Madam Chair, I will have the assistant deputy minister respond to that question.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Elkin.
Madam Chair, the decrease from the revised main estimates to the 2012-13 mains is due to a $2.1 million supplementary appropriation related to southern placements for children. Again, we came forward last year, after we knew what our placements were, for supplementary estimates. Again, we will do the same this year, but it is not built into the base.
Thank you, Mr. Elkin. Mr. Dolynny.
Madam Chair, again, I don’t want to belittle the situation again here, but I’m trying to deal with a set of books that prevent us from having to come back time and time again for supps and supplementary asks from the government. Do we foresee that this is going to be a continuum for the supplemental on contract services year to year during the life of the 17th Assembly? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Mr. Beaulieu.
Madam Chair, we would agree again to put this item into the base, in consultation with the Financial Management Board.
Madam Chair, I appreciate the department’s agreeing in terms of making this process as streamlined as possible.
My next question has to do with program delivery details. Although slight in nature, we do see a decrease in children and family services where they predominantly show a steady increase over a number of budgets. Can the department give us an indication why there was a slight decrease in that budget? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Madam Chair, it is the same item. Residential care children southern placement is the majority of this increase.
Madam Chair, I think I’m looking at the line entry of $21,682 which is a decrease from last year. Can I get clarification from the Minister as to why there is a decrease?
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. I think he meant $21 million. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. It is a decrease on the revised, because of the system that we are currently discussing. Last year we had the mains and then we went to a supp and it increased. Now we are back to comparing main to main. It looks like it’s a decrease, but it is actually a slight increase from the mains of last year, but a decrease on the revised mains.
I do apologize. I said thousand and it should have been millions, which makes my question that much more relevant. I didn’t quite understand that response, but I will look back at Hansard to try to decipher that number.
With prevention and promotion being one of the flagships of this department and the flagships of Cabinet, I can attest that it is also the agreement of Regular Members. Prevention and promotion needs to be looked at. It is disheartening to see that we typically have been spending $6.2 million-plus in this category and now we see a decrease in this fiscal budget, thereby going against the grain, so to speak, in terms of the message that we are trying to portray to the people of the Northwest Territories. Can the Minister and the department indicate why we are seeing a decrease in an area which is clearly wanted and needed, and we are going backwards in times rather than forwards in times? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Madam Chair, it’s a sunsetting of a strategic initiative. I believe it was the family violence and also the transfer of the Homeless Fund to the NWT Housing Corporation from the Department of Health and Social Services. However, we do have some federal funding. I can have the deputy minister provide detail on the federal funding.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. Ms. DeLancey.
Thank you, Madam Chair. In the later section of the main estimates, there is a $12 million entry for wellness funding that’s received from Health Canada, and although there is no new funding for prevention and promotion in this year’s budget, we are in the process of working with Health Canada to re-profile how that $12 million, which is available for Aboriginal communities and First Nations, can be spent. We are moving toward a beginning in the next fiscal year, a five-year agreement that will focus on three key areas: healthy child and youth development, mental wellness and addictions, healthy living and disease prevention. So though we have not included any new GNWT funding and prevention and promotion in the budget, we are working with Health Canada to reallocate funding to prevention and promotion, and the other part of this work is focusing on the development of community wellness plans. We do have a position that’s being funded through Health Canada that is out working with community governments to develop wellness plans. This funding will be used to fund those wellness plans on a multi-year basis as opposed to the process now where groups have to come forward every year for proposals. So we are hoping that by using this federal funding more effectively, we will start to see an increased investment and increased results in the area of prevention and promotion.
Thank you, Ms. DeLancey. Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Madam Chair, and thanks to the deputy minister for that response. Can the department indicate what our budget last year was in prevention and promotion services in the Department of Health and what it is this year? I’m looking for a percentage of what we spent in our budget in the area of prevention and promotion in the 2011-2012 area and what is that new budget or percent in this year’s budget. Thank you.
Thanks, Mr. Dolynny. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m going to have the deputy minister try to respond to that. We may not have the information here.
Thanks, Mr. Beaulieu. Ms. DeLancey.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We do not have that information with us. One of the challenges, of course, is carving out a definition of what we consider to be prevention and promotion, because the amount that’s on this line item is only a small part of what’s actually spent within the system. So, for example, it could include immunization programs, it could include some of the work that social workers do. We can certainly attempt to do a calculation and provide it with some definition of what’s included.
Thank you, Ms. DeLancey. Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you. I do appreciate the fact that if we can get that information to the Social Programs committee, that would be definitely advisable.
With that in mind, my next question in relationship to that question is how does the Northwest Territories fit vis-à-vis our northern counterparts, vis-à-vis the other provinces across Canada in terms of the percentage of their budgets in the area of prevention and promotion in health, and also could that information be broken down and provided to the committee? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister Beaulieu.
