Sandy Lee

The Housing Corporation and the department will continue to support community programs for elders at the Joe Greenland Centre. We also plan to use the common area of the Joe Greenland Centre for an elders day program and continue access to the common area, kitchen, and specialized bathing equipment within the building which will be used by home care. The Beaufort-Delta Health Authority will continue to operate and there are also plans to use the common area and kitchen to provide a lunch program for elders every day, because we want to be in touch with the elders so that we have the constant...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is quite right in saying that we need to do more to support elders in our communities. For example, in Aklavik right now one home care worker is supporting 35 elders, as the Member stated on the radio this morning. We believe there are many more seniors in a community like Aklavik who could do a lot better with support from the government. What we propose to do is redesign the program so that we increase the level of home care in the community so that we can support as many as 100 elders in the community right now, just in Aklavik. We also want to be able to...

As I stated, we are reviewing all of our agreements and it will be based on the review. Thank you.

Because, Mr. Speaker, as I stated, we are reviewing our budget for 2010-11. We are reviewing all the agreements we have with some of the NGOs. We are evaluating to see how we are spending money and what the outcome measures are. We will be renewing the contracts with those organizations and we will sit down with them. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, that was one of the options that I was discussing with Education, Culture and Employment. It should be noted here that ECE and Health are a joint funder and supporter of this program. I know that the staff had been working with the organization. I will update the Member. I have asked for the information, I just don’t have it in front of me. Thank you.

There’s one thing that hasn’t changed, which is that for the last 10 years, well, I guess, not 10 years, the last three years the Member asked me about problems with deficits and he always says the same thing, that nothing is changing, when a lot of things are changing. Mr. Speaker, I just want to say that, more specifically, the system deficit that we had last year was $14.685 million but we are expecting about $11 million system deficit for this year. That is a huge progress. I think credit should be given where credit is due, because our management is working very hard to make long-term...

Yes, governance model review is underway, and I’ve indicated that in Committee of the Whole. It may be that we would have to decide on whether we should have one authority or not, but that’s something that we have to have more discussions on and we have to work with the authorities and do consultation with the community-at-large.

We should be mindful of the fact that that is not necessarily a silver bullet. We are aware of other jurisdictions where they have collapsed the boards and done all kinds of things in that regard without necessarily saving, I think.

I know the Member keeps saying that...

I am aware that a lot of work has been done and is being done on that, so I will follow up to be able to confirm that to her, seeing as it’s going back to 2009.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that we are talking about... While lots of clients of the Centre for Northern Families, have to do with victims of family violence, the Centre for Northern Families is funded in a different way and they serve also different clientele.

I can assure the Member that, under the action plan, a number of things have been accomplished. We have conducted a territorial attitude survey on violence. A territorial family violence consultation was held under this action plan. We have also developed a training program called Supporting Northern Women, a Northwest Territories shelter...

Mr. Speaker, we do have an agreement here that that organization has an important function to deliver and it is an important part of the spectrum of services that we provide for the homeless and those who need our support in the community, not just for Yellowknife but for many people that come to Yellowknife. But the Member is also aware that we have had long-term structural issues with the financial situation of that organization. We have been working, the department and ECE. I just do not have the most recent update, but I will commit, once again, to follow up on that and see what our...