Thank you. Member for Monfwi.
Thank you. Okay. NWT wraparound services, my colleague just talked about that. Okay, it's 36 for the upcoming fiscal year, and it's funding provided. It's an agreement with the Government of Canada on crime prevention to support NWT wraparound services. You know, these are the forgotten people that we keep, you know -- it's regarding that, but, you know, the funding is coming from a specific -- for the specific cost. But the forgotten people that I mentioned is that I would like to mention here, people leaving the correctional centre, you know. This is -- I am sure a lot of them will benefit from this kind of program. We see a lot of our young people, especially young, you know, like young adults, that we know it's -- you know, it's overpopulated by the Indigenous, especially Indigenous young people, where a lot of them -- not just them, but there's older ones too, they keep going back to the correctional centre for -- especially with -- due to homelessness. Certain time of year, you know, you see there's an increase. And there's nothing for them after they leave. You know, we've been saying that about people, young people who go for treatment, you know, when they come back, they go back to the same old environment, to the same environment, so they -- a lot of them, you know, they go back to the same pattern before leaving for treatment.
So same thing with these young people, you know. I am sure they don't want to be in there all the time. I am sure they don't like, you know, what's going on. But we're not focusing on them, you know. So I just wanted to ask the Minister, so -- because I think EIA is a department that we can ask of -- you know, of all the departments because you are -- it's the Premier's office, so Premier's office is in charge of everything. So that's why I am ask -- I just wanted to know, you know -- it's here, you said, you know, the program and services for children at risk, youth, and their families. What about, you know -- and those already in contact with the justice systems. But I feel like, you know, they're not getting the support that they need, a lot of them, because they're out on the street for a while, and they go back in, you know. They keep going back in. And I do feel for them, you know. Like, I mean, they don't deserve to be there, a lot of them. But I know the justice system failed them. We know the legal aid failed them as well. You know, they're getting poor legal advice, a lot of them. We know that.
So what are we doing? Are we doing -- what can we -- what -- I am not -- what can we do -- we know what to do, but it's just that the system. I think we need to do more so that our young people do not go back to jail. There's a lot of other options. And we know that because of the -- because of the nature of the crime, even a minor -- or what do you call it -- under 5,000, it could be for a chocolate bar, you know, like, things like that in a convenience store. I mean, they call the police, and they do get charged, and we see them at the courthouse, like, for a chocolate bar. My goodness. Even that -- that shows up on their criminal record. And that kind -- that really holds them back from succeeding in life. So I know that we need to do more. Because that was like -- I mean, about two months ago, I think there was one Yellowknife resident was in the courthouse for a theft under $5,000 for a chocolate bar. I mean, that's absurd. You know, that's really -- I mean, that's wrong. So I just -- I don't feel it here because I don't hear the Minister talking about it too as well, Health and Social Services or other department. What can we do for these young people that are in the justice system? Thank you.
Thank you. I will go to the Minister of Executive Indigenous Affairs.
Thank you, Madam Chair. And I won't speak too much about the justice department. I am not the justice minister. But I take the Member's point. We have a lot of people in the territory who are in and out of jail, who are on the street, who are in a cycle. And, you know, we do it -- you know, we have supports in the territory. You know, we have community counselling. We have SFA. We have these other things. But if people aren't in a place in their life to be housed and to stay out of jail, those types of things might be beyond their capacity at this moment. And so that's why -- that's one of the reasons we're focusing on homelessness like no government before us has ever focused. We are looking at -- not just looking at, we are implementing transitional housing. There's transitional housing here in Yellowknife. There's plans going forward for many more transitional housing units. Because we recognize that the way we've been doing things is not working. People need stability, and they need support. You can give somebody a house -- as MLAs, I am sure we've all helped people get housed, and then they're unhoused in the, you know, not too distant future. We've all seen it happen.
And so it's clear that people need something more to get that stability in their life. And so what we're doing with transitional housing really is that work. Because a lot of folks, it's going to take intensive, you know, support day after day, someone always there who they can count on, they can rely on, who can support them, until they get to the point that they need. So the investments in transitional housing, investments in wraparound supports, I think will help get at what the Member is talking about. Because it's -- we have to deal with people at the individual level.
This is a person-by-person issue, and people need personal support, and that's what we're doing through our initiatives here and our efforts. Thank you.
Thank you. I will go back to the Member from Monfwi.
Thank you. You mentioned the transitional housing. You know, I have a lot of constituents due to no housing, due to lack of housing and homelessness. They're in Yellowknife. And a lot of them are waiting to get into that program over there by the airport. When is the opening date for that place? Because often, you know -- like, I talked to about five people from Tlicho region, and they're saying they're waiting. In the meantime, I see some of my homeless because it's cold. I went to visit -- I visited some of my constituents today at the hospital, and I saw some of them. They said this is the warmest place that we can be. So, you know, I had lunch with some of them.
