know they lost a facility with the demolition of their previous hospital, and the Minister has been hearing us talk about long-term care beds, and here’s an example outside of Yellowknife where there is action happening, as I mentioned earlier, as well, so I appreciate that.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.

As we roll out the last year, it is going to include some tweaking and

training of the individual staff so that they know how to use the system properly.

With respect to the Woodland, absolutely agree. Unfortunately, we can’t count this as new beds because this is replacing beds that we’re losing, so we don’t get to count this as more beds. It does not change our ultimate count, whereas Norman Wells and Behchoko clearly do.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. Continuing on with detailed questions on page 32, I have Mr. Yakeleya.

This is just a quick comment here on the child and family services and the shelters and what you’re calling group homes. I know we don’t have those emergency shelters in the communities and I just want to ask the Minister, in his future discussions with the department and communities in the Sahtu health board, if there are designated emergency shelters and if there are some empty facilities, some empty homes in some of our communities where some of the families are taken out of the community, and there are some people left, also, could be deemed homeless if they moved to Yellowknife. We’re in that same situation just as sort of larger families in the Sahtu where they sort of get to be invited in and sleep on the couch or wherever and then they wander to another house. So just in the plans, I wanted to know, because it’s becoming an issue and I’ll raise it later on in the Assembly.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. With respect to family violence, there are some identified facilities or houses or places where individuals can go throughout the Northwest Territories and we can probably pull together where some of those, in which communities some of those locations exist. But when it comes to child and family services, our goal is to make sure that the children are with families, so we’re working with the Foster Family Coalition to increase the number of foster families that are available.

We’ve heard clearly that there’s got to be a better way to engage families, to make sure that children stay with families, whether it’s a foster relationship or not. We’re not building facilities to put children in. We want to keep children in a family environment, so we wouldn’t be doing that.

With respect to shelters throughout the Northwest Territories where individuals or homeless people can go, we’ve had a lot of creative NGOs providing services in that particular area and we’ve been trying to find ways to support them where appropriate. I’ve had an opportunity to meet with the chief and ex-SAO from communities like Fort Good Hope who are developing community-based, community-driven plans to meet community needs,

and we’re always looking for ways to partner on projects like that that are community driven to meet those needs of communities that speak to the exact type of thing that the MLA has been referring.

The Minister is correct, and I look forward to some of the shelters that may be designated as a safe home maybe in the communities for families to go to. Sometimes these happen at 11 o’clock at night, sometimes two o’clock in the morning, sometimes four o’clock in the morning. These families, out of the goodness of their heart, allow them into their houses because they’re dealing with some family issue or something that’s going on in the family. Some of those could be considered. I mean, I was in Tulita and they were saying that there are a couple of empty houses and that it would be nice to have these as a safe house for the family. Of course, that ties in with the O and M, so that gets quite complicated sometimes. I certainly support the Minister’s comments on the child and family services and having children be as close to family as possible in the communities. I just dealt with this last week. I haven’t sent the Minister a note, I don’t think, but it’s something that I want to have a discussion with him. That can be done outside the House here.

I do want to say that Fort Good Hope has expressed a strong interest in… There’s an old seniors unit that was boarded up as part of the flood area down in the field, they call it, and I think the deputy minister if quite aware of where that building is. They want to use that as a means of a transient house or a treatment house or something. I know there was a strong push for that. There is some discussion on that and I’m hoping that through the Minister of Housing and yourself, Minister, something can be looked at. I know that Good Hope is very strong on that. They’re looking for that, and they’re certainly going to be looking for some support on the O and M, but that’s something that they thought they could use and utilize, especially in Fort Good Hope. They really need it there. So I would appreciate any type of movement on that, Minister. That’s my comments for this section. Thank you.

The Member and I are actually talking about the same project at Fort Good Hope, and they have approached us, as well as Housing Corp and Justice because there’s an opportunity for everybody to work together to try and find some opportunities for Fort Good Hope, driven and led by Fort Good Hope.

