Jane Groenewegen

I’d like to ask the Minister, if he has the funds, if he would be able to find the funds from within to commit to having the dollars to go with that request to review that facility.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Next I have Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Now that we have established that, in fact, it is Mr. Beaulieu’s jurisdiction, that the hospital actually belongs to him, now I will ask Mr. Beaulieu if the Minister would agree to write a letter to his seat mate, the Minister of Public Works and Services, asking Public Works and Services to do a review of the existing H.H. Williams Memorial Hospital facility to look at any potential costs of renovations in view of a staffing model and program that would allow it to continue to operate as a long-term care bed facility?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Your committee has been considering Tabled Document 9-17(4), NWT Main Estimates, 2013-2014, and would like to report progress. Mr. Speaker, I move that the report of Committee of the Whole be concurred with. Thank you.

I thank the Premier for that. I think there’s actually a lot more but it’s probably not easy with where we are in the business plans to identify all of those, so we will stay tuned and get updates as they become available.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Premier if he could confirm that the 18 positions that are referred to in the budget address yesterday, is that the total extent of the decentralization being looked at for this fiscal year? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. After the budget address yesterday and the line in there about the 18 GNWT positions being decentralized out of Yellowknife to regional centres and to the communities, of course there has been a lot of buzz. There was a lot of buzz leading up to this announcement because there were rumours to rely on, but now we’ve heard an actual number. We’re getting questions, and e-mails, and texts from our members in our communities, saying where are these positions going. I have some idea of how many of them are coming to Hay River and where they’re going, but I would like to ask...

I would like to call Committee of the Whole to order. Tabled Document 9-17(4), NWT Main Estimates, 2013-2014, is the only matter before the committee today. What is the wish of committee? Mr. Menicoche.

Again, not wanting to pre-empt any kind of process or notification to employees or anything, but is the Premier able to be any more specific about those positions?

I thank the Premier for that. Those are good and valid concerns. We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves here. Could we get a general approximation? Would it be safe to say that of those 14 new positions and four relocated positions – and I realize that this is not the Premier’s, it is the Finance Minister’s role to answer this question – would it be safe to say that eight or 10 of those are coming to Hay River?