I’m not sure what $1 million he’s referring to, but I can tell the Member that there are different types of respite care programs that the Department of Health and Social Services is involved in. There are respite care and long-term care facilities in our health facilities and in institutional settings as well as a respite program that we are trying to expand in the Territories. As the Member is aware, in Yellowknife we had a pilot program with an NGO two or three years ago, but we saw the need to expand that program to outside of Yellowknife and we have allocated, under Strategic Initiatives committee, an investment of $363,000 for this year which is a $73,000 increase from last year. We are in the process of developing a territory-wide program but at the same time providing some programs in communities with the highest need. I do believe Fort Simpson is one of the communities, but I don’t have that information. The communities we are moving into right now are Fort Smith, Aklavik and Deline. I will have to undertake to see what needs there are in Simpson and where they lie. We are anticipating that we will continue to fund this for next year as well. That’s where we are with coming up with an NWT-wide respite care program. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. I wonder, Mr. Menicoche, if you could clarify where that million dollars is that you’re referring to, what page that’s on or what line. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I’ll be glad to go through the Minister’s budget for her. It’s the line item on prevention and promotion services. The budget item is up a million dollars from the previous year, from the revised estimate. That was my comment there, Mr. Chairman.
I’m glad to hear that we’re expanding respite services and I’d certainly get the confirmation if it will be done in Fort Simpson. Most particularly for families of special needs is what I was asking for there, Mr. Chair.
As well, I think, if anything, one additional item that I’ve raised with the Minister already earlier on is in the community services and funding of social workers. Once again, the community of Fort Liard raised the issue. We thought it was handled by Christmastime but it wasn’t and it’s still an issue of having a second social worker on a casual basis until the return of the one who’s having medical issues there, Mr. Chair. That’s really got to be reviewed and followed up. The community does need a second social worker. They want that full coverage. They want local coverage, and I believe that we should listen to the community, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
I’m happy to note that that increase of $1 million under prevention and promotion services speaks to Healthy Choices Framework and Healthy Families programming that I spoke about earlier, and Fort Simpson is one of them.
On the social worker question, I am committed to following up on that. I agree with the Member that we need to know what the status of the current incumbent is. We were not able to fill the position with a casual just because… I mean, they have social work coverage, it’s just that to have a position there, because this position requires to have all kinds of statutory powers bestowed on them and it’s not possible to do that on a quick turn-around with a casual. I committed to do that. I am following up on that right now and will get back to the Member as soon as possible. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Next on my list I have Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a few questions on community health programs. First off, I wish the Minister and the department every success in trying to get together a respite program for the entire Territory. I think it’s a big piece of work and something that I think will be greatly appreciated in communities around the Northwest Territories. It think that’s a step in the right direction.
I also wanted to thank the Yellowknife Association for Community Living for the program that they’ve run quite successfully here in Yellowknife for the last number of years. I’ve seen, firsthand, constituents who have had a big impact on their quality of life by accessing the program through YACL. Again, I want to thank the Minister for agreeing to continue with that program here in Yellowknife. So thanks for that.
The other issue -- and I just wanted to touch on this -- just recently there was a report that the Yukon government had a third party do an evaluation of the addictions programming in the Yukon Territory and the findings were that the addictions programs in the Yukon Territory were woefully inadequate. I’d like to just get a better understanding of how adequate addictions programming is here in the Northwest Territories, Mr. Chairman, and whether or not we would stand to gain anything by conducting a third-party, independent, objective review of what addictions programming we have here in the Northwest Territories.
Again, if you look around at the social ills that are out there, addictions certainly plays a huge part in what plaques our communities and our families, whether it’s alcohol or drugs or even gambling, for that matter, and we need to have some safeguards in place that are going to help people get through and deal with addictions problems. I guess that’s the first question I have, Mr. Chairman, is where are we at with addictions? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Minister Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are aware of the work that was done in the Yukon. The review we are doing is in a similar vein. The same group has done a review of similar programs in B.C. and Alberta. We are doing that and we will get recommendations and action items out of that and work with the committee on that in the spring. Thank you.
I thank the Minister for that. I’m not on the Social Programs committee, but that’s the first I’ve heard of the department going down that road and, again, that’s good news. I guess you have to ask questions to find out what’s going on, Mr. Chairman. I’m happy to hear that.
