Final supplementary, Mr. Beaulieu.
Can the Minister direct his delivery staff to work with me this summer to keep me in the loop, so I can help deal with some of the concerns related to the project and deal with the issues before they become unmanageable, hopefully? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I will ask the staff if they will contact the Member every so often and if there is some pending applications, then maybe he would be able to assist with some of those. And, myself, I will keep in close contact with the Member and keep him updated on the activity throughout the summer. Thank you.
Thank you. The honourable Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday, my colleague Mr. Yakeleya raised the issue of confidential medical records from Norman Wells inadvertently ending up at the CBC here in Yellowknife. Mr. Speaker, that was a very serious issue and the Minister, in response to questions from Mr. Yakeleya, stated that it was an accident and sometimes accidents happen.
Mr. Speaker, just yesterday a Yellowknife woman had come forward saying she’s received a dozen faxes containing confidential medical information. Mr. Speaker, I believe the Minister of Health and Social Services has some explaining to do. I would like to ask the Minister if she’s aware of these other breaches of privacy, serious breaches of privacy. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I did hear about the situation that the Member is describing and we are investigating that. Thank you.
I would like to ask the Minister of Health and Social Services how often major breaches of privacy happen with her department and the health authorities across the Northwest Territories that don’t hit the newspaper or the media. Thank you.
As I indicated in the House, every health authority, every health profession, professionals have a very strict protocol on patient records and medical information and they are to follow those protocols. When there are situations like this as sometimes does happen, then you have to investigate and work with the Privacy Commissioner to make sure those breaches don’t happen again and we are doing that with the latest information. Thank you.
In response to my colleague Mr. Yakeleya on Tuesday, the Minister stated that a policy already exists or is in place to protect the privacy of patients with confidential medical records. I’d like to ask the Minister if she’s willing to share that policy with us and, if there is such a policy, why these breaches are taking place. Thank you.
I’d be happy to share that. We know that policies exist, but it’s the people and machines that implement those policies and procedures. The latest information is that the information was faxed from an Alberta facility and our Privacy Commissioner is in touch with her counterpart to follow up on the details of this. Details are not clear at the moment, but we are following up on that as we take these issues very seriously. Thank you.
Final supplementary, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as if it’s not bad enough that the information is getting out there, the lady that received some of these confidential medical records here in Yellowknife had, in fact, phoned the Stanton Territorial Hospital and told them that she had received this information. She never heard back from the hospital. I’d like to ask the Minister, if she’s going to take a look at this, you know, are people going to be responsible for not getting back to this woman and not telling her what she should do with these confidential medical records when she received them inadvertently. Thank you.
We are investigating the situation to see, in fact, exactly what happened and obviously we want to make sure that all the steps that were to be taken were taken. But first of all we have to have the facts, because this just came to light in the last few hours. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Nunakput, Mr. Jacobson.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My Member’s statement today was travel from the outlying communities; Ulukhaktok and smaller communities that travel from communities for medical travel to either Inuvik or Yellowknife being bumped off. Will the Minister commit to working with the various departments and agencies to implement changes provided by the communities to improve the administration for medical travel to prevent future patients to have to wait in their communities or transit centres and half the time while in pain, Mr. Speaker? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Jacobson. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, I will commit to do that with the Member. We are reviewing the medical travel and we are reviewing the very issue that the Member is raising. Thank you.
When the patient is in pain in the communities, they must be flown out the next day or the next flight, no questions asked, to the nearest hospital. Mr. Speaker, there’s no reason that is good enough to have patients suffer needlessly, especially due to an overbooked plane. Mr. Speaker, how long does the Minister expect people to wait in their home communities in severe pain before a medevac is warranted? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The Member is right that we have lots of people in our communities who have a permanent, twenty-four hour medical and health staff. Their services are provided by communities outside. We have to rely on medical travel to do that and obviously the people who live in these communities are entitled to good service and quick access. So, no, we don’t expect people who aren’t well to be waiting in pain. We do have a policy in place to do that. I know the medical director team in the Beaufort-Delta is reviewing the response policy and I will get back to the Member with the details of that. We are working to improve that system. Thank you.
