Jane Groenewegen

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. For a long time we’ve been waiting for a new hospital in Hay River and it finally seems like maybe this is going to actually be a reality. One of the first steps is to identify a suitable location for the hospital. Where it is currently located is fraught with all kinds of problems. It’s in a fairly densely populated residential area, and there are issues with the hospital. It is old and there are issues. So I think the game plan is to go with a new hospital, but now to find a location for a new hospital.

Where the current hospital sits, there are geotechnical issues. It...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the beauty of that site, too, is the government already owns it. It is extremely prime real estate and the Government of Northwest Territories already owns that place. There is very little footprint from any buildings on that property already, so it seems like it would be fairly straightforward. Does the Minister of Health and Social Services, Mr. Speaker, have to get agreement from the current government departments that are occupying that site in order to move forward on that site? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, one of the alternate sites that was considered was an area that the Town of Hay River is currently working on developing. I believe it’s called the Sundog Subdivision. The problem with that is it’s not going to be ready for about another four years, and the other thing is that it’s definitely on the wrong side of the tracks. So if you had an ambulance coming in off the highway or something and there happened to be a train going by, of course the train would...You would have to wait. So that is the difficulty with that location.

It seems otherwise that the current ENR/ITI office is...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The wish of the committee today is to deal with the infrastructure budget for the departments of Transportation and Public Works. Thank you.

I’d like to ask what is the length of time an employee can be off on medical or stress leave with full paid benefits. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister responsible for the public service, for the Department of Human Resources, Mr. Bob McLeod. Mr. Speaker, we live in stressful times and we certainly know and believe that employees are entitled to all the benefits and all the leaves that are encompassed in their employment contracts. Mr. Speaker, we hear that at any given time in the public service, 10 percent of positions are not filled. They are vacant and people must be off the job in various other types of leave as well: education leave, stress leave and maternity leave and all...

Mr. Chairman, I move that we report progress.

---Carried

Thank you. I don’t understand that answer, Mr. Speaker. If somebody is off on medical leave, is the Minister saying it could be indefinite? Like they could continue to receive full pay and be off on medical or stress leave indefinitely, or is there a time period at which some other type of disability-type pay would kick in? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So there is no such thing as stress leave, then. In fact, if a person is on stress leave, it just falls under the category of medical leave and they would then, I assume, be required to produce some kind of confirmation from a physician that they are entitled to be off. So just to understand, there is no differentiation between medical leave and stress leave? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, a little known fact to some people may be that October is Clergy Appreciation Month. Mr. Speaker, I had the privilege of being raised in a home where I went to church all my life. I must say I love church. My father was a deacon in a church and back in those days we even had church on Sunday nights. When the rest of my siblings wanted to stay home and watch The Wonderful World of Disney, I wanted to go to church with my dad, and I certainly remember and value those precious times that I had with my dad and that constitutes a lot of my memories of him.

Mr...