So, it's just that that's -- it's -- if that transitional unit was open, they're saying that, you know, they would be there right now. But they don't know when it's going to be -- when -- we don't know the official date for opening of that unit. So if the Minister have an idea or when is that unit going to be open so that, you know, our people can start going there and maybe get -- I know there's one that I am -- I was talking to. He's been sober for almost a year. He just needs a place right now, so -- and then he's -- I am -- I am proud of him because he's going -- he's seeking help, you know, but -- and he's trying to stay in a warm place during -- during this season, the cold month.
So -- so do we have a date, opening date for that unit by -- by the airport? Thank you.
Thank you. I will go to the Minister of Indigenous and -- Executive and Indigenous Affairs. Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So it is open. The -- I believe it opened just before Christmas. There were some issues that resulted in people not getting in there as quickly as we would have liked, but those issues have been resolved, and I think it's around half full right now. I did a tour there a couple weeks ago maybe, and they said they have a list of about 140 people, I think, is what was on that list, and not everyone on the list is a good fit for the transitional housing. They have different criteria that they use to, you know, screen people in and screen people out, and this is being done by the Yellowknife Women's -- or the -- yeah, Yellowknife Women's Society. So this is -- these are the folks who they deal with on a regular basis, and so I -- I've got a good sense that they know what they're doing and they have a good handle on the population, and they don't want to put people in there who are going to fail or who are going to cause other people to fail. And I don't have a list of all of their criteria and how they make these decisions, but they're -- they're being careful. But they -- they want to get people in there as quickly as possible as well. There's maybe not as many people ready for -- for that type of unit as we would have hoped because we have such great needs in the territory and so many people still are struggling with addictions, but I am hopeful that we're going to get that full to its 24-bed capacity in the near future. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. At this time, I am going to call a recess, and we'll continue. We'll resume once we come back.
---SHORT RECESS
Okay. We have no further questions.
Please turn to page 136, Executive and Indigenous Affairs, governance and service integration, $12,894,000. Does the committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Moving on to health care systems sustainability on pages 139, with an information item on page 141. Minister, would you like to change your witnesses.
Yes, I would, Madam Chair. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Sergeant-at-Arms, would you please escort the witnesses from the chamber and escort the ones that need to come in.
Okay, would the Minister please introduce his witnesses.
Thank you, Madam Chair. To my right is Terence Courtoreille, associate deputy minister, healthcare system sustainability.
Thank you. Healthcare system sustainability on page 139, with an information item on page 141. Are there any questions?
Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Just one sort of overarching question for the unit. Is it anticipated if the health sustainability unit will be making an evaluation plan or plans to -- as part of the work that they are doing in this space? And if that is the case, could those plans be shared with the committee? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I will go to the Minister of Executive and Indigenous Affairs.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Well, there's a lot of planning, and there's a lot of analysis, so maybe I will go to the associate deputy minister for some detail on the specifics. Thank you.
Thank you. Associate deputy minister Courtoreille.
Thank you, Madam Chair. There is a monitoring evaluation plan that we have which guides our work and that -- the details of that plan are posted online, and we'd be happy to share that again through my Minister if that's the desire.
We also have -- and Members might recall this phase of our work is being prioritized into seven areas, and as we go through each of those areas, we're conducting assessments, all of which are targeted towards the 2027-2028 business planning cycle later this summer or early fall. So we're currently in the middle of completing those assessments. Between now and July, we anticipate to have five of those seven priority areas completed. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I will go back to the Member for Great Slave.
Great. Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you for that. I guess just diving slightly below the surface, then, is there an anticipation that the monitoring and evaluation plans for those seven areas that Mr. Courtoreille spoke about, would those then transfer into HSS and NTHSSA as this unit reaches the end goal of its purpose to find the sustainability features? Like, will the work that's done to monitor and evaluate these functions then carry over into the health system, I guess is the best way to put it. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I will go to associate deputy minister Courtoreille.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, certainly we're not doing this work in isolation. We do work with the department of health on these initiatives, and as we progress through each of those seven priority areas. We also work with the authorities and the program areas as we complete those assessments. We actually have a project team that is being comprised of those agencies, and we meet on a monthly basis to review our work and to review progress. But the end goal again, again, Madam Chair, is to have those recommendations compiled and considered as part of the next budget cycle. Thank you, ma'am.
Thank you. I will go back to the Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I am absolutely convinced that my colleagues have better questions than I do, so I will cede my time. Thank you.
