I’d like to recognize Mrs. Eileen Collins in the gallery today. She’s president of the Hay River Seniors’ Society and vice-president of the Northwest Territories Seniors’ Society and has worked tirelessly to articulate the concerns of Hay River seniors with respect to supplementary health benefits and many other projects she’s undertaken.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Member for Thebacha, Mr. Miltenberger.
I’d like to recognize Ms. Bea Campbell as a past president of the NWT Seniors’ Society and Mr. Leon Peterson, current president of the Fort Smith Seniors’ Society. Welcome to the Assembly.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you. I would, too, like to recognize many people in the gallery: my constituents Loretta and Dick Abernethy, the Zaozirnys, Arlene Hache, and my lovely wife, Marianne. Big wave there. I also see Mr. Rick Edjericon, chair of the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board. Many of the elders that I would also like to recognize, and city councillors Lydia Bardak, David Wind, Dave McCann, possibly others. Welcome all.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Member for Yellowknife South, Mr. Bob McLeod.
Thank you. I’d like to recognize my wife, Melody, of 35 years, and my oldest grandson who turned five on Monday and he’s not here because it’s his birthday present, we’re just trying to get him started early. Also, some relatives and friends from Fort Providence: Irene Lafferty, Chief Berna Landry, elders Danny Squirrel and Sam Elleze. My Yellowknife South constituent Gayla Wick, and a long-time colleague, Floyd Adlem.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
I would like to recognize pretty much everybody in the gallery. I can’t see anybody from where I’m at, so at the risk of leaving people out, I’m simply going to say welcome to the House to all the residents of Frame Lake.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.
Later today I will be submitting a petition on behalf of the NWT Seniors’ Society, so I wanted to recognize the president of the NWT Seniors’ Society, Tom Wilson, secretary Leon Peterson, vice-president Eileen Collins, past-president Bea Campbell, and treasurer Blake Lyons, as well as Barb Hood, the executive director. Also, I’d like to recognize Ms. Arlene Hache, recently named to the Order of Canada. Congratulations and thank you very much for all your dedication and hard work on social concerns here in the Northwest Territories, Arlene. Also I see there’s councillor Lydia Bardak, also a social advocate. Welcome to the gallery today and welcome to everyone else that’s in attendance.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I also would like to welcome Mr. Tom Wilson, a Nahendeh resident of Fort Simpson and, for the third time today. It’s a pleasure to see him in the gallery.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. I’d also like to recognize a constituent of mine in the gallery today: Mr. Roy Courtoreille, regional vice-president for UNW. Anyone else that we may have missed in the gallery today, welcome to the House. I hope you’re enjoying the proceedings and it’s always nice to have an audience in here.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last Saturday in Fort Good Hope a special couple celebrated their 50th golden wedding anniversary. Thomas and Denise Manuel celebrated in Fort Good Hope with family and friends from the Northwest Territories and I understand they had a wonderful time. So on behalf of the people of the Sahtu region, I’d like to congratulate Mr. and Mrs. Manuel on their 50th golden wedding anniversary and we wish them another 50 years more together.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question for the Minister of Health and Social Services today. We over the years have asked many times for the Department of Health to review supplementary health benefits to see if something could be done for those folks that are working but do not receive coverage or benefits from any other source. I’m referring to mostly families who work for the private sector and don’t have employee sponsored insurance programs and we thought that was a good thing.
The Supplementary Health Benefits Program was reviewed. Little did we know that inadvertently there would be this means testing which would affect so many of the seniors in the Northwest Territories. We did not know that would be part of the review and that the outcome would be this.
I would like to ask the Minister of Health and Social Services, what was -- for the benefit of the people of the North who may not understand why -- the motive for means testing supplementary health benefits for seniors in the Northwest Territories over the age of 60 years?
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess the Member’s question on the motive can be answered by the intent of the policy. The intent of the policy is to cover or expand the supplementary health benefits to those who do not have them right now. We have a segment of the population right now, better known as lower income working poor, who may be self-employed or working for employers who do not have employer’s coverage and are not getting those basic supplementary health benefits. We have situations like over the last few months where we’ve had people who need an artificial prosthesis that we were not able to approve, because that doesn’t qualify under the existing health benefits.
