Sandy Lee

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Member’s question. As he stated, we did visit the community. We had a good discussion with the chief and we also met in my office as a follow-up visit.

Mr. Speaker, we have responded to Chief Arthur Tobac on his proposal. We are interested in discussing with the community his proposal. Our staff has been directed to engage in a dialogue. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, I am not aware of a request that he has made that we haven’t responded to on this topic. I know he brought it up about Beaufort-Delta and we followed up in writing. I could tell you, Mr. Chairman, that the purchasing of medical equipment has been done through public tender. There are some standardized, mostly public tender or standing offer agreements in one case, but mostly all public tender. It follows the guidelines. All the northern businesses are allowed to bid on them. There are some standards that the authorities require and a lot of purchasing is done through Stanton...

To get more assistance or a single-window approach is something that we would have to approach the federal government on because it is their program. But in the short term and for our own purpose, I do understand what the Member is saying and I think that what I could do is see if we could make the names or the number of Non-Insured Health Benefits funded people in Inuvik available so that people could call there. I do believe that our nurses and our health care staff in our regional offices do help people wade through that. So in the website, when we give the website page, it is usually to...

Mr. Chairman, I am going to ask the deputy minister to give more details on that. Thank you.

I didn’t hear a question there. I take the Member’s comment and I don’t believe we disagree with that finding and suggestion made in the CFSA report.

Mr. Speaker, we should be aware that surgeons and the staff can organize and cancel surgeries at any time if they have any concern with the scheduling or the equipment or any of the procedures. I think it’s important for everybody to know that all the procedures followed are the ones that are accepted nationally. We don’t have any more infection incidents than any other parts of the country. We are, in fact, below the national standard. All instruments used in the OR meet current Canadian Standards Association standards for sterilization.

Mr. Speaker, the decisions they make about reorganizing...

Mr. Chairman, we are not talking about office equipment. We are talking about medical equipment and it could be all kinds of medical things, but not beds, but small medical equipment.

Mr. Chairman, I am going to ask the DM to elaborate. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, we are funding until the end of 2012. We need to review our money, our program and training needs and work with Education and HR to see where we go from here. As the Members know, we will be reviewing in the next business plan cycle, which actually begins right after, as soon as the budget is over. We will be working toward that April, May, June and the Members will have a look at that. I think it is an area that needs a thorough review. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That’s part of our Strategic Initiatives committee Building Our Future investments and Healthy Choices Framework and $254,000, for a total of $500,000. It will be sent to Beaufort-Delta and Dehcho.