Kate Reid

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is more of, again, a business plan question. On page 22 no, that's not true. That's not the entire 89 of the business plan, it speaks to EIA's federal engagement approach. I'm curious what work intergovernmental affairs has done thus far on the federal engagement approach for the 20th Assembly and what timelines we're looking at to see that here in this House? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So in EIA's business plan under departmental highlights page 87, there is a piece around the communications functional review. So the description of this review is almost identical to the last one done in 2014, which was known as the likely report. And I'm going to argue here today that, you know, the reason that communications doesn't get better is no one really wants to fully implement the recommendations that are in that report, and departments want to continue to do what they are doing, namely, preferring to keep control of their message. And so we continue to ask, we...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that clarity.

Mr. Speaker, can the Minister confirm although I did hear her say a little bit about this in an earlier answer, so I'll reframe my question on the fly. Can the Minister confirm how local nurses are being able to be or will be able to be trained in labour and delivery. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in a very real way, people are our health care system, and how the dedicated professionals who make up the system are compensated and treated is a major factor in the NWT's health care crisis. I stand with nurses and all workers to have fair and sustainable wages and benefits. To have a resourceful, sustainable, and thriving community, we need to be healthy, and we desperately need health care workers to be proud to work in the NWT health care system that treats them with respect and values their contributions. Nurses, and all our health care workers, are...

I'm all right for now, thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I wish to table a letter from the Union of Northern Workers to Members of the 20th Legislative Assembly on the Use of Agency Nurses in NWT Healthcare. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I will do my best to not break your rules today, but I'm going to go back to what I was asking the Minister of Health and Social Services yesterday.

My first question is whether or not the Department of Health and Social Services has asked Indigenous midwives about what would support the growth of midwifery in the territory, specifically in our smaller communities? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Could the Minister speak to whether he'd consider expanding or reenvisioning the NWT alert page to draw from GNWT corporate communications or any centralized mechanism that would be able to consolidate all relevant and robust public safety information in a mobile app, like the BC wildfire app. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I'd like to talk about how we communicate. I'm going to talk specifics. The Northwest Territories emergency plan from April 2024 has an appendix B, which is the emergency communications protocol. One sentence on page 6 of the protocol reads: Within this model, departments and agencies are expected to implement their own communications tactics based on their own business continuity needs during an emergency.

Mr. Speaker, I'm hearing general concern that this will give GNWT departments the leniency to silo themselves in future disasters down the line. It's also a...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister. I realize these are last minute questions, and I appreciate that. I hope she can get back to me on maybe some of the history of what the department has done to talk to Indigenous midwives.

My next question is why have midwives not been considered in the recruitment and retention strategies that have been applied to nurses and physicians? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.