Kevin O'Reilly

I thank the Minister again for that information. I am glad that he recognizes that overtime is stressful on our employees, and that the idea of relief workers is a good one. I will be tracking this during the rest of my term, certainly. As I mentioned earlier today, though, a great deal of the overtime is concentrated in Health and Social Services authorities, and Stanton hospital alone accounted for 18 per cent of the overtime costs. This may not come as a surprise to our healthcare and social workers, but I believe this is causing a lot of stress and burnout. What is our government doing to...

Merci, Monsieur le President. Earlier today, I offered some observations on statistics for employees as provided by the Minister of Human Resources, now the Minister of Finance. There appear to be about 100 vacant, undetermined departmental positions at any given time. Can the Minister explain whether this is comparable to other jurisdictions, and what efforts we are making to improve our recruitment efficiency? Merci, Mr. Speaker.

Merci, Monsieur le President. On February 14, 2017, I sent a Valentine's Day message to the Minister of Human Resources, in the form of a set of written questions regarding vacancy and overtime statistics. I recognize this was a complicated and lengthy set of questions, and that the department likely had to expend a fair amount of effort to pull together that information. I sincerely thank the Minister and his staff for pulling the information together.

Today, I offer some observations on that data tabled in this House on May 25th. The vacancies in our department for indeterminate positions...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I'm pleased to recommend the Health Statutes Amendment Act, Cremation Services, Bill 30, for the consideration of this Assembly. This is a private Member's bill which proposes amendments to the Public Health Act and to the Vital Statistics Act. All Canadian jurisdictions except the Northwest Territories and Nunavut have legislation for cremation. The private Member's bill does not seek to create new powers with respect to cremation. It does not create any new regulatory structure to govern the performance of cremation. Above all, the private Member's bill does not...

Merci, Monsieur le President. For my second question, my questions are for the Premier. Members of Cabinet and their support staff travelled to Ottawa in November 2016 for intergovernmental meetings and parliamentary presentations. In his January 31, 2017 reply to my written question, the Premier said that "there were no lobbyists or consultants engaged in the planning or coordination of this trip." Can the Premier explain why we pay the lobbyist firm Earnscliffe Strategy Group more than $120,000 per year to provide "media and government relations and communications" services in Ottawa, but...

Merci, Monsieur le President. Thanks to the Minister for that response. Of course, I have expressed in this House my view that I think the appointments should be made by the Minister himself rather than a deputy minister, but when those names are finalized, is there a commitment from the Minister to release them publicly and make them available to the Members on this side as well? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thanks to the Minister for that response. A few more questions about the Yellowknife Airport Evolution statement that he made earlier today. I know I had asked previously whether the terms of reference for the Economic Advisory Committee were public, and now there are two more committees, an Airline Consultative Committee and an Airline Operating Committee. I am kind of confused here, but are there terms of reference for each of these, and can the Minister provide them to this side and make them public?

Merci, Monsieur le President. I truly do appreciate the commitment of the Minister to look into that and provide further information to us on this side. Sick leave hours for employers are concentrated in the Health and Social Services authorities and in the Department of Justice. While I can understand how health and social workers are often overworked and need to take sick leaves, it's not clear what is happening in Justice. Can the Minister explain these patterns of sick leave and what are we doing to improve employee wellness? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the Minister for his response. Our government is spending a lot of money, more than $11 million between April 2016 and mid-February 2017, on overtime. Can the Minister explain what efforts we are making to reduce overtime, and whether that includes hiring more full-time staff at a reduced cost?

Merci, Monsieur le President. I would like to recognize one of our Pages, Michael Le. He is a resident of the Frame Lake riding, and he is a student at the Weledeh School. I just want to thank all the Pages for their work during this short sitting and congratulate them all on their selection for serving us and working with us over the duration of the last week. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.