Thank you. Any further questions? Yellowknife North, Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So with this unit, there's only a few parts of the business plan that speak to what the targets or goals are on this unit, and they -- that's on page 11 to 12 of the business plan, or page 95 to 96 in our full binders here. And they all have to do with the activity or the goal of defining what are the core programs and services to be delivered. And, in fact, when you look at the public fact sheets that the unit has put out in terms of what do we do, what do we want to achieve, again it says what do we want to achieve. We're going to take a system-wide approach and determine how to sort of answer the question. The fundamental question is what programs and services should be offered. And yet the steps that have been taken so far -- you know, we also have a vague sense that this has to do with saving money, being more efficient. So the unit looked at what are the top things costing money and, you know, a list of top seven things that are taking 70 percent of the system's cost growth, and they're all things that we have to do. Addictions recovery, foster care, long-term care, medical travel. Medical travel is the biggest one, unsurprisingly. Physician services, paying for doctors, out of territory physicians and hospital services, and supported living.
Okay, Identifying that those things cost the most money doesn't answer the question what are the core things that we should offer or not offer.
So this unit sort of continually has perplexed me in the sense of all of the official targets say that the whole point of this exercise is to figure out what's core and not core and then I guess to save money by not doing the things we decide are not core, but then when you zero in on how to save money, it brings us back to things that I think are unarguably core. We got to do those things, but we somehow have to do them more efficiently. And there's mention here and there sprinkled into the HSSU of -- that the unit is going to recommend ways to make some of these existing programs more efficient. But I am not clear how the unit's going to go about that or with the -- you know, the staffing complement, the -- like, do they have experts in, you know, for example, how we can use virtual care to save money on medical travel -- you know, like, how we're actually going to save money on these things requires, you know, expertise of practitioners, people -- people in the system. And so I guess I am not sure how to reconcile the official overarching goal with how we're actually going to save money. So maybe in essence that's a whole speech. I have my little soapbox to start. But maybe my first question will be if it seems that much of the work of this unit is looking at the big ticket items that we're offering that seem kind of non-negotiable to me and how to make them more efficient, why is none of that mentioned in the business plan, and we only see in the business plan the goal of identifying core versus non-core health services? Thank you, Madam Chair. I will start there.
Thank you. I will go to the Minister for Executive and Indigenous Affairs.
Thank you. So the business plan, it's light on the healthcare system sustainability unit because the unit is to look at the services and provide an analysis to Cabinet. There's not much beyond that. I mean, that's a lot of work, but it's a very narrow and targeted focus. And so the goal of the unit is to do that work and provide advice to Cabinet. So, I mean, if you look at bed-based addictions treatment, if the argument is that we are delivering that as perfectly and efficiently as possible, then there would be no purpose for us to go and look at that. I am not of the opinion that we're doing everything perfectly and as efficiently as possible, and that's why we are digging into this because, as I've said before, during my time in Cabinet, I could not get an answer on where the money's going. I couldn't get a handle on why the costs keep rising, how many new positions we had, or anything like that. And so this unit is able to look at what we're doing, look at alternatives that perhaps haven't been looked at because that's not the way things have always been done, and provide that type of advice. So an issue we often run into -- I often run into anyways at Cabinet -- is that the issues are in the weeds, and we're not in the weeds. I am not out there, you know, embedded in a health care centre. And so we need to be able to get into the weeds a bit and have it presented to us in a digestible way to understand what's going on and what changes that we can make. So to say, you know, bed-based addictions treatment, yes, that's essential. Every jurisdiction in Canada provides this service, we're going to continue to provide the service, and we want to do it better and at less of a cost to the taxpayer so we have more money to put into other services. Thank you.
Thank you. I will go back to the Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Is it fair to say at this point that most of the money that we can save here is not going to come from finding non-core services and eliminating them? Is that fair after this -- where we've got to so far with the analysis of what is costing the most money, what is growing the most in money in cost, is that a fair conclusion? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I will go to the Minister of Executive and Indigenous Affairs.
Sorry, Madam Chair. If I can get some clarification, there was some double negatives. I lost the thread on that one. Sorry, thank you.
Thank you. Member for Yellowknife North.
Okay, I will try to -- I will try to be more clear. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Is it fair to say that the cost savings are going to be found in making existing programs and services more efficient rather than in looking for programs and services that we can label as non-core and then eliminating them? Is that clear? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I will go back to the Minister of Executive and Indigenous Affairs.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I think that my hope -- and, again, there's a lot of work to be done here. I've seen the very first analysis so far. We're part of it. And just from what I've seen, there is money to be saved while still continuing to deliver the service. And so I don't think that we have a plethora of different programs that we can just cut and get rid of. In the North, we have to over-capitalize. We have to provide services even when there's a small number of people who need those services because that's what governments do. And so we're going to continue to do those. But within those services, I believe we're going to find the savings. There might be some services that we determine that we're not going to continue. But from what I've seen so far -- and of course this can change because, as I've said I've seen one of these, there is savings within the programs. Thank you.