Again, with the issues I’ve been raising in the House here with the incidents of spousal assault, violent crime in our communities, in our Territory, and the money that we’re spending, I don’t think that we can underestimate it enough that we have to take the programs that we are delivering today and ensure that they are maximizing the return for us. If the statistics keep increasing like they are, we really have to, I think, go back to the drawing board and find out what’s working, how it’s working and why it’s working and expand upon our successes. For things that aren’t working, I don’t know, maybe stop throwing money at it. That would be my suggestion, is we need to review what we’re doing, because year in and year out we’re spending millions and millions of dollars on prevention and programs and services and are they having an impact. I’d like to think they are, and I think for the most part they are, but the numbers need to be getting better and not worse. I think that’s an indication that something’s wrong with what we’re doing if the numbers are getting worse and not any better. Once again, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Did the Minister have a comment there?
Thank you. I just want to thank the Member for the comment. Yes, this is an ongoing challenge that we need to work on, but I just want to add to our discussions here some of the things that people involved with the Family Violence Coalition, Lydia Bardak was on the radio this morning speaking about… We rely on NGOs to help us with this. I think the government has undertaken a number of initiatives to combat family violence at different levels, whether it be through the courts or enhancing shelter money, working with children who witness violence, there’s an initiative to work with men who abuse. We have staged programs to address this very serious issue.
I think we should just be cautious about statistics, because it is subject to interpretation and an argument can be made, and I’m not going to in any way dismiss the stats we have. I mean, stats give us good indicators, but there are various things you could attribute to why the numbers are rising and one of them being that sometimes keeping better track of what’s going on keeps the numbers up there too. I think Members are aware that we need multi partners and multi initiatives, which is what we are doing right now. Thank you.
I thank the Minister for that. I know the good work that’s done around the Territory by service and program providers in the area of family violence. It’s much appreciated and our residents are glad that those services and programs are out there for them. I wouldn’t want to underestimate the work that’s happening there. I think it is good work.
The Minister talked about partnerships. Some of the dialogue that I have had here in the last couple of days has been with the Minister of Justice. I think a big part of this is targeting really the only person that can make a difference in domestic violence and that is the perpetrator, the abuser. We have to find a way to target and rehabilitate or reprogram that abuser. To me that is the biggest thing that we can do. If we have individuals out there that are committing 18 or 19 violent offences and getting light sentences and getting back out and reoffending, we are not rehabilitating, we are not reprogramming. They are just becoming institutionalized and going through the system time and time again. I would like to ask the Minister how the Department of Health and Services interacts with the Department of Justice on violent offenders, especially offenders in the area of domestic violence, and what input do you have in the programming that takes place at North Slave Correctional Centre or any...or is there an open dialogue between the two departments in trying to come up with the best, most suitable programming and services at our justice or corrections facilities to deal with that? Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, on family violence issues as with the situation with some other like topics, we work very closely with departments like Justice. Family Violence Coalition is comprised of NGOs that are involved in this work as well as the Department of Justice and Health and Social Services and other people who are working in that field. Mr. Chairman, I can assure the Member that a lot of the same people are involved in sharing information and working on strategies and evaluating the programs and such. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Next on my list I have Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to start off where I left off during my last round of questioning.
In discussion with the Minister, the fourth point that we have with respect to the child and family services is that we feel that recommendation 39 should also be implemented or at least begin implementation of recommendation 39 during the 2011-12 fiscal year. Once again, we don’t feel that a recommendation indicates or asks the department to make updating the policy and standards manual a priority, but assign staff to lead and manage the project and to complete it within a reasonable time frame is going to cost a significant amount of money. Value for dollar on the rewrite is significant. I would like the Minister to commit that she will move on this recommendation in 2011-12 and begin the process of updating the policy and standards manual under the Child and Family Services Act. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Minister Lee.
Mr. Chairman, I know the Member... This is one of the number of items that we discussed in the standing committee. I just want to make it clear that, as I stated yesterday, I am fully committed to looking at all of the suggestions that the committee made yesterday.
I just need the committee to understand that the response is government’s response and any changes or reconsiderations of budget will be a Cabinet direction. Our department is analyzing those recommendations right now. I will get back to the committee on how we go about with the options. I am not trying to evade; I understand what you are saying. I want to keep on working together with the committee on these. Mr. Chairman, I am fully engaged. It is just that it is the government response. The budget is a government budget as well. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, government response, government budget, Health and Social Services’ responsibility, so we look forward to your commitment to getting that information but we are talking about the budget now. We need to know what is happening before we move forward.
