The bill actually allows us the flexibility to roll in Hay River. Whether it’s all up front or whether we transition it over a time, the bill actually gives us the freedom to roll it in.

Yes.

Thank you. We provide training or, rather, we partner in training for individuals that are taking or interested in resident care. Its primary focus right now is on the facilities, but that training is something that certainly we can look at expanding to other individuals to provide that type of support in communities throughout the Northwest Territories. So, resident care as well as home support workers. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. One of the large things we’re doing is actually the system transformation, which will allow us to focus our resources more appropriately than we have in the past. This will make an actual improvement in all areas of health and social services in the Northwest Territories, including the supports that we provide with home care. It will also ensure that we have a consistent approach for home care across the Northwest Territories. We also have partnerships with the NWT Seniors’ Society and we do provide them with a significant amount of money to run a number of different...

As I indicated previously, the territorial model’s primary goal is to support the knowledge and skill capacity of community health nurses through continued interaction and direct clinical support with midwives. This will benefit all NWT communities by raising the standard of community maternity care. This is one of the primary goals of a territorial program. There’s also the secondary benefit of being able to provide some midwifery support to residents of Yellowknife who choose to access those types of services.

The fact is, at the end of the day, if a patient is at risk, if there are any...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. One of the challenges we face around midwifery and providing birthing services in communities outside of Fort Smith, Hay River, Yellowknife and Beaufort-Delta, Inuvik in particular, is that we need to make sure the facilities are appropriate, that individuals can receive the proper diagnostic and specialist obstetric or services such as C-section. Most of our communities don’t have the capacity to provide that type of service. So we need to make sure we focus our attention where we can actually provide birthing services.

What we’re talking about now is pushing midwifery...

Just for clarity, the Midwifery Program that was in Yellowknife was never funded. It actually never had core dollars to fund that program. It was funding the authority had taken out of other programs in order to create midwifery services.

I’m still committed to midwifery services, I always have been, which is one of the reasons we are looking at re-envisioning how we roll out midwifery services over the next couple of years.

As I indicated, we had planned to move forward with Beaufort-Delta. Things look like they might be changing. There have been some alternate proposals submitted to us on how...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Unfortunately, the position in Fort Smith is still not filled. We’ve attempted to go out and recruit that position a number of times and every recruitment activity has proved unsuccessful. We are intending to fill the position and we continue to go out and recruit and we hope that we do find somebody to fill that position in short order.

At the same time, we have filled the two positions in Hay River. That program has started. They’ve already started meeting with clients and we anticipate that the midwives in Hay River could be facilitating a birth in the community as...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Tu Nedhe, that Bill 44, An Act to Amend the Hospital Insurance and Health and Social Services Administration Act, be read for the second time.

Mr. Speaker, this bill includes amendments to the Hospital Insurance and Health and Social Services Administration Act that would require the Minister to:

develop a territorial plan for health and social services;

authorize the Minister to establish regional councils to provide advice with respect to health services and social services;

authorize the Minister to establish a territorial...

No final decision has been made. We are open to any discussion, but I would say at this time it is envisioned that a territorial program will be based in Yellowknife as this will enable a broader scope of women with certain risk factors to assess midwifery care for at least a portion of their care through the easy access to diagnostic services, specialist obstetrics, as well as for ability for immediate access to C-sections and other emergency procedures if needed. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.