My understanding is that we are fairly average with that. There are a couple of jurisdictions across the country that have agreed to increase the percentage of their budget towards prevention and promotion and we are trying to do the same as well.
Thank you. I do appreciate the Minister striving towards improving that number, but I believe my question is: Would these numbers in terms of last year to this year in comparison tools to all our territories as well as provinces, could that be made available to the Social Programs committee for evaluation? Thank you.
Yes, we can make that available to Social Programs for evaluation.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. Next on the list I have Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a couple things. I, too, felt concerned about the decrease in prevention promotion, but I’m glad to hear you’re looking at creating some kind of agreement with the wellness funding of $1,200. That was very good to see.
In terms of adult continuing care, I see that the numbers actually dropped about $300,000, and with the increase in senior population and limited spaces in long-term care facilities, what does the department have in place to address the growing population of our seniors, as well as lack of space that’s provided? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I will have the deputy minister respond to that.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. Ms. DeLancey.
Thank you, Madam Chair. What appears to be a reduction in funding here is actually because there was some one-time funding provided to one of the authorities to address some contractual pressures. Overall, there is a recognition that we need to do more in this area in terms of continuing care services and beds available, and we are working right now on updating our needs assessment that was done for continuing care a few years ago as a basis for addressing that issue.
Thank you, Ms. DeLancey. Mr. Moses.
Thank you. In this needs assessment, what are you looking at? Are you looking at the amount of applications or requests to go in long-term care facilities, the amount of hospital visits from our senior citizens? What type of criteria are you looking at in this needs assessment, and if it’s broken down to regions or communities or even regional centres such as Inuvik? I know there’s a waiting list for a long-term care facility in Inuvik or Simpson, or I know they’re just getting one in Norman Wells.
Thank you. Very briefly, the Member has touched on some of the key elements. There was a needs assessment done in 2009. It’s out of date. We need to look at demographics; we need to look at exactly hospital visits. We know that, just like southern jurisdictions, we have some people staying in acute care beds in hospitals because they don’t have a place to go, a long-term care facility. We’re looking at our waiting lists and we’re looking at trends for the type of continuing care that’s required.
From the needs assessment of 2009, I’m sure it might have addressed some of those concerns into which regions. We would need more long-term care facilities or extra beds. Were those results particular to those kinds of needs assessment and did the department act on those needs assessments of 2009 into which regions or communities needed the most support? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, our response was the replacement and additional beds to the Jimmy Erasmus Long-Term Care Facility in Behchoko and the Norman Wells 18-bed long-term care facility also. Thank you.
The Member for Mackenzie Delta isn’t here, but I’ll speak on his behalf with the elders facilities in Aklavik being shut down. It has increased the amount of people wanting to get into a long-term care facility in the hospital, which does put a backlog and a waiting list for others that do need to get in there. So does the Minister have any plans in how to address this regional issue? Thank you.
I’d like to defer the question to the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Madam Chair. The Joe Greenland Centre in Aklavik, one part of it was used by independent long-term residents in Aklavik. The other part Health and Social Services had had before. Our plan is to convert that into more units for independent seniors. We plan on starting the work this summer, getting the initial plan there and get the work started, then hopefully have tenants in there before Christmas. That’s the plan for the Joe Greenland Centre right now.
I need to stress that the Joe Greenland Centre is not closing down. The Housing Corporation owns the building and we’re doing some renovations to allow more seniors to live in there.
Thank you, Minister McLeod. Mr. Moses.
I think I’ll say on this topic here and in regard to the seniors’ independence, that’s great to see, but we’re also talking about health care and care of our seniors and the seniors that can’t live the independent lifestyles and they’re living at home with their families and putting stress on their families. We’ve had requests to find spaces for them. When we know there’s backlog and there’s no way we can do it, it just adds more to the problem. I was just wondering if the Minister had any solutions to the situation in the Beaufort-Delta region as it pertains to elders who need ongoing care at this time.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Ms. DeLancey.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We do recognize that we do have a gap in some places in our continuum of care. We have home care services, which we are trying to expand for adults who are living independently. There is some seniors independent living; there is long-term care facilities. But what the Member is talking about is really an assisted or supportive living, which is somewhere in between. It’s for seniors who don’t need to be in long-term care but need to be in a facility where there is some support. We are in the early stages of having some discussions with the Housing Corporation to see if we can work together to start looking at a program to address that gap.
I was going to switch over to another area here. Awhile back we had sort of a press release of this Betty House here in Yellowknife, and under the activity description for community health programs, programs related to emergency shelters and counselling, what is the department doing to provide counselling, therapy and services to Betty House, in particular?
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Mr. Beaulieu.