A constituent told me a similar situation where one time they had to wait due to cancellation, because of a lack of passengers, for four days away from their home. Mr. Speaker, will the Minister take the initiative to try to coordinate alternative arrangements when scheduled medical travel flights have been cancelled such as coming back to Yellowknife going through Kugluktuk up to Ulukhaktok? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Yes, we will follow up on that. Thank you.
Thank you. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee. Mr. Speaker, in my Member’s statement, in two and a half minutes you can’t do much to kind of try and capture and summarize all of the questions and comments surrounding this, but I can clearly tell you today that many, many of my constituents came out to a public meeting that was sponsored by the Department of Health and Social Services and, without exception, were not in support of the changes to the Extended Health Benefits Program. It was a thoughtful and respectful exchange, but I am here to represent the people of Hay River and I’d like to ask the Minister of Health if, when we go back after all this public consultation and all the debate in this House and all the work that’s gone into this, when an initiative comes before the Cabinet, I remember this, there’s a briefing note that accompanies it and under a heading called purpose, there is a brief description. Then it goes into the background and the political implications and all that stuff. But if the Minister could just tell us what is the purpose succinctly for the overhauling of the extended health care benefits in the Northwest Territories at this time. Thank you.
Thank you. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The purpose of overhauling the Supplementary Heath Benefits Program is, one, there is a group of our citizens who need supplementary health benefits that are excluded from the current program; two, the way it is designed now is administratively cumbersome and Member...(inaudible)...talked about the administrative difficulties, specified conditions is run by exceptions; and, third, there is no appeal mechanisms for people who are not happy with the system we have now, so we needed to clear out those issues; and, fourth, the program as it exists now is not fair or equitable or sustainable. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I could swear that I have heard the Minister say repeatedly that this overhaul of extended health care benefits does not have anything to do with cost saving, it does not have to do with money. I think we’ve all heard her say that. Okay. Yet, now in the purpose of the overhaul she’s saying that it is about money, because it’s about the sustainability of the program. I’d like to ask the Minister, in her point number one, when she refers to the group of citizens who are excluded who need support, who need help with their costs, what kind of thought in putting together the proposed policy changes was given to where the resources would come from to include that group of people? What kind of consideration was given to that and why today do we have a scenario where it appears that the GNWT is taking away from one group to support another? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, the Member states that we are overhauling the Supplementary Health Benefits Program, but as the Member knows… I have distributed the article in the Slave River Journal, which did a very good study, a cross-country survey of 12 jurisdictions, and every single jurisdiction including and Yukon and excluding Nunavut, because Nunavut has the same thing as us. But all of the 11 jurisdictions have supplementary health programs that are income tested or there is a deductible, there are premiums, they are capped. So we’re not inventing a new wheel here. This is something that all jurisdictions do for supplementary health benefit. It’s not for insured health benefits, as Member Yakeleya talked about. Those are the essential health services. This one is supplementary. This is the program that in the rest of the country people do pay for part of the service. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, in fact the Minister, by comparing our program to that and other jurisdictions is saying that our program is costing this government too much money and we’re looking at saving money. So to that argument, Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister what kind of financial analysis has been done to actually prove out what these changes will cost us.
Mr. Speaker, I don’t think enough analysis has been done, because I think the new program is going to cost us far more than the existing program. One of those areas where it’s going to cost us is when seniors decide to leave the Northwest Territories. Mr. Speaker, seniors, we don’t need to go into the all details of this, but what they contribute to our communities and their volunteer efforts and everything, but they are also contributing to the personal income tax that this Territory receives. They are also contributing to the transfer from Canada just by their very presence here in the Northwest Territories. They often are close by because they’re part of a larger extended family that is also all here.
