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.