Lesa Semmler

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, this is where the sunsetting is, so the labour market supplements and the COVID endemic funding. That is what is the decrease within this department. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. You'll find doctors under all three authorities and so that -- here, well, you'll see grants, contributions, and transfers, when we transfer those dollars from the department to the health authorities and later on you'll see in the activities where we -- the health authorities later in the budget, so. But we do have a list of all of the different, like, FPTs, and I think we have a subtotal of 56.5, yes, regular physicians.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following document: Follow-up Letter for Oral Question 59-20(1): Retention Strategies for Health Care Professionals. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I can't commit to phasing them out, and the reason why is I -- you know, I mean, somebody might go on mat leave. You know, somebody might move away. I can't tell the future of what the future of that staffing model will be. You know, we phrased out the -- by utilizing a lot of our education programs, the agency nurses in the operating room but, you know, every time somebody leaves and we don't keep them, you know, there's an opportunity that that service could shut down. And as many -- like as I mentioned in the House this week, is that some of the...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, there has been a number of reviews within this department, and one of the most recent -- you know, we have the governance review. And I have mentioned it in this House, and we're finalizing reviewing that. It was an outside independent review of the governing structure of the NTHSSA. And within programs and policies, I think that's one of the things where when I look at with programs and policies, this is where the direction of the mandate, the direction of the business plans, you know, this is our job as the -- as the Legislative Assembly and, you know, the...

Sorry, Mr. Chair. Just trying to get that. Are you asking -- I'm going to have to get back to the Member unless he can clarify which line item are you?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I can confirm we have things in place already, and I think the more and more we are starting to utilizing them to fill and train specialized nursing, we have a specialized nursing training program. We have the Targeted Academic Support Program. We have professional development initiative funding, which can all be accessed by current staff who wish to gain their certification to work in more specialized areas. And as mentioned, any RN who is interested to being trained in a specialty area can submit their request in a few different ways by applying to the...

Mr. Speaker, we only have two obstetric units in the Northwest Territories. One is at Stanton, one is in Inuvik, and that is currently where they are. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, evidencebased or not, we need a basic delivery service. We need birthing services. We need a birthing service that is going to be staffed. That's what we're working towards. And that is what we are focused on in getting a birthing service in Yellowknife that we can you know, stabilize. Adding you know, expanding midwifery is an extra, like I said, in Yellowknife. It's not an extra in Fort Smith, and it's not an extra in Hay River. And, you know, it expanded from Fort Smith to Hay River. It even expanded in Fort Smith, the more midwifery. And so right now, we're having a hard...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Tlicho Service Agency staffs theirs when when they're on the verge of having no nursing and I know that, from my understanding and this is why I know that there's five, is because everybody time I come to the House I always ask my department, so how many agency nurses we have? Because I know this is going to be a question here. And so but I do know that, you know, the Tlicho Service Agency does utilize them to keep their health centres open and they have, you know, vacancies over the summer and so they may have to utilize those if they cannot find...