Norman Yakeleya

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, want to join my colleagues here on asking for nurses in our small communities. I think of this as a P3 project and in the departmental mission we are to promote, protect and provide healthy well-being to the people of the Northwest Territories, and certainly our small communities fit under that criteria as people of the Northwest Territories.

How long have our small communities done without any type of full-time nurses on a full-time basis? How many communities right now can truly say we do not have a full-time nurse in our community? We do have fly-ins, if the...

Thank you. I would also ask the Minister if he would possibly look at the possibility of bringing some of the training to the Sahtu region. I don’t know if that’s to be split. I don’t know if it’s cost-effective, but also we would like see some of the training being done in the Sahtu region on some of these positions that are going to be created with the long-term care facility.

The Minister outlined various numbers of positions and requirements to get into these types of health careers.

I want to ask the Minister, is he working closely with the Department of Education, Culture and Employment and any other institutions to get the awareness, the presentations in the high schools? Because the construction will be completed in 2016, preparing our young people, like I said, the potential number of candidates that are going to graduate this year. There are a number of students who are now in post-secondary institutions. This is a facility that’s going to be completed in two...

Thank you, Madam Speaker. My statement is on the upcoming territorial long-term care facility in the Sahtu and a new wellness centre that’s going to be built in Norman Wells. I listed out this week, the number of potential students who are going to be graduating this year, next year and the year after in the Sahtu and I also listed out some of the numbers of students who have gone through some form of post-secondary education institution training. There are 81 in the Sahtu, according to the list provided to me by the Department of Education, Culture and Employment.

We’re very happy and very...

I MOVE, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that, notwithstanding Rule 4, when this House adjourns on February 13, 2014, it shall be adjourned until Monday, February 17, 2014;

AND FURTHER, at any time prior to February 17, 2014, if the Speaker is satisfied, after consultation with the Executive Council and Members of the Legislative Assembly, that the public interest requires that the House should meet at an earlier time during the adjournment, the Speaker may give notice and thereupon the House shall meet at the time stated in such notice and shall transact its business as it has...

Given the level of, say, for example, personal support care workers, is there a location that this training possibly could take place given the location in Norman Wells is… I know there’s some complexity about bringing that training to the region. Are there locations that we are looking at so that students then can be prepared potentially, you know, that if they want this type of training these are the locations we’re looking at right now? Nothing yet has been determined.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. My questions are to the Minister of Health and Social Services. It’s my understanding that the new wellness centre in Norman Wells is going to be started soon, having a territorial long-term care facility there, and the construction is supposed to start sometime this summer and completed by 2016. More importantly, the facility will be staffed with trained health care professionals, and I’m hoping that the Minister can enlighten the House and constituents in the Sahtu on what type of plans are there and put in place to start training these workers and what type of...

Mr. Speaker, I would clarify my question to the Minister. I know the building is going to be built; there is a schedule there. I want to know within… Maybe the Minister won’t be able to answer this question here. Once the building is there, is there a position from the government that’s going to go with the building in terms of how that building is going to be taken care of and the positions with that building? Thank you.

I appreciate the Minister’s willingness to have some continued dialogue on this and see where we can go with it. This has been achieved in some of our vision and goals that we set out in the 17th Assembly.

So I’m going to ask the Minister, given this, can the Minister provide some of the basic economic dollars as to the communities that do not have health centres or communities who do not have RCMP officers? What are we looking at in terms of the dollars that would be required, and have some discussion to see if we could at least move towards that direction?

The Minister and I haven’t gone out for supper, but we’ve had a lot of discussions on this issue. I’m asking for a plan. In the last 10 years of being in this House and being a Member of the Legislative Assembly, when are we going to stop talking about a plan, given that we have a lot of vacancies? Let’s do one community this year, let’s do another community next year or the year after. We know from the previous Ministers and even this Cabinet, they tell us the amount of money to staff an RCMP officer or the nurse in the community.

I’m asking, when do we start the plan other than give reasons...