There is no question that the Health and Social Services system is under enormous financial pressure. The accumulated deficit is $120.7 million. That is within the health authorities, the NTHSSA, the Hay River HSSA, and the Tlicho Community Services Agency. Sustainability is a very complex problem and, as the Member says, the place to start is not by cutting, but rather to look at what the drivers of spending are and what the value is we get out of that spending. This is really the core of the government renewal initiative, which my colleague the Minister of Finance has talked about, and also within the sustainability plan. What is going to happen is that there will be a dedicated group of three or four staff who will engage in looking at the detail of what we're spending money on and what value we're getting for that money and whether there are ways to reorganize ourselves to spend less money on those particular things.

I'm sure the Member is aware that fiscal sustainability is a problem in healthcare systems all across Canada and has been the subject of federal negotiations for an increase to the Canada Health Transfer, which we in the North don't get. We get our money through the FFT. However, we share this problem that they have. What we are going to do is look at, as I mentioned, internal costs containment, operation review in quality improvement, and the funding and service level so that we can get a grip on what we're spending and why we're spending it. This is not a public plan; this is an operational plan. We have offered to brief the Standing Committee on Social Development on a confidential basis about this plan and to answer questions that they have about that, and that offer still stands.