Kevin O'Reilly

Thanks to the Minister for that. Obviously, we will want to make sure that many of our special needs are recognized and incorporated into the national list.

The national advisory council report also contained a recommendation on a way to deal with the supply of medications for rare conditions, which are often some of the most expensive prescriptions. Can the Minister explain how this element of the proposal should work in the Northwest Territories?

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I am still learning about the legislative process, but my understanding was that, when a bill is before committee, Ministers are not supposed to be doing something with the bill. It is standing committee's right and ability to work with the bill and get public input and seek changes. That is what the role of committee is.

With two of the pieces of legislation that were before standing committee, we only found out late in the day that the Minister, while the bill was before committee, had actually gone out and had discussions or their staff had gone and had discussions with...

Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services regarding the development of a national pharmacare program. First, could the Minister explain what our role was in relation to the national Advisory Council on the Implementation of National Pharmacare, and what our role will be going forward, especially with regard to prescription drug costs and improved health outcomes? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I know that the reason that this recommendation is here is because, in my opening remarks, I talked about how different departments had different approaches to the co-development of legislation. I am not trying to pick on anybody, but it is on the public record that the Department of Lands did not use a co-drafting process for a variety of reasons, which seemed to point to the lack of capacity of the Indigenous governments to deal with that bill, in addition to all of the other bills that were brought forward by Cabinet.

It would have been helpful for committee to know that...

Merci, Monsieur le President. In June, the National Advisory Council on the Implementation of National Pharmacare released its final report, containing the recommendation that the Government of Canada work in partnership with provincial and territorial governments to establish universal, single-payer, public prescription drug coverage for all Canadians. As the only nation in the world with a public healthcare system that does not include prescription medicine coverage, this improvement is long overdue.

A universal national system would extend coverage to include the estimated one in five...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I agree with what may colleagues on the committee have said here. We were getting correspondence from Indigenous governments, and after the closure date for public submissions, that wanted to submit additional information and, in some cases, actually better understand what the process was. So I think it became clear to committee that there was not really a lot of understanding of the legislative process and what the role is for standing committee. We are not the government. We are not the ones who wrote the legislation in the first place. Our job is to actually review it and...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. The intention of this motion, it's my understanding that Indigenous governments, their staff don't need or necessarily want to be engaged or involved in any change that's made to regulations or legislation, but why not sit down and have a discussion, work out when they would like to be engaged and involved around certain subject matters, types of changes that might be made and so on. I think the suggestion is a helpful one to sit down and work this kind of arrangement out so that it's in everybody's best interest. They know how they're going to work together in the future...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I want to commend our committee for spending some time thinking about this. I wish that we had had the luxury of a little bit more time.

I don't think that we sufficiently appreciate that this is a watershed moment in governance in the Northwest Territories. GNWT actually took over management of land and water resources. As part of that arrangement, there were commitments, maybe even legal requirements, that changes in the way that things are done, in terms of how we relate to land and water, have to be done differently now. There are requirements in place that Indigenous...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I'd like to thank the committee for letting me sit in on some of the deliberations they had in Yellowknife around Bill 45, and I want to thank the committee. I think this is a clear example of how consensus government can and should work.

I know that at one point there were actually almost no, or virtually no, written submissions that the committee had received, and I want to recognize the work of my colleague the honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre in seeking out some expert reviews of the bill. She certainly went the extra distance, and that's the kind of job that we...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I give notice that, on Friday, August 23, 2019, I will move the following motion: Now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Great Slave, that the Legislative Assembly repeal the Rules of the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories originally adopted on May 27, 2015, and adopt the newest version of the Rules of the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories identified as Tabled Document 510-18(3);

And further, that the new Rules of the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories, upon adoption of this motion, come into effect...