I get asked at least once a week from Members to approve this or that or some of the discretionary issues. We have discovered that under the current program the only eligible factor is the age and your specific condition under the Supplementary Health Benefits Program and it would be helpful to consider one’s ability or inability to pay. That is why the income testing was introduced. If the Member was to think that is the motive, that is why we have introduced the income test as one of the factors to determine the eligibility.
That is the kind of comment that I was referring to in my Member’s statement. When we keep hearing from the Minister of Health and this government that those who can pay should pay, but the fact of the matter is that for many, many years this government has provided support to seniors living in the North, where it is more costly to live. There could not be a worse time to be taking this away from seniors. It’s costly to live here. Most are on fixed incomes.
I would like to ask the Minister, did anybody figure out how much money the government was going to save by implementing this? Was that considered at all? Because I would think it would not be a great deal of money that the government would be saving by this.
I think that is one of the misunderstandings out there, and that is that somehow these changes are being introduced as a cost-saving measure. It is not. It is not a cost-saving measure. We do not implement health programs that way. Our health programs for every government are demand driven. When somebody gets sick, we pay for their care. When somebody needs a prescription, we pay for them under supplementary health benefits. So this is not a cost-cutting measure. We wanted to include a segment of the population that was not included before.
When you consider the other types of supplementary health benefits insurance and support that’s out there, government employees are covered, people who work for large corporations are covered, the Metis health benefit covers some folks, the non-insured health benefit covers some folks. When you calculate, take all the indigent people who are covered, when you take them all out of the mix, how many people are there in the Northwest Territories who are not receiving supplementary health benefits?
The people that are included are those who are making $50,000 net income, or those who are not over 60, who are not defined as a senior, who don’t have a specified condition, who do not work for an employer with a third-party insurance, who are not eligible for Metis health benefits or the indigenous aboriginal health benefits. So we estimate -- and these are hard because our population fluctuates so we cannot say in specific numbers -- but the analysis has shown that we exclude about 10 percent of the population on lower and working poor. We have families who cannot have their children go for dental care. Remember you have working poor and low-income families. I, as a student, would have not qualified for dental care and eye care and such.
Our intent was not to exclude seniors or a whole bunch of people. This was to expand the program and improve the program. As I have already stated, we understand that we need to work out the details better and we are committed to do that.
It’s interesting to hear that this was not a cost saving. Here’s my question: How many seniors in the Northwest Territories over the age of 60 years who are not covered by any other health insurance does this change and policy going to affect? How many seniors in total?
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.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you. My questions are addressed to the Minister of Health. I’d like to thank the Minister for her statement earlier today and for her announcement earlier this week, and that’s that the new Supplementary Health Benefits Program has been delayed. In my opinion, it’s not nearly long enough. I agree with some of the comments made earlier by my colleagues, that April 2010 is a far better date.
This delay is intended to respond to the gaps that have been identified through consultation. So I’d like to ask the Minister how she will ensure meaningful, comprehensive and open consultation on the implementation of this program. What is the plan and what is the schedule?
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
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 conditions where they had been accessing this program. I could tell the Member and the House and the public that my department and myself, as the Minister, are completely committed to doing a meaningful consultation so that we achieve the intention of this policy, which is to cover a vast majority of our citizens who are in need, as well as expanding the programs to those who are not eligible right now.
I would like to thank the Minister for her comments. It’s nice to know that consultations are going to be happening with the NWT Seniors’ Society, but they’re not the only group of people who are affected by this policy change. There are many people who are not seniors who are also affected by this change. I need to emphasize to the Minister that there has to be consultation with them as well, because they don’t have an organized group to be consulted, as such.
I’d like to know from the Minister that as this consultation progresses, as the schedule goes through, will the Minister guarantee to this House that all ideas and comments will be seriously considered; that the Minister remain open to making changes to this policy and to the implementation plan.
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.
I want to emphasize to the Minister that I said “changes to the policy.” I believe that in the Minister’s statement earlier today that she made a statement that the policy will not change; that the policy is the base for the program changes that she wants to be implemented. I would like to ask the Minister again if she is open to changes to the policy, which to me means changes to the income testing, that that can possibly be dropped.
