Marsi cho, Mr. Speaker. Over the last couple of weeks and last couple of days, we discussed the Health and Social Services practices which prevents staff from attending emergency calls outside their health centres. Specifically, this directive was sent to all community health centre clinic services in the Territories on November 6, 2019. Since that date, if one were in medical distress, it made clear to our residents in the small communities without EMS services, they would have to be brought to the health centre by the RCMP, fire services, or a friend.

Mr. Speaker, this is still unacceptable in my eyes, and it has come to my attention that house calls have started in one of my communities in my riding. In seeing that, I firmly believe that this policy, this directive, can be easily revisited and re-worded as such, that NTHSSA staff can make discretionary calls to assist those in distress outside of our health centres. Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, I think that this definitely is a matter where one department can meet another department again, in this case, MACA, to help close this gap further, and we've discussed this a little bit already. The end goal here is to have our volunteer firefighters, or any volunteers in the communities, immediately trained up in first responder training or first aid training and have their training upgraded or renewed. I am hoping that, by the end of all this, we can properly serve our residents better.

Saying that, Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to see that the Department of Health and Social Services has made strides in other areas, like mental health. They made that recent announcement where they are reinstating mental health first aid. I am really hoping that they can make similar strides to help close this gap for the quality of health services overall.

Mr. Speaker, I want to speak a little bit about the STARS program. That's the Shock Trauma Air Rescue Service that they have in Alberta in certain communities. This is a program that is a partnership -- again, keyword: partnership -- approach using both private and public funds. It allows for air ambulance services for places like Edmonton, Calgary, Red Deer, and Grand Prairie. I think, ideally, we could have a deal where we would see service like this in the territories, but it's very expensive to put together. Just to make a quick note, again, STARS is a society. It's an NGO. They gather funds, and they work really hard with their community to get this service up and running. I would love to have that up here in the North.

Lastly, Mr. Speaker, a constituent shared some images about a job description for a community health nurse in Fort Resolution. In the job description, it was highlighted, a section that reads, "The CHN must have the ability to provide emergency care and treatment in the position and is required to perform transfer medical functions beyond normal hospital training." Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

---Unanimous consent granted