Mr. Speaker, I’d like to ask the Minister what thought she has given to the ramifications, financial ramifications, not to mention those unquantifiable other contributions that are made by seniors in the Northwest Territories, but what kind of quantifiable, monetary, full costing analysis has been done when seniors and their families start to leave the Northwest Territories. Because it’s fine to say that we’re a unique jurisdiction, and we are. Let’s recognize that. That’s why you have isolated post allowance, northern living allowance… I’m sorry. I’ll stop there. Thank you.
I think one thing we should not lose sight of, because it keeps getting repeated, is that this proposal is taking away benefits from seniors in order to pay for benefits for those who are excluded, because that is totally not true. Most people… Mr. Speaker, what this program is doing, is doing what the government has to do. The government has an obligation to help those who need help from us. There are people, low-income families who are excluded from most essential benefits such as eye care and dental. So for some people that might seem small, but that’s important and government has a role to play in that.
The fact of the matter is we could work the Supplementary Health Program so that the vast majority of seniors will be covered. The proposal we have in place gives 80 percent of our non-aboriginal population a package that’s as good or better than they would get if they worked for the government. That’s a very, very generous program. We are making the program fairer by asking those of us who have more than others, and some of them include seniors but a vast majority are not seniors, and we are trying to make the program fair. I understand, Mr. Speaker, this is a very, very difficult thing to do, but it’s one that we need to look into. Thank you.
Your final supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So the Minister would have me to believe that this is just a coincidence that we are going to be reducing the support that we provide to our seniors while at the same time looking for a way to help those other lower income Northerners to receive benefits. So it’s just a kind of coincidence that this all happened at the same time and the two are not related at all. If you listen to the Minister, that’s what she is trying to portray.
Mr. Speaker, I am all for helping those people who have no other insurance and need help. I am all for that. But surely this government could have been a little more creative and thought a little further afield as to how we could find the resources to do that without having to impact the benefits of others.
I’d like to ask the Minister what kind of thought was given to that, because I think everybody knows this government seems to have a lot of money for a lot of things that are of questionable value, but when it comes to supporting the people who’ve given -- a lot of them have given their entire lives to this Territory -- I’m sure the government could have come up with some other ideas of where to get that money to support that other group of people. What kind of thought was given to that?
Mr. Speaker, this Extended Health Benefits Program is not new. It’s something that every government grapples with. We’re not inventing a new wheel here. We look at what is available across the country. We looked at what’s the use of it.
Mr. Speaker, we have a proposal before us that would cover the vast majority of seniors, the vast majority of the population who need support from us. We are asking that those of us, and that includes me and many other people who are going to be seniors one day and who hope to be financially better off, that we make our contribution so that we help those seniors down the road and our younger folks, university students or newly starting a job, a single mother with kids, that they get the basic care that they do not get right now. I believe, at the end of the day, government has a responsibility and the role to look after the poor first, look after the most vulnerable first. We will look after seniors and we will look after everybody who needs us, but no government can afford to do extended health benefits with no questions asked and pay for supplementary health benefits for somebody who’s making two, three, four, five hundred thousand a year. The fact of the matter is we have those people. Thank you.
The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services. I want to follow up a bit on my statement today and from yesterday as well.
You know, it’s said, Mr. Speaker, that a society is judged by its treatment of children, the sick and the elderly. I think we in the NWT want to be judged well. We want to feel that our society is a good one and I think we put programs in place to look after our children, our sick and our elderly. So it leads to the idea of a safety net, which the Minister has referred to quite a number of times in our discussion over the last few days and months.
So my question to the Minister is, as I mentioned in my statement, there are those residents who, under the proposed plan, will end up with excessive medical costs in any one-month period because they have third-party insurance and don’t have any access to supplementary health benefit. So I’d like to ask the Minister where is the safety net for those residents who have third-party insurance and have to endure excessive medical costs. Thank you.
