Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Mackenzie Delta.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's good to see the community mental health wellness and addictions recovery with an increase in this year's mains. I've always stated that, you know, community-based programs will work for our people who are hurting. This is no different. So my concern is funds going to the regional government versus the community. I can see funds going to the regional organization in terms of providing addictions counselling. And, for example, in the Beaufort Mackenzie Delta region, the Gwich'in wellness camp, there's -- I'm sure it's going to be funded because there's a lot of interest. There's a lot of individuals expressing interest and people who did go for counselling, but they had no aftercare. So it'll be good if some of these communities can access funds to set up a friendship centre because I've noticed when people do come back from addictions recovery programs, they have no place to go. They wander around the communities. And within a week, they're back with their old friends because they have no place to go. In the past, they had friendship centres where you can go and hang out or actually get counselling from qualified people who went through these traumas. So will there be more funding for communities to access funds to start up sort of a friendship centre or a service centre where clients can go and meet with counsellors? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, and I really appreciate the Member for bringing, you know, one of the things that I think -- when I looked at this fund last week before I went out to meet with an Indigenous organization and community, was that the community wellness and addiction recovery fund was opened in two regional governments until January 31st of this year to apply for multi-year funding. Only three organizations had reached out. And so now that those three organizations has reached out, there is a little over $3 million in that fund, and it can be used for mental health and addictions in very flexible, as I mentioned in the House too, as well that, you know, it could be used for on the land. It could be used for any Indigenous government and so in your communities can apply -- like, each one of your communities can apply on this fund. It's a first-come-first-serve basis. So I can provide more details. And I think am, actually got my department, because when I recognized that this wasn't being accessed I encouraged them to put together something that I can send out to all the MLAs so that they can let their Indigenous community governments -- because I think with this fund, it's for Indigenous governments. And then there's also -- not just under this fund, but the suicide prevention fund, there's another additional pot of money that can be accessed and is flexible to use towards suicide prevention in your communities. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Mackenzie Delta.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to the Minister for providing that information. It's good to see that there is projects such as on-the-land-based programs. It'll be good to utilize some of these funds for that. So I will be informing members of my region that there is limited amount of money on a first-come-first-serve basis to help their community residents.

On another note, long term care and continuing care services. In the past in Aklavik, they had the Joe Greenland Centre, which was used very well by the whole region. There was people from Old Crow, people from Fort McPherson, Tsiigehtchic, Inuvik, that stayed in this facility because they were looked after well and they were looked after by Indigenous workers, so they felt comfortable. And right now that facility closed, and it's used in a different way. And what I've been hearing from members of the community of Aklavik is they require more community support services because elders who live at home, they don't -- they have to administer medication and sometimes they have multiple meds that they can't read or they don't know which ones they were supposed to take. So I wonder if there will be some increase in the community support services specifically for Aklavik where they've written the letter stating that they do need help in this area. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, that is in a different section that we haven't got to yet. But under this section, I know there is home care and home support work that does support communities. And so if you want to move on to the next section, or did you want me to wait to answer to that when we get to that section, Mr. Chair?

Thank you. I think we could wait until we get to that section. I'm going to go to the Member from Mackenzie Delta.

Oh, I'm good there. That's good. Thank you.

Thank you. Now next on the list I have is Member from Range Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, so I know that there's sunsets to -- oh, and I'm not sure if they're here. Anyways, so just related to labour market supplements to recruitment to referrals to -- recruitment and retention, period. And it's close to $3 million. So how is the department making up for this? I know we're in the midst of a bargaining process so is there a plan to bring something -- is there a reserve being set aside in case there's a need for this resource to be brought back once those negotiations are concluded? Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It'll be details will come after bargaining is done. And, you know, I mean, I think there's not much more information that I can provide as I don't have that. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Range Lake.

So the -- like, the labour market supplement was brought in around -- like, many provinces and territories were bringing in those kind of bonuses during COVID when health care professionals were leaving their profession or going towards private agency jobs that are much more lucrative, and the supplement existed outside of the collective bargaining process through an agreement with the union. So can the Minister explain why that -- why we're waiting for collective bargaining to decide whether or not to bring that back? Because my understanding is it's not a -- it's not related to that. It's in addition to the collective agreement. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. That agreement expired on March 31st, and that agreement was decided during an urgent need, during COVID, and so it's now part -- you know, I mean, now there's collective bargaining on, and so that's as much as I can say about that. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'm going to go back to the Member from Range Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Well, I look forward to the conclusion of collective bargaining, then. Hopefully we have clarity on what we can provide to frontline health care professionals.

So I'll turn to the midwifery cuts and also to the need for agency nurses to staff obstetrics at Stanton Hospital. Why is the department having such a hard time providing birthing services in the Northwest Territories or investing in birthing services? Because it seems like we're not really interested. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. You know, for myself, I was a labour and delivery nurse, so I don't understand why nobody wants to be a labour and delivery nurse, so. But, you know, for the most part I know even when I was a manager trying to convince some nurses to go and train to be a labour and delivery nurse -- it's a specialty. It's just like any other thing people want to do. And, you know, and I think for a long time here once we -- one of the issues that we know that within the current obstetrics where we -- I mean, it's not a secret that there was many vacancies over COVID, and then that's when, you know, it enacted the time that we needed to start using agency nurses to ensure that we could provide birthing services back in Yellowknife. And since then, we've done lots of training. We've trained nurses. We've provided training. We provided combination training of education so that they could get the mentoring and the specialized training to be able to become obstetric nurses. And so we're starting to get more in that area. As of right now, they still need mentors because they're not independent and so that's why we're still having to use agency nurses to bring in because we don't have any permanent staff that are available or able to recruit at this time. And our goal is to be able to train enough nurses. And then with the change in model in supporting those registered nurses to be able to work at their scope, we've changed the model so that we could bring LPNs on into the obstetric unit, which wasn't there before. And that is taken off the weight of the RNs so that they can do the job that they need to do and then the LPNs can support them in that department. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Range Lake.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I was going to ask the Minister if she cares about obstetrics. Clearly, she does, so I appreciate that. So when's this going to kick in, right? Like, because it's -- it sounds like a plan. It sounds like we have the resources coming together. So when can we expect this new model to take over and the agency nurses to be relieved of their contracts? Thank you.