I believe my statement was that we would keep the policy intent, which is to make this policy more fair and equitable. Income tests are a mechanism to achieve that, but obviously all the details are up for discussion. So we will go to the public with what we have learned, we will ask the public about what we need to consider, what we need to change. I have learned a lot in this process. I have made it clear from day one, December 19th, when I got the first e-mail, I learned new things and I responded to everybody, saying thank you for giving me that information, I will take that into consideration and we have lots of items under consideration and we will take some more and we will incorporate them all to make this program a better program. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to say that the Minister has often been heard to say that we have a Cadillac health program here, and that being said in comparison to other jurisdictions. Can the Minister promise on September 1st, 2009 an NWT resident will not pay any more for health benefits here than someone living elsewhere in Canada? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I believe there was somebody else who was quoted to say we have a Cadillac program. Mr. Speaker, I think there is no dispute by seniors and everybody that we do have a very good program for seniors, not only for health benefits but for housing, property tax exemption and such. I have told the NWT Seniors’ Society that we are committed to making sure that we have a very good package of programs for seniors. So I will continue to work on that principle and I am sure everybody else will make sure that I do. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Abernethy.
My questions today are for the Minister of Health and Social Services and are based on my Member’s statement from earlier this afternoon. I was wondering if the Minister of Health could tell me what, if any, financial analysis was prepared and utilized by Cabinet to help them make an informed decision and responsible decision to implement the Supplementary Health Benefits Program announced on December 18th, 2008.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
Mr. Speaker, it’s general knowledge that these program changes were consulted on, discussed, debated in this House and outside this House between 2003 and 2007. The policies were changed in September of 2007. I do not have all of the calculations on what came about to achieving that. I have been responsible for implementing those, but the policy objective was not a cost-cutting measure and it is not necessary to make sure that we stay within whatever is budgeted under the Supplementary Health Program. So it is wrong to say we are making these changes on the backs of the seniors. That is not correct.
We still seek to cover the vast majority of the seniors. We seek to cover those who have chronic conditions, who have children with disabilities. We seek to cover them and provide them with the assistance. What the policy intent is saying is while we appreciate that we need to cover seniors, we need to cover those with chronic conditions, we need to add in an extra factor which is one’s ability, an ability to pay as one of the criteria. It is a policy statement on the part of the government. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thanks for that response. I was kind of curious as to what kind of financial analysis was done and presented to Cabinet to help them make a decision, an informed decision. Clearly there was none. Just as a note, I disagree. I believe this program change is occurring on the backs of the seniors as well as those individuals with family members with chronic conditions. You are taking money out of one pocket to put it in another. So since I am not going to get an answer to that first question, I’ll ask my second question.
When the Minister presented the proposed program to Cabinet in 2008, did the Minister include a breakdown of the possible ramifications of implementation? By that I mean things such as the cost of a mass exodus of seniors leaving the Northwest Territories, the $22,000 transfer payment, the income taxes they pay, as well as the goods and services they buy and the services they provide by way of volunteering. As well, did she include or identify any costs related specific to the entire system as a result of more people choosing to go into the hospitals for care rather than staying in their homes, because under supplementary health as it exists now, they can stay in their homes and receive treatment in this system in order to make it so they don’t have to pay. They are going to go into the hospital, so it’s going to cost the system more. Did the Minister provide that information to Cabinet? Because I believe that would have helped them make an informed decision, which clearly they did not. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, obviously he didn’t catch my first answer. An analysis was done, policy approved in 2007. Mr. Speaker, I have to tell you that our government’s objective is not to encourage people to move away, not to incur extra costs because people are not taking drugs they need or medical supplies. We are committed to improving this program. We will cover the vast majority of our population who need the support from the government and that’s what the seniors told us during the consultation between 2003 and ’07; that we need to make the program generous for seniors. We have tried to do that and we will make sure we will do that so as we work to improve the program. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. Before I go on, I am just going ask Members to respect the amount of time that we have for question period and the opportunity for all Members to ask questions. The only way we are going to do that is if we shorten up the preambles and the answers to the questions. So I would ask Members to respect that. Supplementary, Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Clearly it is not the motive of the Cabinet to chase them away, but their actions are, in fact, going to chase people away. The announcement in 2007, you haven’t mentioned any financial analysis. You keep saying analysis. You are now moving forward and you’ve indicated that you are going to do consultation. You indicated that you have done consultation in the past, which clearly was more of an information session. Can you tell me how this time around you are going to do meaningful consultation with the stakeholders? That doesn’t mean you are just going to tell me you are going to consult. What are you going to do so we are actually engaging these individuals?
Mr. Abernethy, I would remind you to address your questions through the Chair.