The last thing I want to ask on the Child and Family Services Act is actually a question that I stood up to ask during oral questions. I completely blanked on it. As soon as I sat down, I remembered what the question was so I will ask it now. The response indicates that you guys will be doing a strategic plan. I asked you during question period if that meant could you please commit to completing a strategic plan, with our input, obviously, committee’s input, before the end of the 16th Assembly. I didn’t hear you say yes. Could the Minister now commit that that strategic plan will be completed before the end of the life of this government and that committee will have some involvement in that and, lastly, that you will keep us briefed on progress regularly? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, yes, the answer is yes. We will have the strategic plan done this fiscal year. We are hoping by August and we will work with the committee. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, I am not going to ask any more questions on child and family services. You are probably happy to hear that.
This section of your department, community health programs, one of the areas that you provide grants and contributions to are non-government organizations. A lot of what the department is affording in respect to counselling and addictions and stuff like that is done through NGOs in the voluntary sector. They are a very responsive group. They can do an awful lot. They can often go a little further with the money they provide them. We could, if we delivered programs and services in-house. I see them as being a critical aspect of business in the Northwest Territories. We need to make sure that we are providing them meaningful and ongoing support. Not every NGO is obviously in the category where multiyear funding is necessary, but certainly some are, some that are providing obviously some key counselling service, addiction services, treatment, housing, all the things that you heard us all talk about today.
I noticed over time some NGOs have slipped to one-year funding as this review of the NGO sector has gone on. I am wondering if you can tell me -- how many might be too specific -- but do we have many NGOs that are running on one-year funding from the Department of Health and Services? If so, what are we doing to ensure that we can provide some of these key NGOs multiyear funding so they can stabilize their service delivery and better meet the needs of the residents of the Northwest Territories?
Mr. Chairman, we do support multiyear funding for NGOs. Not all NGOs are able or equipped to do that. We consider the multiyear funding arrangement on an NGO-by-NGO basis. We are currently reviewing our funding arrangement with NGOs in the department. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, in past years I remember seeing a bit of a summary from the department. I think it might have been your department. It might have been a different department outlining the NGOs that we are supporting and which ones are multiyear and which ones are more one-time. Could you please get us a current update on the NGOs you are funding, how much you are funding them and which ones have multiyear funding, just for our information? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, we will do that. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Next on my list I have Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I too was going to ask about multiyear funding agreements for NGOs. I just have a quick follow-up question to Mr. Abernethy’s. The government has recently put out a program manager’s guide to NGOs. The Minister mentions they are reviewing agreements that the department has with NGOs. Are they using that program manager’s guide to assist them in their reviews? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Lee.
Mr. Chairman, yes.
Mr. Chairman, thanks for the answer. I wanted to go back just quickly to the Joe Greenland Centre staffing. The documentation that we received, I know it is from the NWT Housing Corporation and Health and Social Services. A little while ago we received a briefing note which indicated that two home support workers would probably be hired. The Minister mentioned up to two home support workers at one point and then a little later on in her remarks she stated hiring of one home support worker, so could I get a clarification as to how many staff are being hired for the renovated portion of Joe Greenland Centre? Thank you.
I need to reiterate that we are not hiring employees for the renovated Joe Greenland Centre. Home care workers, we are talking about home care workers that will be employed by the authority to work for the entire community.
In answer to the Member’s first question, the briefing note said two home care support workers. When I was in Aklavik meeting with the community, after that we have looked into that further and we are working toward having three home care support workers. So it is one more than what was suggested in the briefing note. Right now there is one home care worker in Aklavik and he spends, apparently, most of his time driving elders around. We need people to do more than that. We need to have home care workers that will support elders with their medication or medical, working on light housework, making sure their chronic disease conditions, or just be able to do more home visits, so we are going to expand the home care supply there by 300 percent with reprogramming. We are not going to be staffing. Joe Greenland Centre will be renovated and returned to what it was meant to be, which is an independent living unit. The NWT Housing Corporation has at least eight or nine elders who are on the waiting list who could benefit from moving into that unit. Thank you.
Thanks to the Minister and thanks for the clarification on the staffing. I knew that and kind of didn’t state it that way, but I am glad to hear there will be three home support workers in the community of Aklavik. I think that’s a good thing.
I wanted to ask a question about the amount of funding in this budget for homelessness. Could the Minister initially tell me what programs that we run for homelessness? I believe there is a couple but if she could name them for me. Thank you.
I might have to ask my staff here to get me the details, but we run the Small Community Shelter Program, that is for $250,000 and then we have another program under a different name where we help our people to be relocated or go back to communities they came from sometimes. That is a separate funding for $200,000, but I need to revisit the name of that program. These are the two that I can think of right now, other than O and M funding support that we provide to lots of different NGOs.