I would like the deputy minister to talk a little bit about what we’re doing around housing for individuals that need temporary housing, safe shelters. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. Deputy Minister DeLancey.

Thank you, Deputy Minister DeLancey. Committee, we’re on page 32, Health and Social Services, community programs, infrastructure investments, $7.006. Does committee agree?

Thank you, committee. I’ll ask you to turn to page 34, Health and Social Services, infrastructure investments, $77.389 million. Does committee agree? Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just had a question on the electronic medical records. I know the Minister has been mentioning how advanced we are in this area. He also did mention there were a couple, I think with regard to Stanton, issues, but I’d like to get it straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak. So if I could get some information on what the issues are that are remaining in the implementation of electronic medical records in Yellowknife and where we are with the whole project territory-wide. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We continue to roll out EMR and we have it in Yellowknife, Hay River and Fort Smith. Right now we’re working on Stanton. As I indicated yesterday, there have been a couple delays on our rollout at Stanton, but we continue to move forward and we intend to continue to move forward with the other communities – Deh Cho, Tlicho, Sahtu, Beaufort-Delta – over the next couple of fiscal years. For specifics on some of the delays we’re experiencing on Stanton, I’m going to go to the deputy minister to provide that detail.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. Ms. DeLancey.

Thank you, Ms. DeLancey. Mr. Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have a couple of questions on the Stanton Territorial Hospital Renewal Project. First of all, I appreciate that the Minister will not privatize medical services. Of course, committee insisted that during the development of the P3 policy that if we ever contemplated hospital renovations as a P3, we would certainly not be open to privatization of medical services. Of course, as I understand it, the P3 project has something to do in its title with maintenance. I think it’s construction, operation and maintenance or something like that, not operations. That’s the medical side I hope. Anyway, what is the schedule for the… We’ve got a $40 million expenditure, I believe the Minister mentioned for this fiscal year under consideration, what’s the program for renovating this hospital? How many years will it take? Can he share with us some general details on departments within the hospital, for example, that will be impacted and how that’s going to be managed?

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’ll say it again, there’s no intention and we will not be privatizing the delivery of medical and health services in the Northwest Territories, just so we’re incredibly clear.

This is a multi-year project. The RFP went out earlier this fiscal year. We have narrowed it down to three proponents. Discussions are happening with those proponents and we hope to have a proponent and move forward with a contract with that proponent. That, I believe, is expected to be June, if everything moves forward according to plan. Then there will be more of a design phase. That will be

the first part of the year. Then it will be basically a four- to five-year process before we are finished everything.

We have learned some lessons on trying to renovate existing facilities while at the same time providing services. We definitely had some challenges when we tried to renovate and provide services in Fort Smith and that has helped inform the process. So this, in process – and the budget that has been allocated – includes the whole plan and design around the provision of services during construction, which means we’ve taken into account our needs operationally as well as how we move forward and where we move things so that we minimize impact on the delivery of services as small or as minimal as possible. But for better detail on that, it would be better to go to Mr. Heath for the specific details.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. Mr. Heath.

Thank you, Mr. Heath. Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess I would be interested in a few more details generally on what the $40 million will be used for this year and do you know what area of the hospital we’d be starting with in terms of helping people get ready as Mr. Heath mentioned.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Mr. Heath.

Thank you, Mr. Heath. Mr. Bromley.

That’s all I have, Mr. Chair. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Committee, we are on page 34, health and social service programs, infrastructure investments, $77,389. I have Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to say to the Minister, certainly the health centre’s flooring replacement in Fort Good Hope is much appreciated and needed. I know I did do some visits. This was actually a couple of years ago, so I’m glad it has been looked at. It has been dealt with and I appreciate it.

At the same time, when I visit the health centre facilities in Tulita, I am hoping that we would look at more urgent need because of the progress that I’ve tabled to the Minister, not to have our hardworking nurses cohabit with mice in the communities within the centres there. That’s very dangerous, very dangerous. I know the Minister is supportive of our northern nurses in our small communities. You do the best for them because they work long hours. I hope that somewhere within the small capital project this priority can be looked at in Tulita as soon as possible with the living conditions.

