Jane Groenewegen

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions today are for the Minister of Health and Social Services, the Honourable Michael Miltenberger.

Probably one of the concerns we have had raised most often at our constituency office, and just from meeting people in the street and talking to them -- townsfolk of Hay River -- is the wait time to get into the Hay River Medical Clinic. That seems to be the hot topic right now in Hay River. With all due respect to our CEO and our board, they have devised a new plan where they are trying to resolve issues like backlog and avoid no-shows. Certainly...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I want to make a statement today that I hope will help our constituents understand a very key element of how we accomplish work on their behalf. There are many ways to approach our constituency work. We can make statements in the House, ask questions during session, write letters to Ministers and departments, send e-mails, have meetings, issue press releases, hold constituency meetings, have newspaper columns, publish newsletters, et cetera. But to be very specific, many constituents we don’t often hear from unless they have an issue with their dealings...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Standing Committee on Governance and Economic Development met on October 11, 2005, to review Bill 9, Municipal Statutes Amendment Act. This act makes minor amendments to the Charter Communities Act, the Cities, Towns and Villages Act and the Hamlets Act.

The committee asked for an explanation of the new amendment that deals with transferring unpaid service charges to property taxes. The amendment will allow a municipal taxing authority to recover any outstanding bills or fines that relate to real property and charge them against property taxes. A homeowner, for...

Thank you for that, Mr. Speaker. I thank the Minister for that. We’re trying to think outside the box here in terms of how to address this problem because we don’t want people to see our communities as having a lesser standard of living or quality of life because of lack of medical services. So those are the kinds of things in discussions we’ll probably have in our communities. I’m glad to hear that response, and I’ll certainly pass that on in Hay River, that maybe we’ll have to do some recruitment as a community on our own, quite apart from what the Minister does. You know, I can’t think of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, when we switched from fee-for-service to salary, it was intended to be a recruitment tool to get physicians to come here so that they would be able to enjoy a quality lifestyle. We could offer a definitive package which was competitive with other jurisdictions in Canada. Is the department looking now at doing a combination of fee-for-service, where there is a salary and a fee-for-service combination, something that would encourage physicians to see more patients on a daily basis? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you, colleagues. I want to make it abundantly clear that I know extremely well, as do the people across the North and in Hay River, that there are many challenges facing health and social services in the big picture. But I want to say that a good working relationship is the premise of why I remain very optimistic about continuing to address those concerns. I would just like to thank the Minister for his attention to those issues. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to say how much I appreciate the committee that did travel to Hay River and hear from many of our NGOs, including the family support centre, and I know that those MLAs who heard that presentation with me know exactly what I’m talking about today.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, as a government we need to prove that we are committed to protecting the victims of family violence and to keeping faith with the support workers in this territory who are the ones who are on the front lines, who are working to break the cycle of violence. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Minister for that. I don’t think it can happen too soon. In the list of people that he recited who are going to be consulted on this, obviously absent were the people who are involved in providing the service themselves, even the volunteers or the paid contracted ambulance services. I would like to know, will they be included in the consultation in setting up this new and organized system? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services in follow up to the questions that I posed to the Minister of Transportation and MACA yesterday with regard to the ambulance service that is provided by the volunteer fire department located in Hay River. As I stated yesterday, the volunteer fire department provides an ambulance service, which takes some vehicles -- as I stated yesterday, one is 10 years old, I think one is 19 years old -- out on the highway and services quite a wide radius of the road system in the South Slave area. So I...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, since the appointment of a new chair to that board in the person of Mr. Todd Burlingame, is he satisfied that Mr. Van Camp, who he says is eminently capable -- and I totally agree with him on that -- has been kept informed of applications that have been reviewed in unsettled areas, that he has been kept informed with correspondence, attendance at meetings, has been kept in the loop as a participant on the board? Is the Minister satisfied that that has occurred in recent months? Thank you.