Wendy Bisaro

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I give notice that on June 4, 2014, I will move the following motion: now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, that Members of this Legislative Assembly strongly urge our federal and territorial counterparts to support Bill C-583 and urge the Parliament of Canada to schedule full committee hearings with testimony of expert witnesses, including at least one hearing in the Northwest Territories; and further, that Members of this Legislative Assembly urge the Member of Parliament for the Western Arctic to support Bill C-583.

Thanks to the Minister. Some of the information that I have indicates that we try to identify children or infants with permanent hearing loss. My concern goes to infants who have some hearing loss, because some hearing loss is going to impact kids as much as permanent hearing loss.

So to the Minister, if we have a child with some hearing loss as opposed to permanent hearing loss, do we follow up with supports and with treatment? Thank you.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Again, one of the things we found through the Auditor General’s report is there’s great difficulty in keeping the health and social services authorities to account. They have contribution agreements, but they don’t have performance agreements as a separate agreement or within the contribution agreement. Committee felt that in order to get the accountability from the authorities that is required by the department, there needed to be a performance component in the contribution agreement and that’s what this motion speaks to. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up on my statement and ask some questions of the Minister for Health and Social Services about infant hearing programs in the NWT. I know we have an Infant Hearing Program and I guess my question to the Minister is if he could explain to me so that I’m truly clear on what we have.

What is the content of our Infant Hearing Program and when was it first started in the NWT? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just briefly again, one of the things that we discovered through the report, the Auditor General pointed out that there really is no accountability framework right now that the Department of Health and Social Services is using within the child and family services division. It is extremely important if we are to stop putting children at risk, if we’re going to stop the gaps that have been created in services and if we’re going to make sure that deficiencies don’t continue to exist. We need an accountability framework and we need to have far better accountability within...

Thanks to my colleagues. Our hearing screening program is sponsored by the Stanton Territorial Health Authority and the Department of Health and Social Services, and it’s delivered at every birthing centre in the NWT. However, it is a voluntary service for parents.

All children in the NWT deserve access to proper hearing screening to help them reach their full potential. Newborn and infant hearing screening programs must be mandated for all NWT newborns, no matter where they are born. Thank you.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Just briefly, this is pretty much self-explanatory, but it is important that the public know what’s going on. It is important that anybody involved in the child and family services system be aware of actions that have been taken and what changes the department is contemplating and also that they be given an opportunity to comment on those.

One of the things that we determined in the 16th Assembly when we did our report was that people really didn’t feel they knew what was going on within the child and family services system, so this communication plan is very important. Thank...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just briefly, the committee’s desire here is to make sure, knowing that the Health and Social Services department is looking at changes in governance within our health and social services authorities, knowing that, the committee is very concerned that we don’t wait to make the required changes in the child and family services division and in the services we provide.

Certainly the two major reports that have been done previously, in 2000 and in 2010, had quite a few recommendations and not much happened. So we don’t want that to happen again. This is a serious situation...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just wanted to speak briefly to these four indicators that are identified in this motion. Members and the public will see that these four indicators are referenced in quite a number of recommendations as we go through. These four areas of conducting investigations, addressing needs, attending to children in care and screening of foster homes, they’re four basic indicators which the department can use over time to show improvements or lack of, and committee feels very strongly that these have been very well identified in the Auditor General’s report and that they are a...

Thanks, Mr. Speaker. The Minister and I have to respectfully agree to disagree. He is forcing the boards to make one of two bad options. They either use their contingency to fund the shortfall or they have to cut staff and increase their class sizes and reduce the quality of education.

The boards use this contingency money to fund extra staff, so they may get a special needs student who needs an assistant. They may get an extra 20 students in September that they need to find a staff person for.

I would like to know from the Minister, without a surplus, if my board has no surplus, in such a...