Michael Miltenberger

We share the urgency of the Member in terms of resolving this issue. The capital plan for next year is $75 million for the whole Government of the Northwest Territories. The majority of that money is already subscribed to with multi-year programs. I agree we need to have this issue resolved. We’re working with the Department of Finance, the federal Department of Finance, and the Premier will be taking the opportunity when he meets with the Prime Minister here on Thursday to raise the issue, as well, to impress upon him the urgency of this and that the North stands ready to invest in a lot of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That is the intent, recognizing, of course, as the Member pointed out along with other MLAs, that one of the challenges is the rapid turnover in staff and often the use of locums or casual nurses. It is a challenge.

I appreciate the Member’s comments and feedback. I intend to follow up with the board chair and the deputy minister. Thank you.

As we develop the regulations around the fund, the issue of the investment guidelines in terms of not only being conservative but if there is the will to look at investment in ethical funds if those funds exist, those funds are available and that can easily be built in. I wasn’t quite clear on the whole comment the Member made about bonds, but once again going forward all this information will be available to the 17th Assembly. The 17th Assembly will decide on how this fund is to be fleshed out and if it’s to be invested in and where the money is going to come from and how the investments will...

I will follow up, as I’ve already committed to, and I would point out, as well, that we have very many campaigns about patients’ rights, about the right to know, to take part and know what’s happening with your own care. We’ve got initiatives on healthy living, Get Active. We’ve been pushing people on personal choices to deal with lifestyle, eating, drinking, don’t abuse alcohol, don’t smoke, get some exercise would go a long way to promoting better health in our communities. All those things are ongoing, but I will pass on the urgency of the situation that has been raised here by a number of...

Going back to 1995 in the last century pre division, since that time of the four Assemblies I’ve been in there’s always, during the course of the Assemblies, the issue of resource tax and mineral tax has come up. It’s been discussed, it’s been sort of like looking at a new car. You kick the tires, you examine it, but at the end of the day the decision has always been not to proceed. So the 17th Assembly will have the same authorities and rights that every other Assembly has had before it to look at how it wants to set up its budget, how it wants to deal with the revenue side. So they will be...

Thank you. I will extend the commitment that I made to the Member for Nahendeh as well as the Member for Nunakput about discussing this issue with the deputy minister and the board chairs.

I’d like also to point out that we’re spending millions of dollars in electronic health records, medical records, telehealth. We have a very ambitious plan for a fibre optic line down the valley that would provide fibre optic link to all the communities and give them the best cutting-edge communication services so, in fact, their telehealth systems would work at full capacity. Children would be able to go on...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Member has been in this Assembly 16 budgets, as have I, and we’ve talked since that time about taxes, resource royalty taxes, mining taxes, ways to raise revenue. We’ve tried hotel taxes and road tolls. We contemplated other taxes, as well, increases to the payroll tax. We’ve lived through the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression in the 1930s where we had to be very careful in terms of further negatively impacting the business community at a time when they were suffering significant loss.

The challenge for the 17th Assembly is going to be we are going...

As I indicated to the Member for Nahendeh, I will raise this issue not only with the deputy minister but I’ll be talking to the board chairs about the concern and who, in turn, can talk to the senior staff to deal with the issues and pass on the concern and ensure that every effort is made to provide all the services necessary and that we avoid these types of circumstances. But recognizing, as I said earlier, that over the course of any given day thousands of Northerners successfully go through the doors of health centres. We have to be concerned about those situations that the Member has...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If I could refer the Member to clause 4, that lays out some of the processes that are going to be available to deal with and interact with the public, get public feedback to provide direction and feedback on performance. The topic of holding public meetings to review investment activities in the performance of the fund. The monitoring of the performance. There will be an opportunity through that process to have public input. Of course, there’s always the opportunity through MLAs and through committees as well.

The issue is not so much, in my opinion, the need for additional resources. It’s to try to fill the positions that are already there to avoid the circumstances, that the Member talked about in his statement, where there’s lack of services. The small communities tend to not get the services that they’re expecting on a regular basis, which is a gap that we try to avoid. Thank you.