Glen Abernethy

The Member may remember that during the initial Caucus meetings of the 17th Assembly, the supplemental health benefits were actually not one of the priorities that were identified. A number of priorities were identified by Caucus. We are working on those priorities right now. We are making significant progress on all of them. This is not something that’s gone away. This is something that I think is incredibly important and I’d like to see as part of the transition documents into the 18th Legislative Assembly. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Chair. In addition to the 32 indicators, which are the GNWT indicators, we also do continue and contribute data to other organizations like CIHI that is doing national reporting. Our data is included there where it doesn’t actually identify… When the numbers are too small, they don’t put it in, but where the numbers are enough, they report on those and we contribute regularly to those organizations.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I do want to just articulate quickly that Yellowknife is not the only place where this diabetes program has been going on. Hay River, Fort Smith and Inuvik offer a targeted diabetes education and care program through their authorities by teams of educators that include nurses, nurse practitioners, dietitians and physicians. The Tlicho Community Services Agency, in partnership with the Tlicho Government, is training local diabetes educators to work with their nurse practitioner who will work directly with people diagnosed with diabetes to learn how to manage their disease.

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It’s my understanding that we actually turned those resources on that particular site over to I think it was the Liidlii K’ue First Nation, but we’ll have to confirm that with the understanding that if we ever wanted to run an on-the-land program in that location we can use those facilities as well. So, honestly, they can use those facilities for anything they need, they don’t need our permission. They can utilize them for any type of programming that they deem as appropriate and reasonable for residents of the Deh Cho. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The individual deficits will become the Territorial Health Authority deficit. It will be one deficit. The Members have asked a number of questions about cost savings and there will be, in certain program areas, an opportunity to save money, which we’ll be able to roll back into the system and we’ll be able to use that to start paying off some of the deficit. We figure it’s about a five-year transition period. We should be able to start knocking that deficit really down.

On top of that, we’ll also be able to really dig into where all the key indicators or the key drivers...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I don’t have that at my fingertips, but I will commit to getting that to the Member and committee. Oh, wait! Yes, we do. For ‘14-15, $100,000; ‘15-16, proposing another $100,000.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We actually provide the supplemental health benefits as per the program and the dollars have remained fairly consistent. I will say that we’re actually doing a bit of an analysis right now because it does appear to be creeping up and the primary result is the aging population. So we will likely be coming to committee for further discussion on the increased costs to the supplemental health benefits. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. On my left is the director of Finance, Jeannie Mathison. On my right is the deputy minister, Debbie DeLancey.

Mr. Chair, for the specific detail on the action items and what’s happening, when we hope to have some of them available, I will go to the deputy minister for that detail.

Mr. Chair, during the hiatus between May and September, Yellowknife Health and Social Services actually went out and did a number of engagements with the public and other individuals about what types of programs and services they expected or would like to see, including actual conversations with the homeless people who happen to use the shelter, probably the best people to talk to about the types of things they wanted. That has helped to form some of the things that are going to be taking place.

There are a lot of significant changes between the old Day Shelter and the Day Shelter that we have...