Julie Green

Okay, I'm trying to grab the question. So where we don't have resident doctors to provide specialized services, people are sent south for treatment. So most recently you would have heard about the rheumatology program. There was a regular visitor rheumatologist who became unavailable. And the result of that is we were unable to hire another resident or longterm rheumatologist and so people are going south to receive treatment. We decided that that provided the best continuity of care. So I think that more than anything, the situation with rheumatology points to how fragile our health system is...

Yes, thank you. So the IRC I know has used mental wellness and addictions recovery funding to fund Project Jewel. And I believe that they report on that annually. I don't know if they've done their own evaluation of that program but we would certainly welcome them doing that because it is a program that's been around for quite a while.

I think it's fair to say that the mental health needs of the population of the planet have escalated since the pandemic began, and people are struggling to keep up with the demands for counselling and other kind of supports. We have community counselling. We have...

Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. I'll ask the deputy minister to talk about how that was developed. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. We have a sustainability health system sustainability office that is working with a health sustainability plan. There are three major work streams to the plan, internal controls and cost containment, operational review and quality improvement, and funding and service levels. So this work has been ongoing for a couple of years. I think the end goal is to ensure that the deficit doesn't grow or grows more slowly so that we can contain those costs. There have been a lot of different initiatives within this area. And for more detail, I'll ask the chair if the deputy...

Yes, thank you. I'd like to take a look at what's available now and how that can be used, and if it seems to present a lot of gaps to consider how we can reenforce that message for youth. Thank you.

Yes, thank you for the question. So $4.23 million is for longterm care. $3.9 million is for extended care. And the programs that are moving into Stanton Legacy are already funded. So there is no additional funding for them in this budget.

Thank you. We don't have any information about Jordan's Principle spending in this area.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we don't pay for people to bypass the public system. They need to engage with local healthcare providers in order to get a referral for services not offered within the territory. And if they obtain that referral, they would also be eligible for medical travel. But these are things that need to be done in advance. I see a trend of people coming to me after they have spent the money asking for a reimbursement. I want to be clear that's not how it works. How it works is you go to your healthcare team and you tell them what your issue it and you get into the...

Thank you. I'm not sure if it relates directly to that. We do have a section at the end well, some of it relates to directly to that. $3,361 relates to the language support for Hay River Health and Social Services. There is a section of the budget at the end called funding allocated to health authorities in which Health and Social Services Hay River Health and Social Services has its own page and some of the spending is well, all of the spending is detailed there. This is specifically page 213. Thank you.

Yes, thank you. There was a big change in the way child and family services was delivered following the 2018 Office of the Auditor General report, with an emphasis on keeping children with their families and in their communities if at all possible. And in our last annual report, we reported that 92 percent of children stayed in their communities and/or with their family or extended family. So last year, we only had eight percent of children in care who are in the permanent custody of the director. The real advancement in this area is that the IRC has passed its own child and family services...