Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Minister Lee.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Lee.

I commend you guys on the placement of the grads. I think that’s fantastic; I think it’s going a long way to helping us with our nursing problem.

My question was more around…. I understand that the enrolments are dropping, but to me that’s very worrisome. We need to keep those numbers up, and we need be graduating as many northern nurses as we can. So my question to you is: what are the department and the government going to do to continue to get people to enrol in this program and succeed? If the nursing students are facing challenges with child care and finances, what are we going to do to...

Mr. Cummings.

I’d like to take a second to recognize Ms. Kathy Tetso in the gallery. She’s the CEO of the Health and Social Services Authority.

I think that’s great. I think the PLAR process is an important one and certainly an avenue to help some of our nurses get to the level of NP. It’s good to hear that that’s where some of the money’s going and we’ll be continuing to invest in our current nurses who wish to upgrade to nurse practitioners.

I want to drop back to the Community Health Nurse Development Program. As I indicated before, there was specific reference in the Premier’s statement to enhancing the Community Health Nurse Development Program, but based on the reductions, it looks like you’re cutting the program by four...

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Ms. Bisaro.

The Department of Health and Social Services has a mandate. In reviewing the positions you’re eliminating, how did you determine which ones weren’t contributing to the mandate of the department and, therefore, you were justified in eliminating? I want to know what type of analysis you did in relation to what your mandate is, and how you chose to eliminate specific positions and not adversely affect your mandate.

So what are you going to be using this THAF money for? To help develop nurse practitioners?