Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, when somebody is admitted and they're known to, you know, if they're -- say, if they're admitted for something else, like pneumonia and all that, their history is taken into account and so they would manage their -- them within their plan of care during their admission and however that would be -- you know, whether it is through medication management, it would be part of their admission process. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'll go back to the Member from Yellowknife North.

Okay, so just to be clear, can the Minister confirm that we are not forcing people to detox in the hospital if they're not ready or wanting to just to be a patient in the hospital? There's no need for that because we have other ways that we can manage their alcohol dependency within the hospital; can the Minister confirm that's where we're at? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, you know, this -- you know, I think the thing is that we're getting way, way down into the details of how people are admitted. And physicians, you know, when they have somebody coming into the hospital being in admission, they will manage them according to their plan of care to their -- whatever their issue or condition is. Where alcohol management is more where we support is at the community level through -- like, only one of our programs. But I know that taking that into account that, you know, we are looking at other ways that we ensure that through our systems, you know -- and the Member, I think, has also brought it up, if not this Member, other Members, you know, when we have patients that are struggling with addictions and they are in one of our -- like, in our managed alcohol program and if they have to travel for certain things, we have recognized that we need to do more work on supporting those individuals as outpatient but not necessarily, you know, the inpatient management of alcohol withdrawal during -- you know, the priority would be to -- if they were admitted, would be to their condition that they're being admitted for. And then secondary they would be making sure that they are managing those symptoms of their -- if they are withdrawing. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.

Okay, thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll have to follow up with the Minister later to dig into that. And just finally, switching to a different topic.

So it was mentioned a few minutes ago that some of the health -- or NTHSSA's deficit has now been allocated to some of the items on this list to help relieve some of the deficit from the health authority. How is it decided what costs end up under the health authority's budget versus what ends up under this budget; can they just transfer all their deficit to this budget and then be done with it? We solved our deficit. Like, or what are the criteria that say, no, that has to go into the health authority's budget or that has to go under HSS's budget? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm not sure if I understand the question. I think what -- if you're referring to that we are dealing with deficits because we were reallocating funding this year to put towards the deficit, so if you -- for example, there was -- when we renegotiated the last NIHB agreement, the money that we were allocating to NIHB from GNWT funds, we were able to put that towards some of the deficit because the special allotment through NIHB, the third party agreement, paid for the thing that it's been -- that we've been paying for for years. And so we were able to negotiate NIHB to pay for NIHB where we -- so we were able to keep that funding for -- and reallocate it to things that were historically ongoing drivers of the deficit. So things that continue to drive the deficit up that we were able to reallocate that funding to that so that it would bring our deficit down. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.

Okay, thank you, Mr. Chair. I think I understand if the Minister is saying that if we're getting, like, a new federal funding source, then we can help use that to bring down the deficit, and then the numbers are going to show up in these things. But I guess what I would be afraid of is that if it's still the GNWT footing the bill but we're just shifting sort of the blame, so to speak, it used to be under the health authority's deficit budget and then they solved their deficit by just putting the money under something the GNWT's responsible for paying -- well, HSS is responsible for paying for directly under their operations budget. But I can understand if it's a matter of we get new funding coming in from the feds, and we're trying to channel that money through. I'll leave that there. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for your patience.

Okay, thank you. Is there any further questions from Members? Seeing none. Thank you.

Please turn to page 205, Health and Social Services, health and social services programs, operations expenditure summary, 2025-2026 Main Estimates, $446,079,000. Does the committee agree?

Thank you. Moving to the long-term and continuing care services beginning on page 210 with information items on page 213. Are there any questions? I'm going to go to the Member from Frame Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm going to ask a high-level question first because it may explain all of the cuts. But I notice there's about a $10 million reduction here; can the Minister explain that. And does that $10 million reduction explain everything that's being cut there similar to some of the items I asked about in the previous item?

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, that is the cost share agreements with the First Nations/Inuit home and community care sunset funding because we were in the same situation, like, with the other agreements. We have a couple agreements that happened partway through this year. So that's not reflected in here so that's why it shows up as a decrease. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate that. So the Minister can confirm that we're not facing any service cuts this year for these items?

Okay, thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

That is correct.

Thank you. I'll go to the Member from Frame Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just also some questions on page 212. The Member for Great Slave doesn't need to point out that I was being given an unlimited clock there.

Mr. Chair, so just on page 212 there, there's an almost $9 million -- or there is a $9 million reduction of health and social services authorities funding. There's a cut to the respite fund. There's a cut to the seniors' fund. Are all those explained by the same answer that the Minister gave me just a minute ago there?

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.