I understand what the Minister said about the new Tulita health centre that has been on the books. Certainly people have been asking for that and they appreciate what the Minister is saying right now. However, we need to wrap this up because the urgency now is that the health residence with the furniture, with the flooring, with just the old age of the building and hoping that we could take out some mouse traps in that facility. That’s not good for us. The same with the shed that they have storing their medical health supplies there. We have to do better. I wanted to put that in your mind so that these nurses that we get are not going to have to continue to live in those types of conditions day in and day out as we sit here. Tonight they are going to go back to the same facility.

I guess they are looking for their leadership, now that you know it’s out there, what you’re going to do about it. There are some options and I’m glad you’re open to the options. Certainly within the government there are no guarantees, but I wholeheartedly ask you to look at it seriously for the nurses. There are some units that could be looked at in Tulita and having you work with your colleagues to look at this capital infrastructure budget here. Is it somewhere we can do some work so that we can make it liveable in Tulita?

The other stuff is long term. I understand that, but priority right now is the residence and the shed. So I appreciate that, even with the work that you’ve already committed to Fort Good Hope. I wanted to raise that, Mr. Chair, at the Assembly here, and the Minister again is being reminded for the last couple of days when I talked with him. I just wanted to raise that with the department, and senior officials are here and Members are here. The conditions need to be really improved in Tulita. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. With respect to Fort Good Hope, I appreciate the Member’s support. What we’re doing there is removing all the carpet in the health centre and replacement with impervious non-contaminable infection control appropriate flooring. It’s about health and safety of the patients and the staff and meeting our infection control standards. That’s what is going on there.

As I have said several times, we recognize the challenges of the Tulita facility. We know that facility is quite degraded and ready for replacement. It’s at the top of our list. It’s the first one that we feel needs to be done moving forward. It is a B facility, so we have a standard design. In the standard design, depending on the community, those units can include anywhere from two to four living units that are available for staff at market rent rates. That will address the problem long term.

But the Member is right; there are some short-term challenges in the community. The Member has raised them with me on several occasions. I have been talking with the department and we’re working with the Sahtu Health and Social Services in an attempt to identify some short-term solutions on that facility.

Long term certainly will address a number of issues in Tulita for the health care facility, the residence accommodations and the proper storage facilities. I got that. I’m really pleased that the Minister is looking at the short-term solutions, working with the Sahtu Health Authority on the nurses residence. It is shoddy. It should be torn down. It should be off the site, really, and same with the storage shed. There’s no floor. It’s just gravel, and on the gravel we have a very expensive piece of health equipment. We had a palliative care bed lying on the ground. If we are to look at the goals and the values of health care and what we are seeing right here, we are so far off.

I understand what the Minister is saying. Short term I hope is within a month or within a week.

How can we sit here and allow the nurses to be in these residences and there are mice running around? Mold. They are setting mice traps. That’s how we are looking after our nurses. I really want to

encourage, support, push, pound everything for the Minister to get the nurses into a suitable accommodation so they don’t have to worry about the mice running around, or the furniture. The furniture is in pretty rough shape.

I appreciate what the Minister is saying. I know he is going to do his best to see this. So, I’m looking at the definition of short term. How long are we going to allow our nurses to live with the mice? They actually have their own trapline. So, I really need to stress the importance of this to our Minister.

In Tulita, in the Sahtu, that’s the level of quality we look after our health care workers. God bless them for working this long. How long has this been a problem in the Sahtu? Maybe longer. That’s why I’m stressing it. I don’t think anybody else in this community here around this room would allow their nurses in that condition. I don’t think so. That’s not the standard of health care facility we want for our nurses. I got it. I support the Minister and I’m very happy that they are looking at the long-term solution. That…(inaudible)…to a lot of his continuous effort and push to leadership, but it’s something that has to be looked at, at the Tulita health residence and the shed, that they have to work under those conditions. This is my last plea to the Minister. I’m going to keep checking to see how we’re doing with our nurses in the Sahtu. Thank you.