Thanks to the Minister. Those are the two programs that I was aware of. I guess I would like to ask the Minister, she mentions O and M funding for various NGOs, but the Small Communities Homeless Fund and the other, I think it is Homelessness Assistance Fund or something, they don’t really apply to larger communities, so I would like to ask the Minister if there is any money in the 2011-2012 budget that can assist homelessness programs and needs within the larger communities, regional centres and the city of Yellowknife. Thank you.
We do provide, for example, we do have a day shelter program which is a form of... I mean, we are not obviously the users of that facility, don’t stay there, but we do serve the same clients that come out of Salvation Army or other homes in Yellowknife. We have funded the SideDoor Youth Centre with one of these two programs. We provide funding to Salvation Army, Centre for Northern Families and YWCA, so that is sort of the multi-spectrum of funding that we provide to different groups that deal with the homeless population or, you know, it is not entirely accurate to say that none of that money goes to programs in Yellowknife. Thank you.
I don’t believe I said that we don’t get any money, I recognize that there certainly are organizations that run programs and that there are contributions from the Department of Health and Social Services, but I am a little concerned that there is no fund for larger centres that is application-based, which I gather that the Small Community Homeless Fund is. I guess I would encourage the department to try and provide some funding at some point, if it is not in this year’s budget, then consider it for next year’s budget. There certainly are needs within all of our communities for homelessness funding and it shouldn’t just be based on operations and maintenance funding for existing shelters and programs.
My last question has to do with the Healthy Choices Framework and the Healthy Choices Program. I want to say that I think it is an excellent program. It is one of the few areas, in my mind, that we have cross-departmental coordination and I think things seem to be coordinated rather well there. Somewhere along the line, a while ago anyway, we received a copy of the Healthy Choices Framework and it was an evaluation framework at that time, it did not show any evaluation of the program, so my question to the Minister is: has there been an evaluation of the Healthy Choices Framework and, if not, when could we expect to see the results of an evaluation of the program? It has been in place for a couple of years now and I think it is probably due to be evaluated. The evaluation framework we got is really quite detailed and I think it would be a valuable tool to determine whether or not the money we are spending is being well spent. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Lee.
Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the Member’s comments on that. This initiative is part of our Building Our Future Strategic Initiative Committee project and Ministers across departments and deputy ministers sit in this group. I will undertake to follow up on that evaluation suggestion and follow up with the Member on that.
I just want to add one more note about this Small Community Homelessness Funding. I take the Member’s point, but just going back to the history, those programs were set up precisely to address the needs of small communities that didn’t have shelters. I understand shelters are under, they are stretched and they are in need of more resources than what they get, but the Small Community Funding Program was set up to assist small communities because they just didn’t have any other resources. Thank you.
Just a quick follow-up on the Healthy Choices Program. I didn’t get from the Minister whether or not an evaluation has ever been done. I am presuming from her answer if she is following up, that no evaluation has been done. Could I get clarification on that, please?
My information is that is hasn’t been done and we will follow up and I will get back to the Member on timing of when that could be done. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister Lee. Next on my list is Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to ask the Minister in terms of community health programs, is the department looking at a comprehensive family program? We have a bunch of programs all over the place, and have they put together a unique northern, even an Aboriginal cultural family program, and yet in my seven years I haven’t really seen a family program come out of the communities in terms of treatment in terms of addiction, family violence or any type of abuse for the whole family. Is that something that we should be asking more forcefully in terms of putting family programs together? I want to ask the Minister in terms of what is really being done in the North, and if she can keep it brief.
Thank you, Yakeleya. Minister Lee.
Mr. Chairman, I don’t know how to be brief, so I am going to ask the deputy minister to give more detail, briefly. Thank you.
Ms. Meade.
Mr. Chairman, as mentioned earlier, the department is doing a comprehensive review of the mental health programs, both from the in-patient psychiatric and the flow-through for coordination, mental health and addictions. We hope to have that review completed in the spring. The people conducting the review and working with getting authority and community input are actually given the direction to ensure that it is not southern program but that it reflects the North and the Territory’s needs and the cultural component, their recommendations around the family component. We do currently offer family counselling in the areas of if there are members of violence, children who witness violence, and on mental health and addictions, but it is not a said family program, it is family specific at this time. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Meade. Mr. Yakeleya.