The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And we have heard that concern. As the Members might remember, the first time when we came out with this proposal, the implementation plan, was that there would be two types of different programs and the income cut-off was $45,000. Everybody told us that that was not workable and we have to make a more flexible program. This is why we have revised the program so that income threshold starts at $50,000 for a single person and about $70,000 for a couple. But if you have children, the threshold goes up, up to the point of $170,000 to $190,000.
Mr. Speaker, no other program across the country accommodates the fact that we have needs for the families. The fact of the matter is the Member says we need to look after the children and the elderly. Yes, we do. The Supplementary Health Program right now does not have dental benefits or vision care benefits for children. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the Minister for her comments. She indicated that she has heard the concern that has been expressed by a number of Members about people who are going to endure excessively high medical costs. My question, I guess then is: is she going to respond to that in terms of this particular program? Is there going to be a change to the program? She states that there is no other program in Canada that deals with residents the way that we do, but I would say to her, as well, there is no other program in Canada that leaves people with excessive medical costs out to dry. I would like to go back and ask the Minister. You have heard the concern of people who are going to have excessive medical costs. Will you respond to that and amend the policy? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, as the Member knows, the government has presented the latest proposal. We are meeting with the committee. I was advised that we will have more meetings on that. If there are specific issues that we could work on to improve what we have, we still have time to do that, Mr. Speaker.
I just want to note that, in the NWT, I know we could always come up with the outliers, but on average in the Northwest Territories claims are about 2,816 claims are less than $5,000, 195 claims are a little over $5,000 and about 86 are less than $10,000. So, yes, we could always look at outliers and anomalies and say we do have challenges that we need to look at. But for the vast majority of claimants, the proposal we have laid out would look after many of them and most of them and we will include so many people who are currently excluded into the plan. We have to consider that as something that is positive. You can’t just talk about people who are protesting the loudest. We do need to listen to the silent majority too, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, the Minister in her answer said that she is going to listen to committee’s concerns and I can advise being on that committee that there are many concerns and the Minister will be getting a summary of our concerns shortly, I believe. She said that she is willing to work on it. That is positive, but I really wonder whether or not when she hears committee’s concerns, she is actually going to act on it. She also said that this is going to apply to the vast majority of people. My concern is for that minority who are going to become medically bankrupt. The Minister is ignoring that possibility. It is not a lot of people, but it is some people. Do we want to marginalize those people and put them into bankruptcy? I don’t think so.
The Minister advised us yesterday and today that Cabinet has considered all possible options in terms of preparing this proposal for changes to the Supplementary Health Benefits Program. I would like to know whether or not or where are the results of that analysis. There should be a sheet that has pros and cons that compares one option to a second option to a third option to a fourth option which leads to a considered decision. I would like to ask the Minister where the results of the analysis that was done by the department and/or Cabinet and will she share those results with Members. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, we have provided the information that we have been using. If the Member has that information that she would like to get, I would be happy to accommodate that. I don’t know what she means by... I guess she is talking about a table with 100 different ideas.
Mr. Speaker, as I have said already, we are not inventing a new wheel. This is a commonly used model everywhere in the country. We have designed our program more fairly and generous than anything in the market, other than Nunavut. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Final supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will try to put my request in words that perhaps the Minister can understand. When one has a number of options, six or 10, one lists them on a page and you then go across the page on the top and you put this is a positive, this is a negative, this is a positive, this is a negative. You then look at each option and you evaluate. You could even give them a number and assign a number to them so that you come out of each option with a plus or a minus 500, minus 600, et cetera. That then allows you to take the options to six or 10 options that you have and rank them from number one to number 10 or one to six. Was that done in this case? Where are the results of the analysis that the department did? That is what I am asking for.
Mr. Speaker, I think the better way for me to provide the information that she is looking for is if she could give me the questions.
Mr. Speaker, we looked at the premiums. We looked at the deductibles, using the deductibles. We looked at different income models. I know the general public out there want to know what analysis have you done to do universal versus charging cold payment. Mr. Speaker, we have done that. If the Member wants to have that information, I would be happy to provide that to her. Thank you.
The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Abernethy.
