The Member is correct. On January 27, 2020, the Northwest Territories Health and Social Services Authority had transitioned to the GNWT service accountability and management, which is called SAM. This brought six of our different financial systems carried over from the previous regional health authorities to align to a coordinated system. Prior to this change, payments were processed from within the health authority, and now, the GNWT's financial and employment shared systems, FESS, centres with the Department of Finance process payments. The centres provide Northwest Territories Health and Social Services Authorities with a convenient one-stop shop for processing all its financial transactions. This is the same system used by other departments within the GNWT. This change is meant to provide more consistency in the payment processing and better financial information across the Health and Social Services centre.

As with any system implementation, the Northwest Territories Health and Social Services Authority and the Department of Finance are currently going through a period of change as with this move, there are 1,500 employees that have transitioned into this new system. New process, new systems take time to refine, and staff to require time to adjust this new way of working. During this adjustment period, we expect there are going to be delays, but our staff is working hard to ensure that the target time for processing meets within the 30 days.