Mr. Chair, understood, agreed. The CEO will be going into Tulita to meet with the staff and attempt to address the problem and give us a better idea of how long it will take to address. I will absolutely keep the Member informed as we move forward. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. We will continue on with detail questions on page 34. I have Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have one question and I want to ask it around the Stanton Hospital renovation project. We had a number of questions and answers yesterday, and at one point, I believe it was Minister Miltenberger who stated that there was a good business case to make this renovation a P3 project. I thought to myself, okay, yes there might be a good business case, but I have been advised and I have done a little searching myself and have found that hospitals are not necessarily the best projects for P3. There are some pretty damming reports out there about other jurisdictions that have done P3 projects with hospitals.

So, I’d like to know from the Minister, if he can tell me, in the consideration for making the Stanton Renewal Project a P3 project, what consideration was given to positive or negative results from other P3 projects across the country. Did you rely simply on the business case and on the numbers, or did

you look at, sort of, the soft information that was out there and the projects or negative reports of projects which are out there to be considered? Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The lead on this project on the construction is the Department of Finance. They were the ones who would have been doing the analysis on the P3, so I would like to go to the Minister of Finance.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We brought in some professionals on this and they did a survey of the landscape. While there are clearly incidents where things maybe didn’t work according to plan, there are also many instances when they did. They looked at all of those issues, they looked at what was being proposed here, the type of projects, and when they came back with their recommendation, it said that from the balance of all these factors that there is a business case to be made for this project to proceed as a P3.

Keeping in mind all the considerations that have been talked about here today, the fact that it is not privatization, we will continue to run the programs and own the programs, and this is a deal on the building of the infrastructure and some of the hard services. We are looking at that. It was last March. From what I have read and understand, the document was shared with committee, and on that basis we are proceeding forward. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Ms. Bisaro.

That’s fine. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Continuing with questions on page 34, I have Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Minister of Finance has indicated that if the bids come in high that we would not go forward, or possibly not go forward with a P3, and if our borrowing limit requests come in, we might have some capacity to do it ourselves and do that. Is the Minister aware of that and supportive of that situation? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. For that we are actually going to go directly to Minister Miltenberger. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As with all projects, Public Works will be managing the infrastructure project itself, per se, but clearly when the value for money, the issue comes as we proceed with the P3 and that is where

we finally go and the prices come in way off the mark, then I will have to look very carefully at the cause of that.

This is not a project that is a cost-plus where money is not an object. It is $350 million. So if that includes looking at other ways of building the project, of course we will look at that. We want to get the best, highest quality project that we can on budget and on time.

Yes, Mr. Chairman, if any project comes in over budget, no matter what method we use, we look very carefully at that project. We would rather scale them back or we would retender or do different things to make sure we try to live within the dollars available. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think it’s understood and I think the Ministers would agree that public infrastructure is generally cheaper because there is not a profit motive. In this case, bringing in a private enterprise, there is a profit motive. Motivation for doing this is that we are short on capital and this is a mechanism to get around that. But it is more expensive than a public project, so I just want to confirm that that’s the reasoning for going for a P3 here. Thank you.

Okay. We are going to go to the Minister lead on this project. Minister Miltenberger.

Mr. Chairman, that is not in fact the case. We are looking at a P3 procurement approach, first because our policy obligates us to for projects over $50 million. We had a lot of discussion around this whole P3 approach around the bridge, which wasn’t actually a P3 project. It is a recognized, valuable method of building infrastructure that’s used out around the world and across Canada. Issues like public interest are paramount. The value for money has to be demonstrable. Appropriate public control and ownership, as the Minister of Health has said, will be preserved. We have to have a clear accountability framework, and whatever we do on this process, as per our policy, will be fair and transparent and, of course, sufficient and economical. This is an opportunity to put that to work and see.

I point out again, as well, we’re doing a similar type of process with the Mackenzie Valley fibre link, a much smaller project in terms of size and cost but of considerable value in its own right. So, we want to see if this is in fact the case.

