Robert C. McLeod

Mr. Speaker, there are a number of things we could do to move forward on this. One thing I would like to see is we hear from the communities that it's costing them money and use of their equipment and that to get people out on the highway to rescue those that are in need, and one thing we know about the North is nobody is going to say no to anyone that is in need, so they will go there. What I would like to see is justification for the money that they say that they are spending going out, and then also, we need to work as a Legislative Assembly to try and meet some of our fiscal challenges so...

The department… We provide annual funding for community public infrastructure based on which community governments may use to procure equipment to support highway rescue and ground ambulance services beyond their municipal boundaries. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Through the School of Community Government, we do offer courses to elected officials after municipal elections, and we will do so in this case. It’s actually a very good course and it tells them of their responsibilities, what they can do, what they can't do. Through the accountability framework that we have implemented now, I think it's going to allow us to nip these problems before they get to be to the stage where they were at in Fort McPherson. That's going to be one of the benefits of the accountability framework, is it will protect the community from getting into a financial situation...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In July 2014, we met with the community of Fort McPherson and we were concerned about their financial situation. At the time, we said that we were going to place them under a municipal supervisor, which actually became the municipal administrator as well. We dissolved council and we took over the operations of the community of Fort McPherson.

I have to commend the people of Fort McPherson. We had made some changes early on that they weren't happy with. They let us know. We made some adjustments, especially to the elders' water rates, and they worked with the community...

Mr. Speaker, once the report was done and after exploring some options, it was determined that a phased-in implementation would probably work the best. There is some cost involved with that, and I believe there is some legislation that needs to be developed. Again, we have heard from the NWT Association of Communities and people across the territory, especially in the larger communities, the importance of this. The Member said in his statement before, I think we have studied this to death, and now is the time to implement some of the recommendations of the study, and I will commit to doing my...

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Any prefix, you dial 1-1-1-,1 gets you the ambulance. Any prefix, you dial 2-2-2-2, gets you the fire department. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the committee was formed in 2012. It had representatives from the Department of Justice, Department of Health and Social Services, MACA. They were formed to implement a strategy to strengthen our community based ambulance and highway rescue services. The strategy actually resulted in $1.63 million being provided to community governments to support their community based ground ambulance and highway rescue services, including upgrades, major repairs, or enhancements to existing mobile equipment or the purchase of new mobile equipment. Training which we found was going to be one of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, within the GNWT, there is no single department that has legislative responsibility to provide ground ambulance service for residents. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the Member makes a good point, and I will check with the department and see if there are opportunities. We'll explore options and see if there are opportunities for us to offer these courses before the elections actually take place, so those that are considering running for council will know exactly what they're getting into and what they're responsible for. I'll follow up on that and I will get back to the Member.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know there are seven of us over here, right? Mr. Speaker, the definition of a small community, as defined by the federal government under the Provincial-Territorial Infrastructure Component and Small Communities Fund, is communities with a population of under $100,000… or 100,000 people. Thank you.