Caitlin Cleveland

I am wondering if the Minister can speak to what the department is currently doing to address the high cost of medical travel in the Northwest Territories.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Further to my statement today, I'm wondering if the Minister of Health and Social Services would be able to inform the House of how much the cost of medical travel has increased over the last five years. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Hypothetically speaking, if we end up with multiple very bad fire seasons in a row, if we are incapable of increasing our borrowing limit from the federal government, how do we continue to be able to protect the NWT from bad fire seasons, given that we are at the top limit of our borrowing capacity? Thank you.

Not the answer I was looking for, but I will live with it for now and hopefully won't end up putting it together on my own. My second question is in regard to the Canada-wide action plan. I am wondering how long we are prepared to wait for information from Canada to come. Do we have a threshold of when we are going to decide to go out and create our own action plan, or will we be patient and wait for the Canada-wide one? I am wondering if Cabinet has decided as a group that we are going to wait until the end of this year and then move forward with our own plan, just so that we know, on this...

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and I definitely appreciate that. Over the course of gathering information from multiple different departments, it took my CA and I about a month to put together all of the information and the resources that the Minister referred to that are available through the government, and that's not very useful or realistic for someone who is suffering from domestic violence. My next and final question for the Minister is: is there a plan for this Assembly to create a domestic violence action plan? Thank you.

I appreciate the response from the Minister, and I appreciate as well that she stopped herself when she said the length of this Assembly, because I think it's really important, with us having the second-highest rate of domestic violence in Canada, that we need to give this an owner right away, preferably by the end of this sitting. My next question is: will the Department of Justice, or whoever the lead department is for this, commit to putting together an information resource that we can distribute to people to let them know what their options are for the next chapter of their lives that does...

Before I was born, a baby girl was born in a town west of London, England. Her family moved to Canada, where she eventually achieved a Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts in Journalism, and Master of Arts in History. Along the way, she fell in love with the North and served its people as a reporter, active volunteer, and now a two-term MLA. Sometimes we need to hear about how one person traveled from point A to point B to achieve their goal to help us chart our own path to success. Julie Green's Women on the Ballot Workshops were a significant catalyst that led me to this role.

This year's theme...

I am wondering what the expected deadline is on that plan from that institute and if we will be able to see it on this side of the House as soon as Justice receives it.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to continue my conversation with the Minister of Justice in regard to domestic violence. I apologize; I hope I am not putting too much pressure on her. My first question is just in regard to the resource that I requested earlier. I am just wondering if, while we are waiting for Cabinet to choose a lead department, the Department of Justice would be prepared to take on creating those resources for victims of domestic violence? Thank you.

Would the Minister be willing to commit to identifying, with her colleagues, a lead department for domestic violence before the end of this sitting?