There was a lot of heated debate last time and initially there were thoughts that the project of the bridge would be a P3 but that quickly proved not to be the case, so this time we’re taking another look at it. There was a P3 project done way back in the

1990s in the 13th Assembly. First try at it, it was not

an overwhelming success. Very expensive. This whole concept has evolved considerably since then and we will be monitoring it closely. We will be working with committee as we do this step by step and make sure that we hit all these critical principles. Thank you.

The bridge was certainly a P3 project and it was a failed P3 project and it cost us a lot to get out of that and we did it then as a project of public government. I wasn’t aware that we are obligated for projects over $50 million to use a P3 policy. I thought it provided the opportunity to allow us to look at P3s. So, that’s quite a finesse by Cabinet, so maybe I would like to just get confirmation of that if I could. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Again we’ll go to the lead Minister. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For projects over $50 million, the policy requires us to look at whether the P3 approach is a viable approach to be considered, and we have done that. The business case has been done and the assessment comes in that yes, it is a viable project and the business case is there under the P3 approach, hence the consideration. Thank you.

Thanks for that confirmation by the Minister. So, what are the long-term consequences of this P3 project? Can you describe what the ramifications are to Stanton public infrastructure, its operation and maintenance, potentially, over the course of time?

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.

Mr. Chair, we’re looking to build a state-of-the-art facility to meet the health needs of the residents of the Northwest Territories that will be maintained and operated for a significant number of years moving forward.

I would certainly hope it would be maintained and operated for a significant number of years. What I’m looking for is who is going to maintain and operate the hospital and for how many years before this public infrastructure returns to the public.

We maintain ownership of the property, the infrastructure and the resources that are in that building. If it is negotiated in a particular way, we may contract out the maintenance of the facility, but that has yet to be determined, and as I’ve said previously, it is still a giant ‘if’.

When will the public learn how long we will be contracting out the operation of our Stanton Territorial Hospital?

It is a 30-year agreement, and as I indicated previously, we will know where we are as far as contracting is concerned in June 2015 is the targeted date at this time. Implementation, if maintenance services are included in this, will occur sometime after that if indeed it happens.

Thanks to the Minister for that response. My last question is: Will there be another opportunity for committee input once the bids or tenders are made to participate in the final decision on this project?

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Again, we’ll go with the lead Minister on this project, Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As we do with all major expenditures like this, we’ll have full engagement with committee on a go-forward basis, especially given the approach being contemplated and the dollar amount on the table.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Committee, we’re on page 34, health services programs, infrastructure investments, $77.389 million. Does committee agree?

Thank you, committee. If I can get you to turn back to page 31 for total infrastructure investments, Health and Social Services, total infrastructure investments, $84.395 million. Does committee agree?

Thank you, committee. Does committee agree we have concluded consideration of the Department of Health and Social Services?

Thank you, committee. I’d like to thank our guests here this afternoon, Mr. Heath, Ms. DeLancey. Thank you for joining us here in the Chamber, and, of course, the Minister. Sergeant-at-Arms, if you could please escort the witnesses out of the House.

Committee, I’ll get your attention on the Department of Justice in your capital estimates, page 47. With that, we’ll turn it over to the Minister responsible to see if he has any witnesses he’d like to bring into the House. Minister Ramsay.

Yes, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Ramsay. Does committee agree?

Thank you, committee. Sergeant-at-Arms, if you could please escort the witnesses into the Chamber.

Minister Ramsay, if you’d be kind enough to introduce your witnesses to the Chamber this afternoon.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. To my right is Sylvia Haener, deputy minister, Department of Justice; and to my left is Ms. Kim Schofield, director of finance, Department of Justice.

Thank you. Ms. Schofield, Ms. Haener, welcome to the Chamber again. Committee, as we indicated earlier, we are foregoing any opening comments. We are going to go directly to general comments. Again, general comments. Does committee agree that if there are no general comments we can proceed to detail?

Thank you, committee. We are going to forego page 47 until we’ve been done consideration of detail. I’d ask committee to turn to page 48, Justice, corrections, infrastructure investments, $17.166 million. Does committee agree?