To be honest, I am not sure if that would be part of…That might be going outside of the work the Department of Health and Social Services would do in terms of addressing some of the major concerns that were brought up about the supplementary health benefit changes. Having said that, I do acknowledge that within the course of the last six or seven weeks since the policy changes were announced, we have heard lots of stories and background situations that does make us think about it and put it into context in thinking about how these changes will affect our population. So in general terms, I will...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The document that the department will prepare as a point of start for discussion will include such information. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Absolutely.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, first of all, it’s really important for the seniors out there to know that this government will continue to provide a package of programs that are better than any of the other comparable, competitive, very good…We have very good packages for constituents. As the changes are laid out right now, for a single income senior, if your retirement income is around $60,000 to $70,000, you will still get supplementary health benefits. I think talking about net income has missed that point. When I travel across the country and the Territories and tell them that most...

The fact is we do not have universal coverage for supplementary health right now. We don’t. So we’re not moving away from universal coverage. The whole point is the impetus of changing this is the fact that we have a group of working poor, as we call them, or low-income families, or if you have a job that doesn’t have third-party insurance. So the self-employed. We have a group of people who are not covered under the existing system. So it is not accurate to say that we have a universal program. We have a universal program for those who are over 60. We have a universal program for those who...

Yes, we will be talking to all stakeholders, not just the seniors. I was just using that as an example. I say yes to the follow-up questions that the Member asked.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can advise you and the Members that that is in fact one of the main topics that were under discussion between myself and the executive of the NWT Seniors’ Society. As I stated in my Member’s statement, we are committed to doing consultation with the stakeholders. The Seniors’ Society has suggested that maybe we should have a workshop so there can be back-and-forth exchange.

I have learned since this program had been announced last December that the families and individuals in the North come in all kinds of shapes and sizes, with all kinds of unique health needs and...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Since the announcement of this policy, I happened to have travelled to Fort Simpson, Inuvik, Sachs Harbour, Paulatuk, Ulukhaktok, and I have to say, when I explained that the changes are meant to expand the program so that we include a group of people that are excluded, people agree with that. When we say the senior cut-off is $55,000 net, and for most people that is a really good income on a retirement, because that means you have to make about $75,000 to $80,000. The gaps that we have found are that we need to revisit the income threshold itself, whether it’s too low...

Yes, I mean, that’s the regular process. There’s nothing new about that. We don’t do any of these without going to the committee, Mr. Speaker, and we never have.

As I have already stated in my public statements, the income test threshold has been revealed to be too low; that a vast majority of our non-seniors are making a much higher income than that threshold. So we expect that if we were to implement the programs the way they’re outlined, we may be excluding about 5 percent of top earning seniors from the basic Supplementary Health Benefits Program. But we have introduced the Catastrophic Drug Cost Program as a safety net so that nobody in the North will have to pay more than 5 percent of their net income for the Catastrophic Drug Cost Program.