Mr. Chairman, I look forward to the review in the springtime and having some further discussions. I want to ask the Minister in terms of going forward in this area here, Mr. Chairman, it seems that we are spinning our feet here in terms of getting help for people in our communities. I recall an old lady in Colville Lake that talked about having a program on the land. It has been about seven years now since I have been in the Assembly. It is very difficult for this government to put a program on the land. We spend about $2 million a year in Nats’ejee K’eh and we see that every year we have a hard time putting drug and alcohol programs on the land. I wonder if we really are listening to the people.
Again, I come back to my same comments that I made before. Are we really listening to the people? They keep asking, can we get a program? We get these three-day programs, but we really need a strong program on the land that won’t cost much. It will save this department a lot of money, save the families a lot of money and certainly it will bring the families together. If we don’t show any type of leadership and motivation or some courage by taking the bull by the horn and putting a program out there...
Families do want to go out there, yet we are not there yet. We have to fight the bureaucracy and the system. I guess it is frustrating at times, but I am not going to give up yet on this notion of having on-the-land programs. I want to ask the Minister in terms of when the Minister does her review, will there really be emphasis to Aboriginal people like the old lady in Colville Lake? Now that she is getting older, she is telling me it would be nice to have programs on the land. I wonder if the bureaucracy and the Department of Health and Social Services gets it. Are they still stuck on facilities like Nats’ejee’ Keh or mental health? It is the culture you are dealing with. The culture is being heavily influenced by a lot of things. We need to move in that area in the Health Promotion Program. We can save the communities a lot of money, but we are not. This is what the people are telling us. Why should they keep telling us what to do? We keep asking them, but it is just like we are spinning our feet and not listening to them. We need to move away from that, Mr. Chairman.
It has been seven years, and yet I haven’t seen a document that says this is how we are going to do the program on the land. I haven’t seen it. It is frustrating to sit on this side going back to the communities. You can work with families, children, fathers, everybody, but we have them all separate, even with the issue of residential school. It is right across the valley. Our jails are full with people that, for whatever reason, have put them there. People are killing themselves, young people. I talked about that earlier. Today we have homeless people. We have to give them hope and inspiration to do something. The only way that the elder told me -- and I believe the elder -- is if we have our system that supports to go on the land. That is the way I believe. But somehow our health programs don’t quite honour that or respect it. They give us lip service, but their actions are very weak when it comes down to actually doing it. I have experienced it with this department and other departments. Some departments are a little better than others, but can you really tell the old lady and the elders in Colville Lake we will now do a land program?
Now there are young boys in more trouble than ever because we haven’t helped them out. We need to listen to our people. Youth are asking for help. If there is a death in the community of close family, we tell them to get over it in three days and go to school, and they are expected to sit in school and deal with this emotion. We need to put them out somewhere where they will get good help. Mind you, this is only one part of the health programs that needs to be changed. I wonder if this department is big enough to make those kinds of changes and have faith. That is what I wanted to tell this department. I am not going to go over my wish list again because I could send them all what I said in the last seven years and ask them to follow up on some of those things. That is what I want to say, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Yakeleya. Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m sure the Member wants me to be brief, so I’m going to try to be brief. The Member is right that we spent $2 million at Nats’ejee K’eh but we also spent $6 million for the community counselling mental health program. That’s not to include the psychiatric unit and the heavy duty mental health work that goes on at the hospital. I understand the Member’s frustration, but what we are talking about is a huge demand. We have this huge need among a large portion of our population who needs mental health support, right up from psychiatric and most acute care that needs to be delivered in the hospital to what the community people want to do on the ground level and on-the-land programming.
The Member knows that we have provided funding for communities. We have provided funding for communities in the Sahtu as well. I know that the Sahtu Health Authority has provided funding for on-the-land programming. Granted, they’re not an established and consistent programming, but it is not the bureaucracy or the lack of will. It is that we are dealing with a massive, massive mental health and addictions challenge in the Northwest Territories.
I said we are reviewing the Mental Health Program, as I answered MLA Ramsay. We are going to come back to standing committee with the findings in April and May. In the meantime, I will be announcing the integration and some reorganizing of our mental health programming to improve the service in the interim. This is a huge challenge for us and there is just so much demand and stretching of the resources. This is the challenge.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. Next on my list is Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We talked a little bit about community health programs yesterday. I didn’t have an opportunity to get into one of the subject matters that I consider to be very important in Tu Nedhe. That is the whole area of the issue with suicide in the small communities. I’d like to ask the Minister if there is anything significantly different in the sense of an increase of attention or programs or anything on suicide prevention in this budget compared to what was in the previous budget.
