Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm wondering if in this work health is reevaluating how and who provides services. Examples of this would be maybe someone with a nursing degree is doing a role that doesn't require a nursing degree. Potentially other provinces and states are currently looking at expanding at-home testing kits to include not only HIV but STIs as well. And so is that type of work being done as part of this? Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the question. One of the game changers during this pandemic has been virtual healthcare. I'm sure most people in this room have had a virtual appointment with a healthcare practitioner or a mental health counsellor, and it certainly has opened the possibility of care without having to leave home, which many people appreciate.

We also do, as the Member has said, have people in new roles and that has prompted us to look at things like the scope of practice, whether people are working to the scope of their practice or whether, in fact, we need to change the skill mix to provide care more efficiently. So these are lessons that we are reflecting on now and we expect to respond to. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. One question that has come up quite a bit actually as MLA for Kam Lake are questions regarding the backlog of surgeries, specifically elective surgeries that aren't considered urgent but do add to the quality of life and the ability of different residents to be able to go grocery shopping, leave their homes, return to work. And so I'm wondering how Health and Social Services intends to address the backlog of elective surgeries in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So it's true that early in the pandemic some surgeries were postponed. And during this most recent outbreak, the Omicron outbreak, there was a period of about three weeks where Stanton again postponed elective surgeries, especially if they'd require a hospital stay because they were trying to preserve the hospital beds for people who were admitted because of COVID. But these surgeries have since resumed, and following this most recent outbreak, there's a triage of the elective surgery list going on with prioritization and scheduling happening as soon as possible. So I expect that residents who are waiting for elective surgeries will hear from healthcare professionals as soon as possible about when they can expect their procedure to happen. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and thank you to the Minister for that. I think that there are residents who will be very happy to hear that.

My last question for the Minister is in regards to cost. Cost of COVID has been quite extreme everywhere, not just in the Northwest Territories. And I think when we first began this, we were counting down the days until we could wipe COVID costs clear off the books, but the reality of it is that there still will be a cost to managing and dealing with COVID because people are still expected to do the work that goes with that. And so I'm wondering if the Minister has a dollar figure as to what the expected cost increase to the NWT healthcare system will be to maintain COVID health requirements and services here in the territory? Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the question, but at this time, I don't have a specific dollar figure. What we're trying to work out is what kind of increase in our public health capacity we need to continue doing testing, contact tracing, vaccinations, and managing outbreaks. And so it's so difficult to tell exactly what kind of resources we're going to need for that. And here's why:

Since the Omicron variant, we've had 6,000 cases in the NWT, three times as many as we had prior to the beginning of Omicron. So the amount of staff that has been involved in responding to that outbreak has been enormous, and many of the staff themselves have been affected by this outbreak. So this is an area that we are trying to plan for, and we recognize there are some significant challenges because of the uncertainty of what future outbreaks will be like and what they will require. We just have to consider the difference between the impact of Delta and the impact of Omicron to understand how variable COVID-19 responses are. But having said that, we are certainly prepared, within the coming week or two, to share our preliminary thinking with Regular Members about what kind of resources we need to manage COVID as an endemic disease. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a few more questions of the Minister of Health and Social Services, please.

In my Member's statement today, I did speak about the burnout and the exodus of healthcare workers. And we're not only seeing that in the territory, but you're seeing it nationwide and you're seeing it globally as well. People are tired. And I think people's expectations are also changing as well for what they want out of life. The good news is that the Northwest Territories has great things to offer, including some good work life balance and some great people to hang out with, and we need more people to move here and work in our hospitals. And so I'm wondering if I can ask the Minister of Health and Social Services how Stanton is planning for the loss of potentially additional healthcare staff and what they're doing to attract new healthcare professionals.

Before we left in December, we had a large conversation in this house about the OBS ward. And as we stand here today, the OBS ward has not yet returned to full capacity and so having a conversation about healthcare workers in the territory I think is a very important one. Thank you.

Thank you, Member for Kam Lake. Minister responsible for Health and Social Services.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this is obviously a crucial area. We don't have healthcare if we don't have human health resources. So because of the large vacancy rate in our health workforce and because of our mandate commitment to increase the size of the resident healthcare workforce, we've developed a three-year health and social services system human resources plan, which will be made public in April. Some of the work is already underway that is laid out in that plan, including exploring financial incentives, improved access to training, ongoing outreach to understand the issues impacting retention of nurses and other health professionals, and strengthening approaches to recruitment.

