Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last week I stood up in this House and talked about all the wonderful programs and services available in the Northwest Territories. Today I’d like to focus on one area. That is the area of support to seniors.
People are living longer in the Northwest Territories and we want to keep our population from declining by seniors thinking about having to retire in the South because of the challenges here in the North. In spite of all of our good programs, that’s something that we have to be concerned about. I listed some of the support we do have for seniors, such as Pharmacare, vision care, driver’s licence cost relief, property tax relief, seniors emergency home repair programs, and then when you get into residential facilities owned by the GNWT, of course, we know that if a senior is over 60 and living in public housing or government housing that the rent is still very, very low. It’s not zero anymore, but it is certainly not means or income tested, and it is still very, very low. I forgot to mention the fossil fuel subsidy as well. That is another benefit to seniors living in their own home.
But I still think that we need to be very proactive as a government in assessing the needs of seniors coming up. We need to anticipate. Now, I know that the Department of Health and Social Services keeps a lot of statistics, and I’m sure that Housing has some statistics, as well, but in the interests of ensuring the comfort and well-being and the continuance of our seniors living in the Northwest Territories, I would like to know if there is a central census database of any kind which is a proactive measure and contact means to stay in touch with seniors no matter whether they are living in a care facility, living in their own independent home, living in supported housing such as what the Housing Corporation provides. I think that if we do not have a central database like that. We need one, because we need to anticipate the needs of seniors going forward and we need to be very proactive as a government.
I also think that the level of support to seniors, the degree of support to seniors needs to be more level. I hear from a lot of constituents who are under extreme pressure right now with the cost of living. I can only imagine what it is like for people who are on fixed incomes and do not have the ability to go out and make more money. How much of their income, their fixed income goes towards those costs?
Later today I will have questions, I’m not sure if it’s for the Minister of Health or the Minister of Housing, about how we are anticipating the continuing and growing needs of seniors in the Northwest Territories.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise today to work with my colleagues on a micro theme on seniors. We know in the Northwest Territories that the population of the Northwest Territories is getting older and older and we are seeing a lot of forced expenses with that. We need to support our seniors whether they stay at home or whether they stay in facilities.
In this House over the last few years, you’ve heard us talking about the extended care beds in the H.H. Williams and the new health centre that’s going into Hay River and the fact that they’re not there. We’ve been able to get them in the budget, but the concern is what is the status of the future of Hay River seniors. How many seniors are going to be there, how much demand are we going to see in the future? The government has indicated that they are going to do a study, but we still haven’t seen anything about that study which was supposed to be completed by this year.
I will have specific questions to the Minister of Health about where that study is and what is the outcome for a regional centre like Hay River on the demands for seniors facilities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
