Sandy Lee

We are working with the Privacy Commissioner. We are providing and the Sahtu Health Authority has reported to her in writing, or will report to her in writing, about what happened and what steps are being taken to prevent this from happening again. Understandably, the Sahtu Health Authority is quite upset about what happened. We are very sorry to the individuals involved and we’re doing everything we can to make sure that this doesn’t happen again. We are working closely with the Privacy Commissioner. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we made it always clear that what we are trying to do in Supplementary Health Benefits is to offer an insurance program for those who don’t have it. We are not going to be topping anybody. What we have now is we exclude a whole bunch of people who have limited supplementary health benefits and then we top up people just because of their age. What we are saying is we will look after the seniors, we will look after the youth, we will look after the working families. Everybody would have equivalent to 80 percent. For certain people under certain income thresholds, we will cover 100...

The people of the Sahtu and every community and region in the Northwest Territories should be assured and they should feel comfortable, and I want them to feel comfortable, that their health care professionals, whether they are social workers and anybody with private information, every profession has a code of conduct on how they deal with private information. It is an absolute no, no to breach any of that information. This was an accident and sometimes it happens. We are very sorry that that has happened. We are investigating to see exactly what happened and any steps that will come out of it...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I absolutely did not say and I would ask the Member to correct that I said that this was a tax on sick and the elderly. Mr. Speaker, that is misleading. That phrase is offensive because, Mr. Speaker, the fact of the matter is our health care system is entirely based on taking care of the sick and the elderly. We take care of the sick and the elderly.

Supplementary health benefits is a completely different thing. The Member says that there are actually people not excluded. Obviously, then, he is not paying attention to the low income families who need help from us.

Mr...

Mr. Speaker, we as leaders are put in this place to make decisions on behalf of people and not study things to death and delay and debate. Mr. Speaker, as the Member has stated, the cost of living is a big issue in the Northwest Territories, but we also know that the NWT and especially Yellowknife, for many years, we have people on a very high income. We have to recognize that fact. The thing that the Members have to know and the values that the Member speaks about, we need to talk about low income working families who are struggling every day to pay for basic dental care and basic vision care...

As has been said many times, this program has been reviewed since 2003 because people feel there are people who are excluded from this program and there are no means for them to appeal or to have us look at the list. Unless you are under Income Support, you do not get support for dental or vision care. So I believe that it is incumbent on the government to come up with a program that gives access to 100 percent of the people, but ask those who could afford to make a co-payment to contribute a little, contribute part of that, Mr. Speaker. This will be like any other, it’s like giving everybody...

No, Mr. Speaker, I have not appointed a board of inquiry during my time as Minister. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, since the implementation plan on this policy, since it was released in the fall of 2008, it’s had about two and a half years of review. We believe, as a Cabinet, that this is a good policy change. It will expand the program’s access to a lot of people who, as the Member said, are the most vulnerable. It will bring in 2,000-plus people who do not have a basic supplementary health care benefit such as dental and vision care. And the plan, we will be reviewing with the committee, as we had promised, but the plan as it stands now is to implement the changes...

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Member for the question. I think what we agree on, and even the Members in this House and what we are hearing from outside, is that everybody says that we should find a way to include those people who are not included right now. I think the issue is about how we do that. The suggestions that have come forward in our public meetings are that we should do it by universality. Just make that part of the Canada, our NWT health care or bring them in by increasing taxes or progressive taxation or do it by reducing other government programs, but I think there is an agreement...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There is a very specified procedure for filing complaints under the Medical Profession Act. Anyone who has a concern with a physician or any other medical practitioner could write… Well, they could first talk to the chief executive officer and the people in their authority. Then there is what’s called a complaints officer under the Medical Profession Act, and the complaints officer would review the complaints. Complaints could go into alternative dispute resolution or any other ways of sorting it out, or the matter could go into a board of inquiry where a board made up...