The fact is that staffing at Stanton always fluctuates. And the good news is that as of December 21st, the vacancy rate had gone down by 4.2 percent compared to June of 2021. That doesn't solve all of our problems, but we're going in the right direction. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and I appreciate that, and I look forward to seeing that plan when it's shared with Regular Members. I think it's one that not only Members but a lot of people from one end of the territory to the other are looking forward to seeing.

Currently, Stanton is very reliant on agency nurses, and I know that this is common right across Canada, and I'm wondering if the Minister can speak to whether or not this plan incorporates agency nurses as a key component and long-term plan for continuing to maintaining staffing levels at Stanton or what the future of agency nursing is in the territory. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the question. The fact is that we need to continue to provide health resources in whatever way we can, whether that's hiring locums or agency nurses or, best of all, having people become our resident indeterminate staff.

So, we've worked particularly on hiring local indeterminate staff. I'm pleased to tell the Member that all 11 nursing graduates from Aurora College in 2021 were hired into indeterminate positions. The Indigenous Gateway Program has provided us with ten new hires. The Health and Social Services summer student program has provided us with 81 summer students last summer. So we are doing our best to hire the people who are trained and available locally, and we're also very interested in helping people upgrade their skills, if that's what they are interested in doing. We have funds available for that. But as I say, the bottom line here is that in order to keep our healthcare system going, we hire locums. We've always hired locums. We just recently started hiring agency nurses. And they are probably part of our future. But our preference is, of course, to, first of all, retain the staff we have and, in the event of vacancies, then to hire local staff wherever possible. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I was furiously writing as the Minister was speaking, and I have about 25 more questions but I'll start with one.

Mr. Speaker, do graduates of Aurora College currently have a guarantee with the GNWT that following graduation of a nursing program that they can secure employment with the Government of the Northwest Territories? I know that right now it is hopefully a given but is that a guarantee that is afforded to students who complete the program. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I don't believe it's a guarantee, but I will inquire and return with that information. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Another thing that the Minister alluded to were funds for education. And one of the things that I'm finding with different constituents that I serve is that funds for education aren't clearly accessible depending on what department that you work in. Some people work in departments where it is part of their mandate to provide that training because it helps with the job that they're currently in, whereas other GNWT employees may have found themselves in a position where they want to go into nursing; they want to be part of the solution and they want to serve the people in a healthcare capacity that they've grown up with, that they care about; these are their neighbours and their family members. But their home department doesn't have a healthcare mandate, and so they don't have access to the same education dollars as their colleagues in other departments. And so will Health and Social Services work with the Minister of Finance in order to set up a whole of government approach to helping GNWT employees access education dollars to become a healthcare worker? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you for the question. At this point, there is a dedicated health human resources unit in the Department of Finance so we, in fact, already work closely with them to recruit people and to provide for training and other opportunities for staff. So that would be decided on a case-by-case basis, what kind of support is available and to whom and when and how that relates to the department that the person is coming from. So this fund for skill enhancement is in place, and we want it totally spent. If people are interested in expanding their skills and taking up different roles in the healthcare system, we're more than willing to see that happen. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this question is for the Premier. Mr. Speaker, other jurisdictions are opening up. Their borders are opened up. You can cross them as you please. And I guess you can here as well. But I guess, you know, people are coming across and, you know, some of them are asking me what it take to come across. I said, well, with the way enforcement and monitoring's going, I said, it's either a SIP plan or Tim Horton doughnuts, one or the other.

So, you know, I'd ask the Premier when can we expect the border monitoring personnel to be asked to stand down and the border wide open? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member for Hay River South. Honourable Premier.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We work closely with the CPHO, and the CPHO is determining that now based on science and like I think the Minister of Health and Social Services says, we will provide an update to Members in the short future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Honourable Premier. Oral questions. Member for Hay River South. Colleagues, our time for oral questions has expired. Written questions. Mr. Clerk. Returns to written questions, Mr. Clerk.