Kieron Testart

Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Thursday, October 31st, 2024, I will move the following motion:

Now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, that the House call on the Auditor General of Canada to conduct a performance audit of all aspects of the management of the Northwest Territories Health and Social Services Authority in its delivery of health care services, including medical travel and the recruitment and retention of nurses, doctors, and allied health professionals, and to prioritize this investigation;

And furthermore, that the Speaker formally transmit...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, nurses and doctors have to deal with as many as three systems, not just one. Only -- I think only one of them is electronic. The other two are paper systems. So what is the Minister's -- will these changes phase out paper? Let's just leave it limited on Stanton where a lot -- a great deal of these issues are creating bottlenecks. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I said in my Member's statement, the NWT has no access to -- does not have access to a medical communication system that's vital for diagnostic imaging which requires health care professionals to put scans on disks and then send it down with patients on appointments on medical travel. Can the Minister speak to what her plan is to resolve this so we can bring our health care system into the modern era. Thank you?

Mr. Speaker, the digital age dawned so long ago that now our kids are almost born with a smartphone in hand and could not ever contemplate a world without high-speed internet. Indeed, our kids are now teaching us how to use our own laptops and phones. Yet, here in the NWT where the latest generation of health care professionals enter the workforce, they are forced into the way-back machine to relearn obsolete technology. Why? It's because NTHSSA still sends most diagnostic imaging onto CD-ROMs while other jurisdictions continue to upgrade dedicated medical communication networks. Using CDs to...

I'm curious now, Mr. Chair, so I'm going to ask. As the Minister is the Minister responsible for Climate Change and the government's climate change plan, and he's got officials there, is it possible to calculate the carbon emissions or carbon impact of one truck in the GNWT fleet? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Well, that is very positive. And I know most of northern Alberta is on very heavy fossil fuels so creating a pressure valve for them would probably be in their interest. Also the Grays Bay Port project could be a new link for sealift into the Northwest Territories. Is that something the Minister has looked at as well, to lower cost of living in the Northwest Territories by providing sealift from, say, the port of Montreal rather than trucking everything in with heavy trucks? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So as this is a very lively discussion around these infrastructure projects, can the Minister indicate if these, Taltson, Slave Geological Province Road, Mackenzie Valley Highway, if they're revenue generating projects. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I can tell you my constituents are frustrated. I can tell you this family is very frustrated. I hope the Minister will bring something practical about how to improve the system. But one thing I'll say, the rates are far too low to cover the costs of today. When is the Minister going to adjust those rates to reflect the reality of today's costs? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the Minister's doing this work but if they've -- and they've moved medical travel into the department so the Minister can really weigh on these things and it's not arm's length distance in the authorities. But what's the point of doing that if there's no exemptions that can be made? So can the Minister clarify what the exemption policy is for medical escorts, not for the people who are medivaced but for medical escorts. Thank you.

Thank you. So -- well, that's -- anyway, that sound very positive. I think the one thing that we've become aware of is that the NWT -- or we need more national coordination on this. We need more things like task team 2 that can do operations in the Northwest Territories persistently and not just when we have an emergency and whenever, you know, federal public safety initiatives around emergency forces and things like that or disaster relief forces. So I think having a facility like this sounds like a good way to anchor the NWT in that process because we have a -- you know, a high quality...