Like my colleagues on this side of the House and I think many members of the public, I am struggling to understand how this particular model that has been proposed was arrived at. My questions are addressed to the lead Minister for Refocusing Government committee, Minister Miltenberger. I would like to know how much research and analysis and what kind of research and analysis was undertaken prior to the determination that this model that we are currently looking would be used to affect the board reform that we are talking about. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The lead Minister for refocusing government, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Tlicho model which has been in existence for probably at least 10 years has been one that the territorial government has been involved with throughout its development. It has won awards. It seemed to bring together in a way that supported the consensus model that allowed for integration of services for a small jurisdiction where we have not many people and the need to be efficient. It is one that we have a considerable history with. When we look at other things like territorial boards or the status quo, it seemed to be one in the North, designed in the North that had applicability outside of the Tlicho region. Thank you.
I thank the Minister for the answer, but I am afraid I would have to agree to disagree with him, unfortunately, again. It seems to me that there was no analysis or research. The Tlicho Services Board model was looked at. It was determined that it was the best one. There was no other option presented for Regular Members and for the public to look at. So again I want to ask the Minister, other than looking at ideas which were presented perhaps by other members on the Refocusing Government committee and the Tlicho Services model, what research was done to determine that this model should be the one that has gone forward in the proposal? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I would just be restating or repeating the answer that I just gave to the Member. Clearly, April is a milestone date we have targeted to see where we go from here. The Tlicho model is a made-in-the-North model that we looked at and we think had applicability. Our initial concept was to move that forward and that is what we have done, recognizing and building in the milestone date of April. Thank you.
I guess I will have to take that answer as no, there was no research or analysis done. I would like to ask the Minister why, in that case, when a model was proposed that the consultation, such as it is, that is currently being undertaken, why was there not a number of options presented? Why was one model or option presented as the way to go and people asked to comment on that one? Why were there not four, five or six different models proposed and people asked for comment on that? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I would respectfully disagree that there wasn’t enough work or research done. It may not meet the regular standards that the Member had in mind, but we did enough, in our opinion, to move forward with a model. We decided to pick a model that already had a track record in the North that looked to hit a lot of what we would see as key points and abilities to build, to integrate service, to be able to streamline governance, streamline finance and administration, look at the ability to do better work on the case management approach. Based on those factors, a decision was made to advance the initial phase with this particular model. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you for the answer, I think. I guess I really don’t understand why a decision was made to go with one model when there are opinions being sought from Regular Members, from members of the public, from board members, et cetera. I guess to ask the Minister again, what rationale did you use to determine that it was up to either Cabinet or the Refocusing Government committee to pick this one particular model and not allow other options out there for the public to comment on? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, this process was stretched out with a long timeline to 2010-11, recognizing that there was going to be a lot of work to get us from where we start to where we may end up with the issue of board reform. We are not precluding those types of discussions at this point. We took the first step to say, here’s a model we think has applicability and we have been doing the work to get us to April that will give all the information for us collectively to talk about and look at to decide on next steps. If it is not that model, not that approach, then what approach and if the broader discussion is as a Legislature, we want to collectively put off the table the whole issue of board reform, then come April, I suppose that would be a discussion we could have in this House today during the time that we are going to be sitting here. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.
