Glen Abernethy

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm not going to make that commitment, but what I will commit to is having the department sit down and quantify what it thinks it will take as far as timelines to determine and work with the authority to define how wait lists will be determined and, from there, how long it will take to find a mechanism to reasonably and responsibly make that information public on a regular basis. I will commit to having the department do the analysis on how long they think that will take, and share that with committee.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. You'll notice, in the document in front of you, there is a column of actuals for 2017-2018. As we know, those are based on the actual numbers after recalculations and whatnot in that fiscal year. Last year, 2018-2019, or rather this current year, we had a big base adjustment that brought our mains up to the $29,278,000. We anticipate that there will still be a minor supplementary that might increase that number slightly, but this is the base amount that we have moved forward with on each year. We recognize that, given that these ultimately are based on actuals, there...

Sure, absolutely, but as people come back with information, they do apply some principles and theories that may be beyond some of the scope of what we are currently doing and providing. In this particular case, there were recommendations about how work is provided or how work flows within Avens. They want to look at their operations to see what opportunities exist there and what that might equate to once they attempt to implement some of those things. There is work that needs to be done so that we can actually totally have a sense of what the costs will be.

In the report, there are also some...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. When we finalize the plan, we intend to do some communication through our existing medical travel program. We will certainly do some press releases. We will make sure that the information is included on the appropriate websites so people can see it and are aware of it and are aware of the other mechanisms that may be available to them to help them offset some of those costs, so that they know well in advance. Our anticipation is that we won't make the decision and roll it out the next day, that we will have some time in between so people are aware it is coming.

Mr. Chair, the money from the mental health and addictions, which was $450,000 and now moved to $250, $200,000 of that has actually been moved into the line directly below, on-the-land healing fund, as part of the increase there of $725,000. Some of that money is new, but some of that money has been moved into this area from that area, so it is still in the budget. It has just moved. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, right now, the answer is no, but I, like the Member, believe it's important for people to know, and the department is working to getting to the point where we can report on some wait times. It is not here today, but it is work that is being done. I want to see it. The Member wants to see it. I think I've been asked in the House over the last couple of days a number of questions on wait times. People want to see it, so I will be directing the department to find a way to make that information public. Having said that, these investments we're making today will help us reduce the wait...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Those funds are actually included within the capital project, as part of the total capital process. They're not part of the O and M costs.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I really appreciate the Member's comments about the relationship that is necessary between Health and Social Services and the school system. When we entered into this initiative, there was a lot of conversation that, the school boards, some of them actually have some dollars to do something like this, and they haven't always been able to do it, but one of the goods things was those people were employees of the school boards and they were part of the team. We didn't want to lose that team environment. We didn't want to lose that relationship, but we also accepted that it...

Without question, Mr. Chair, some individuals will notice a slight increase in their co-payment. Like I said, following the suggestions from committee, we're trying to reduce the number of individuals who are impacted. We are modifying the thresholds. We are changing and including different thresholds to help us ensure that we don't affect too many of our people. We've also been contemplating some other mechanisms to help support those individuals, but until such time as we get a bit more of that work done, and I anticipate it will be very shortly, we are just trying to verify some things...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This government is committed to fighting and addressing poverty as one of the many partners necessary to fight that battle, but there are limited funds, and there were significant amounts of mandate items that we needed to make some progress on.

Recognizing that there are multiple areas that are actually addressing poverty, housing, education, and many other things that we are doing, we felt, given that we had the $500,000 last year, that we weren't in a position to seek more when we had so many other priority areas to spend a very limited amount of money on. Thank you, Mr...