Statements in Debates
As I indicated, through BETTER project we’ve developed these motivational videos. We’ve been working with Education, Culture and Employment that has a project called Screen Smart, which is introduced in NWT schools to help children who may be obese to pursue healthy living so they don’t develop type 2 diabetes later in life. I’m not 100 percent sure; I can’t remember the exact program the Member is referring to with respect to diabetes education, but we are, through our public health unit, getting information out there on diabetes to make sure people are as informed as possible. If the Member...
Midwifery services, as I indicated in the business planning process and the budget planning process, there will be planning that will take place during the ’15-16 fiscal year and into the ’16-17 fiscal year. We’re hoping by the end of the ’16-17 fiscal year we should be in a position to have a real solid plan of how many midwives we need and begin the staffing process. Thank you.
When that number or that decision to put a midwifery program in the Beaufort-Delta was originally decided or originally included in the report, a number of realities were quite different. We actually didn’t have stable physicians in the Beaufort-Delta providing birthing services. They had not implemented the MORE OB program in that particular region and the birth numbers were quite high.
Since that time and prior to this decision, birthing rates in the Beaufort-Delta had stabilized. We had full-time, stable physicians in the community who had actually gone out and put in the MORE OB...
Yes, I do.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the gallery today I would like to recognize Ms. Fernanda Martins, relationship development coordinator; and Nikki Groebbecker, the revenue development coordinator with the Alberta/NWT Division of the Canadian Cancer Society and I’d like to thank them and the society for their ongoing advocacy and support of people with cancer. Thank you so much. Welcome to the gallery.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to thank the mover and seconder for bringing this motion to the floor as well as bringing the important discussion. I’ve listened carefully to all the Members and what I think is clear is that addressing the issues of individuals living with disabilities is a shared responsibility, and clearly we need to work together on solutions, whether that’s government to government or governments working with NGOs or NGOs working together. We must all work together in meaningful partnerships to actually make change and bring about change for people with disabilities.
To...
It’s a shared responsibility across the Government of the Northwest Territories depending on the different portfolios. Housing has a significant number of responsibilities around persons with disabilities and they have been addressing those. As does MACA with communities, as does Health and Social Services, things that we’ve done around the Early Childhood Development Action Plan, work around respite. As the Minister responsible, one of my responsibilities is to share information across the different departments and ensure that they are working towards a common goal, but it doesn’t change the...
Aside from medical travel, the Department of Health and Social Services isn’t actually involved in transportation, but I have had this issue raised to me and we have shared this information with MACA, who has indicated to me that the community government could choose to use either their gas tax or community public infrastructure funding to purchase handivans in their communities to provide services to their residents. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The Department of Education, Culture and Employment has taken the lead on the Labour Market Agreement for Persons with Disabilities. The labour agreement was signed with the Government of Canada in February 2014 to provide funding to better support education and training and to put more employment participation for persons with disabilities. This agreement is one of a series of labour market agreements successfully negotiated between the GNWT, particularly the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, and the Government of Canada with some targeted initiatives for some older workers and...
I’ve reviewed that, as well, and it is an incredibly good document. I do want to applaud the NWT Disabilities Council for their initiative and incredibly hard work.
As I’ve indicated, we’ve taken action on a number of items that were in the initial action plan that was provided and they’ve been included in a different strategies or different action items that we’ve been moving forward, like the early childhood development. We’ve done a significant amount of work around respite. Moving forward, the type of information that was provided to us is going to help us inform these different program...