Thank you. I will go back to the Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So one of the observations that is printed in the unit's preliminary analysis fact sheet last year -- well, there's two main observations, that there could be better financial tracking but, secondly, that there is overlap within corporate service functions across the system. And this is something that we hear anecdotally from lots of people within the healthcare system who work within it. And it was supposed to be one of the core sort of parts of the work plan of the public administrator. You know, there's this sense amongst lots of people that there seems to be overlap and too much concentration of people working in the sort of administrative level versus frontline level in the healthcare system and, you know, we have health authorities, we have the department, there's lots of different offices. So if this is one of the early insights, how is this unit going to get at how we can streamline that sort of administrative or corporate level within the healthcare system and eliminate some of that duplication? Is it a matter of getting into the weeds, or at what level is this unit going to do that analysis? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I will go to the Minister of Executive and Indigenous Affairs.
Thank you. So right now the analysis is being -- is focused on the programs that have been prioritized and the areas that have been prioritized, as the Member mentioned those seven areas earlier. But that said, through the work it's evident that there are areas of duplication. There's NTHSSA, there's the Department of Health and Social Services, there's the Department of Infrastructure and finance, and among all of those, there's overlap for capital, for privacy, for IT, and there's areas that we know that we can look at to address some of that overlap. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Next, I will go to Member for Frame Lake.
Okay, thank you, Madam Chair. So, yeah, I am going to continue on a very similar thread to what my colleague was just asking. And I guess a few questions I've had about the unit.
One is that, you know, the unit has been established now for a while, and they've staffed up and it sounds like gotten well into their work with some results coming to us in the near future. I am just wondering, you know, was there ever -- and I do apologize if I've missed a report or an update somewhere. That is easy to do in this job. But were there any short-term changes that have been identified? I mean, the previous Member was just starting to speak to things like administration. And, yeah, I am wondering if the unit has been able to identify any kind of short-term wins that have come out and, like -- or light bulb moments where it's like, wow, we really weren't tracking this thing and by doing so we figured out that money was getting spent that didn't need to be. Have there been any insights like that?
Thank you. I will go to the Minister of Executive and Indigenous Affairs.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So the idea is really for a comprehensive look at some of these areas that will then be presented to Cabinet to make decisions. So it's not so much an iterative, here's some information, you should go and fix this. It's going to be a -- I would say a bigger initiative than that. There's a lot going on in the healthcare system and, you know, which is why we have the unit, because the healthcare system is too busy to do these -- to look into these kinds of things, essentially, and so I don't want to pepper them with, you know, try and make this change, make this change, make this change. They're doing their own review, they're doing their own program enhancements, all of those things. And so the system was continuing to be the system and do what they do. We are working sort of behind the scenes, gathering information so that we can make better decisions. And from the information that is gathered, there are short-term wins in there that the health system could adopt. We do make that known to them when we come across something, that we do point it out. But I'd have to defer to the Minister of health in terms of how they are adopting those. Thank you.
Thank you. I will go back to the Member for Frame Lake.
Okay, thank you. Certainly, I think we may have identified an area where the department could maybe follow up with us in writing afterwards. Just knowing that there have been things identified and that follow-up is happening in a different department, I would be curious to hear that progress. I think it would be helpful for us to know and understand. But we have limited time here, so I am going to move on.
I know that there was a report that was released early in our term. I am deeming it the MMP report. I can't remember what its official name was. But it had a number of recommendations for efficiencies that could be found. And I am just wondering if that report and the recommendations in it have been considered by the unit. I am sure that there's probably a number of those, not necessarily MMP-derived reports but reports about how we can achieve better system sustainability of this or that unit. Like, for example, you know, we were asking the health Minister just the other day about the supported living review. Well, there was a bunch of recommendations in that review for supported living, and now the unit is reviewing supported living. And the Minister has been telling us that we can't make the changes that the review recommended because the unit's not working. So the difficulty I get into as kind of a Member of the public and a layperson looking out into the system is that we have a lot of these reports, and it seems to me like in some ways if we just went ahead and implemented some of the things in the reports, we'd be ten steps ahead as opposed to reviewing and reviewing and reviewing. So I am wondering if the Minister can comment on whether the unit's been able to use recommendations from some of the many existing reviews that we've already done, that we've paid a lot of good money for and spent a good amount of time on. Thank you.
Thank you. I will go to the Minister of Executive and Indigenous Affairs.
