There are many reasons why there could be high rates of overtime in a community and the impacts of that overtime are certainly something that we need to be conscious and aware of on our staff, and we do have a Collective Agreement that articulates clearly how much time a person put in. There are mandatory rest periods and all these other things to ensure people are getting the down time that they need.

But the Member is right. Once we’re doing this work, depending on where we see the high rates of overtime, it should be able to help us focus in and start asking questions about why, what’s going on, are staff getting the supports they need? It’s going to help us with all of those questions. But I would suggest that, at the same time, there may be communities where there’s no overtime where the same level of concerns for employees would exist regardless of whether there’s overtime or whether there’s not. I know, through my employment with the GNWT, that sometimes overtime is not telling you what you think it’s telling you. So, we would have to analyze them closely.