Michael Miltenberger

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the money that was allocated, some went to fund additional beds at the Centre for Northern Families, as well as the Salvation Army, to get us over the winter months.

The Member raises an interesting conundrum, as it were, or dilemma that we have as a government. As she has indicated, for whatever reasons, families can be without housing because they are in arrears or they have been evicted. Then it has become a homelessness or child welfare issue. So we have some short-term funding to get us over the winter in Yellowknife with northern families in the...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the Minister has laid out the basic facts very clearly. I’ve been tasked, as the lead Minister, to deal with the homelessness issue and I’m also the chair of the social envelope Ministers and we collaboratively got together to look at how we’re going to deal with this issue, which is quite complex. Our initial focus was to deal with what they call absolute homelessness for the coming winter, which was those folks who don’t have accommodations at all, a warm place to sleep at night. At the same time, the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation is...

Thank you, Madam Chair. We’ve had a contract with Capital Health now for many years. We did a major renewal a couple years ago and there are extension clauses built in, but we’ve had an arrangement now for many years with Capital Health as our nearest source of that kind of tertiary level service and specialized service. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’ll commit to investigate the Member’s concerns. I’ve seen some of the documentation he’s pulled together, keeping in mind that we have a capacity issue in terms of how much legislation we’re able to do in a given period of time. But I will commit to look at that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, like every problem area that we do have, there are more problems than there are resources. The people who are on hand to do the work are coping. We do have funding available for another psychiatrist, but have yet to be successful in recruiting. Are there problems that could be better served? Probably, but we have a significant number of resources on the ground, in the communities, mental health workers, community wellness workers, in addition to the nurses and doctors and psychiatrists here, and some psychologists and counsellors. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, since the Member was encouraging or saying that I have to be Minister to conclude all the studies I already have underway, I could probably squeeze in one more.

---Laughter

But the reality is, Mr. Speaker, this doesn’t require a study. This requires a plan of action and, yes, I would be happy to report back in June. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, when the Member raised the issue during the review of the budget of Health and Social Services, I indicated that I would be talking later that night with the president of the Social Workers’ Association, which I did do. We had a fairly lengthy discussion. One of the topics of concern was what is happening in the college; the need to do a better job in marketing the college program and what other things should we be doing as a department to better support the social work profession.

I have since had meetings with the deputy to pass on some of the concerns...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there are resources on the ground in every community that have, as one of the job responsibilities, to assist all the people, including seniors. We have members from across the Northwest Territories on the NWT Seniors' Association that I meet regularly with, as well with the boards. Also, I have very close feedback from many MLAs on issues in their jurisdictions. I believe that we have resources there. If they are not given enough profile on the ground to the services that are available to seniors, then I am definitely prepared to look at that and work...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, when the seniors’ action plan was done, it was done with that kind of concept in mind, where we had a number of departments -- Education, Health and Social Services, Housing and MACA -- work to come up with a strategy for seniors.

We are anticipating being able to have some federal money to better fund those different initiatives. There is an intent to try to make it as convenient as possible. We work with the territorial Seniors' Association here, we assist them with funding, we assist them with their help line where seniors can call and get services...

Mr. Speaker, very clearly we have an intent to modernize and redo the Mental Health Act, it’s just that it’s not on the top five or six pieces of legislation that we have on our agenda that we have left in the life of this Assembly. Very clearly, it’s one of about 26 pieces of legislation that we have that is out of date and needs to be fixed. At this point, a decision was made where I looked at the pressing priorities to focus on two major pieces, which are the Pharmacy Act and the Public Health Act, in addition to the tobacco and the other personal directives one. We’re not arguing that it...