Robert Hawkins

Mr. Speaker, as I said in my Member’s statement, Northern House, in my view, is a clear example of hard work and certainly an excellent demonstration of what the North has to offer.

Mr. Speaker, I’ve been highlighting my issue, trying to raise awareness about preparing for RV'ers, and certainly I know the staff working down there are clearly providing excellent examples of how people can get here and things to do. But if all that work is for naught, if we’re not prepared for them, I’d like to find out from the Minister what type of work is being done by Industry, Tourism and Investment to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today I talked about tourism, my support of it, and certainly I recognize the hard work going on in the ITI shop to make sure that the Northwest Territories is certainly advocated in a very positive way to attract tourism. But one of the areas that I’d like to find out today and lay before this House is what is this government doing specifically to provide services for that type of tourism market. I referred to the RV sector, which is a very popular tourism group. Mr. Speaker, specific to investment in the Northwest Territories, what is the...

Mr. Chairman, I guess my question next being is: has it ever been put to these organizations, each of the individual 15 tables, about would it be in their interest to consider accelerating negotiations and searching for principles that would work to accelerate it? Has that question been put to them? Thank you.

Thanks, Mr. Chairman. I move that committee reports progress. Thank you.

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Thank you, Mr. Speaker. With all due respect, I don’t think the Minister sees what I’m trying to get at, which is the fact that I agree that the public system is there to top up, I agree that the public system is to back up the person as the backstop, and I definitely agree that the public system is the safety net provided to all our citizens. My fear is that we’re leaving potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars or even up to millions of dollars over the course of a number of years that we’re not tapping into the third-party insurance that is legally mandated. I’m not asking her to make...

Then by saying that we all have to work together, does that then not instil the reality that someone could obtain a veto or what is the process therein? Thank you.

I appreciate the answer from the Minister. When I say this it is not directed at the Minister, it’s the problem. I want to say this can’t be actually taken lightly. People have to be well aware that we could actually be saving a lot of money out of the public purse if we considered this opportunity and in many cases a reality. Is there a policy within the Department of Health and Social Services that when somebody arrives at Stanton or any other health centres, one of the first questions in their information forms that they fill out is do you have third-party insurance that could cover these...

Mr. Chairman, does the Premier have the support of these northern leaders for this type of transfer? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m really glad to hear we have the policy office, because I suspect they never make a mistake so that’s why we have no appeal process. It’s sad to say that we don’t live in a perfect world, so I guess my question would be to the Minister, then, is what’s stopping us from setting up an appeal process if a person is denied medical travel so we don’t have to drag it to the Assembly floor time after time after time again and we can deal with it probably in a peer review process, especially when a lot of things are denied when they have medical letters supported by doctors’...

Thank you. I’ll certainly accept that.

The next phase is what work has been identified that’s stopping the transfer of these types of employees to the Northwest Territories? Thank you.