Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to echo the words of our chairman, Mr. Moses. This was a very thought-out piece of legislation and I do want to applaud this and it is hard sometimes for Members to do this publically. I do want to applaud the hard work, I believe, this department has gone through on preparing the public, and I will say the
public in its large sense, on this piece of legislation coming forward.
It made the work of committee a lot easier. A lot of stakeholders from across the North who we talked to had a very good appreciation of what I would consider a very good understanding of what this meant, albeit I would have suggested in the future that we provided more of a visual representation of what this model will look like. I do encourage the department to maybe continue to burn that torch on really providing a visual representation of what this new model will entail, once it starts to unfold and come into line. Again, good work on behalf of the government and the department in preparing the committee for doing the due diligence that we have to do.
Without going into a lot of the detail, I know the committee has issued the report, the report has been tabled and we did go clause by clause and I think a lot of Members did speak to it. I just want to echo some of the key areas which I still believe need mentioning here. I know that the transitional provisions for Hay River employees did consume a lot of our attention, especially when we were in Hay River. A lot of the employees did show up. In fact, I didn’t do the percentage but I believe around 95 percent of the room that came out, which was fairly substantive at the Ptarmigan Inn, were employees of the Hay River local. I think the key words that I got out of it as a Member, in consultation with the public, was they wanted some form of peace of mind.
I think what came out of a lot of comments was that they were looking for that peace of mind within the legislation that would enshrine the government, that they would go bargaining in good faith moving forward but, more importantly, that the pensions and seniority were to be kept whole. I want to echo that again. Again, I can’t pre-empt what negotiations may look like in the years to come, but I am hoping that because it is now enshrined in Hansard, that this will indeed be the guiding weigh point for the department, for the negotiating teams, because I believe this act sets the prompts. The promise is now in law that we will be bargaining in good faith and that we will make sure that the public and the Hay River residents who are involved with the changes of the health authorities will be kept whole.
The other area is the area of critical incidents. I do applaud the Minister with agreeing with the committee’s recommendation that the Assembly, through way of motion, was able to initiate a critical incident investigation through the department and through the Minister. We believe this is a foundational step and a foundational piece of better legislation which allows the political process to intervene in the event that families come forward and are looking for closure. I think we have actually
heeded to that call and I do commend the department for agreeing to that amendment.
The other area that I want to talk about is… Sorry, Mr. Chair, just one second here. My fault, I had a note and I am looking for it here.
For the sake of time, Mr. Chair, I hit the two highlights, so for that I will not consume any more of committee’s time. Those are the two big ones that I had here. Thank you.