Bob Bromley

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just on hospital services, it seems like we’re really towing the line, and maybe even decreasing the budgets over time, for hospital services. Obviously, I think we are providing more services, the more medical procedures and so on.

I’m particularly concerned at Stanton where, as the years go by, we realize how poorly designed the hospital is for modern health care delivery in a hospital situation, how bad that is. So I can’t believe that we’re really delivering better care with this stagnant or declining budget. I’m sure we are gaining some efficiencies. Can I have the...

Thanks to the Minister. The Minister had some great ideas there. It shows the value of consulting with the artist, which I very much appreciate.

Concerns were also expressed that such an arrangement would create competition with art retailers, and I supported checking with businesses to see if they had a problem with this art display opportunity. Clearly, the government would not be selling the art.

In his early effort to develop the policy, has the Minister consulted with our business organizations to solicit their feedback and learn whether this would be a good promotion or a problem for them...

I see the $152 million, so in terms of fees and payments, the $35 million and the program delivery details, $198 million. So all the travel by the authorities would be within the grants and contributions. That seems strange, but I just want to get that clear. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are in follow-up to my Member’s statement earlier today and are addressed to the Minister of Public Works and Services. In May I raised the idea of providing space in GNWT buildings for the display of artist products supported with government policy. The Minister said he thought this was a great idea and that he would work with his colleagues and have conversations with some of the local artist organizations to gather their input. Could the Minister inform us of his progress on that work?

Thank you. An area I have no expertise. I have nowhere to lodge that answer, so I’ll have to just trust the director here, which is fine. If I can jump ahead just a little bit because they may be related here on the next page, I see that we’ve increased $360,000 for population health contributions in the area of tobacco, and healthy choices by about $360,000. Is that part of this shuffling?

Thank you, Madam Chair. That’s all I have for this page.

Thanks to the Minister. That sounds like a plan. Is the Sahtu being done during this current fiscal year that we’re in? And if that’s the case, and we’ve heard the plan to go where there are lots of new babies, where in the budget do we have the proposal for expanded healthy families programs for this fiscal year coming?

I think I will leave it at that. I am interested in results, but committee is there to deal with that. I’ll look forward to that.

Mr. Chair, my next question has to do with the pharmaceutical costs. I know seniors are going up something like 8 or 9 percent a year in the Northwest Territories and we are known to use a lot of drugs, apparently. The costs are going up. I know the Minister has been working hard to try and find out what we can do in the area of pharmaceutical costs.

Is there anything yet achieved or where are we at in our work towards trying to achieve some cost efficiencies with bulk purchasing or whatever? I know there have been a couple of things happen with just a couple of drugs at a federal or national...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to follow up on a couple of my colleagues’ questions. Just on this most recent one, I know the Minister is aware of my thoughts on this. I was disappointed that the contract didn’t go out for RFP when it came due and that there was a decision made to extend that. I don’t know if there was an additional cost to that or not.

I think one of the issues that we’re raising is often we have small airlines that are based in our smaller communities, but without support they’re not able to maintain their services like they would otherwise be able to. Of course, since...