Bob Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I thought I’d indicated I had one more. I don’t hear a response to whether or not our one ECD position is staffed currently in the department.

Great information there. In terms of the less professional side of the equation, which is, of course, the seat of much of our early childhood development opportunities dealing with the public and community groups and young parents and other ways, parenting skills and whatnot that may be delivered by non-government organizations, is there a mechanism for the department to interact with them or is that left to the regional authorities? Thank you.

As a priority and recognizing the considerable amount of new information that’s available now – and the deputy minister referred to a really excellent report by Dr. Corriveau that does incorporate a lot of that information in a popular format -- is the department playing a role getting that information to authorities and helping them identify the opportunities in early childhood?

Mr. Chair, just before my next question, does the Minister agree that early childhood development is a major opportunity and responsibility that we have, given our new considerable and new enlightening knowledge in terms of our prevention priorities in terms of health and many other broad government goals?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I see here the page deals with maternal and child health, so I am assuming that early childhood development is one of the responsibilities within this program. What role is the department playing? What new programs are being put in place for early childhood development recognizing the priority that this government is putting on that this year? What role is the department playing in working with sister departments on the broader early childhood development programming?

The extensive communications and discussions in the House and in committee that we’ve had over the past five years have meant nothing in terms of carving a niche for planning infrastructure dollars on an expedited basis as opposed to another five-year process. Is that the Minister’s understanding? There have been no discussions in Cabinet about that? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for the opportunity to present to the Minister and his staff here today. I have to say that expanding the eHealth is one thing that caught my attention. We had talked about that, we have made some progress, but I’m wondering what are the limitations here and how are we addressing them. We have been talking about this for years now. In discussions earlier today with the Mental Health Commission of Canada, it was also raised as an important element in addressing mental health issues across the North. I know the Minister is aware of that and I will be interested in...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As people struggle with the high cost of living, providing adequate, affordable and nutritious food to our families can be a challenge. We are dependent on costly southern food, so the affordability of eating right is an issue. When we rely on food from the South, we export our purchasing dollars to the South, and instead of local jobs and businesses, we support jobs and investment afar. Greenhouse gas production increases from transporting food long distances.

The affect some communities have experienced from changes to federal air mail demonstrates the problem we all...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It’s all good information. I’m learning the process here more and more. So could I just get a commitment from the Minister – I’m sure he’s doing this already, but given this is a priority – that he will continue to explore all fronts on getting the expanded and expedited programs in early childhood as we learn more and recognize the need and opportunity? Thank you.

I appreciate the comments from the Minister. That sounds great. Just backing off to a little larger scale, what’s the format and the role of the department in trying to help our professionals and our service people keep up to date with new information such as the amazing stuff that’s coming out of early childhood research now? How does that work?