Thank you, Member for Hay River South. Minister responsible for Health and Social Services.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Member for the question. I don't think there is a family in the whole of Canada that has not had some experience with addictions and the chaos that it causes, and I'm no exception.

With respect to the transitional housing initiative, we issued an expression of interest in December of 2021, so just over a year ago, to ask community organizations if they would like to develop a model for transitional housing for people coming from treatment centres. We got four communities that were interested, including Fort Good Hope, Inuvik, and Yellowknife. We also had some interest from Hay River from the committee for persons with disabilities. They have not yet delivered their service delivery model to us, but we expect it shortly. We have received it from the other places, and so the job now is to do the analysis and put the requests for funding into the business plan cycle. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I'm glad to hear that there's some movement there, and I'd like to see it happen a little faster, though.

Mr. Speaker, this government is no doubt the leader when it comes to inefficiency which is apparent by the number of public housing units and other buildings sitting empty or being unutilized. Mr. Speaker, what discussion has this Minister of health had with her colleagues around the use of, or repurposing empty or underutilized infrastructure for detox, aftercare treatment, and transitional sober recovery housing? Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Member raises a good point. We've had a couple of programs close recently that occupied the Territorial Treatment Centre in Yellowknife and the Trailcross Treatment Centre in Fort Smith. So we are aware that there is some surplus infrastructure. I think the process is to first of all identify the programming we want in the surplus infrastructure and then see whether it's appropriate for use. Some of the infrastructure that the Member has mentioned is very old and would not be up to code whereas other buildings would be ready for occupancy in short order. So I think that trying to reuse what we already have makes a lot of sense. It would certainly speed along the delivery of the service compared to trying to build from scratch. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And, you know, it's good to hear that, you know, government is looking at it. And, you know, unfortunately, you know, I don't think the movement is fast enough because people are, you know, dying around us.

Mr. Speaker, this government is using and taking advantage of NGOs as a form of cheap labour to deliver health-related services for the department.

Mr. Speaker, as this government is clearly reliant on NGOs to administer and provide some of its healthcare services around addiction support and recovery, I then ask the Minister if increased compensation and multiyear agreements with NGOs performing health-related services are being considered, and if not, why not? Thank you.

Yes, thank you. I have to say that I personally, and the department as well, recognizes the need for stability and support in the NGO sector and the value of the services they provide to our communities. So we are certainly open to looking first at more compensation and secondly multiyear agreements. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know, talk is cheap so I'm kind of hoping that I actually see some money hit the floor at some point, and sooner than later.

Mr. Speaker, no detox beds and no aftercare facilities. Without those two components, we can only expect more people to die, and those deaths will be on us. Mr. Speaker, with the federal government offering up additional healthcare funding for the NWT, will the Minister of health confirm that there will be a shift in her department's assessment when it comes to address the front and back end of treatment which are detox and aftercare beds or facilities in the Northwest Territories? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we had a good go-around yesterday on detox so I'm not going to go back there.

In terms of new federal funding, I'm very interested to see what the details are and how that money can be spent to the benefit of residents of the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Monfwi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Does the GNWT have a partnership with an Indigenous-based addiction treatment facility for NWT residents? When will the GNWT have an Indigenous-based addiction healing treatment facility accessible to NWT residents? Thank you.

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

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last month, the Department of Health and Social Services asked for Indigenous addictions-based treatment facilities to provide proposals for Indigenous treatment for NWT residents -- or addictions treatment with an Indigenous lens for NWT residents. That competition, or that request for proposal closed on Friday. And it's my understanding that procurement shared services are now evaluating those proposals. The goal that the department set out with was to have the new service provider in place by April 1st. Thank you.

Thank you. Can the Minister explain the referral process for NWT residents to go for treatment; how long does the referral process take?

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this is really a two-part process. The first part is that the individual who wants treatment needs to be assessed by a healthcare practitioner or counsellor as understanding what's involved in treatment, ready for treatment, preferences for treatment, where they would like to go and so on. That is part one. Part two is then sending the referral to the addictions treatment centre, and then they do or don't have beds available, they put the person on the waiting list. There are a number of variables depending on the size and capacity of the treatment centre. But in general, the whole process from beginning to end takes an average of three weeks. So that means it can take less time, but I'm also aware that it's taken more. Thank you.

If an NWT resident wanted to refer themselves into treatment without a case worker assigned to them, will the GNWT cover this cost? Thank you.

Yes, thank you. The issue of self-referral is a little bit problematic because it doesn't give the counsellor or other support workers the ability to continue connecting with that person before treatment, after treatment, and making sure that they are accessing the resources that are available to them. We have contracts at this point with five facilities. So if people use our referral process to one of those five centres, then the costs are covered. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Monfwi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. If an Indigenous NWT resident wants to attend an Indigenous addiction treatment facility, will the GNWT cover that cost? Is this covered by our treaty rights? Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, if an NWT resident is referred to one of the treatment centres that we currently have contracts with, we will pay the full amount of the treatment cost, and we expect to add an Indigenous specific offering to the treatment centre list by the beginning of April. Thank you.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I have a second round of questions for the Minister of Housing NWT, specific this time to the homelessness strategy.

Mr. Speaker, last year the OAG audited public housing in the Yukon. The OAG found that the Yukon Housing Corporation did not have complete, timely, and relevant information to manage programs and benefits. Three of the nine recommendations coming out of Yukon's audit were on data collection and analysis. Has the Minister been briefed on the results of the Yukon audit and on how those lessons could be applied here in the NWT? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member for Kam Lake. Minister responsible for Housing NWT.