Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I give notice that on Monday, February 16, 2015, I will move the following motion: I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Sahtu, that the Legislative Assembly strongly recommends that the Department of Health and Social Services clarify procedures for Stanton Territorial Hospital employees to follow when violent incidents occur, including procedures expressly for the use of physical restraint in these cases;
And further, that the Department of Health and Social Services direct Stanton Territorial Hospital management to hire security personnel with recognized training in non-violent crises intervention and physical restraint techniques;
And further, that security personnel at territorial health care facilities be hired as full-fledged employees of the Government of the Northwest Territories, guaranteeing continuity of service and benefits resulting from accumulated experience, institutional memory and professional training;
And furthermore, that the Department of Health and Social Services review its policies and procedures pertaining to security at territorial health care facilities, including long-term care and extended care facilities, and report back to the House within 120 days.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I MOVE, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that, notwithstanding Rule 4, when this House adjourns on Thursday, February 12, 2015, it shall be adjourned until Monday, February 16, 2015;
AND FURTHER, that any time prior to February 16, 2015, if the Speaker is satisfied, after consultation with the Executive Council and members of the Legislative Assembly, that the public interest requires that the House should meet at an earlier time during the adjournment, the Speaker may give notice and thereupon the House shall meet at the time stated in such notice and shall transact its business as it has been duly adjourned to that time.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The motion is in order. To the motion.
Question.
Question has been called. The motion is carried.
---Carried
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya.
Item 19, first reading of bills. Item 20, second reading of bills. Item 21, consideration in Committee of the Whole of bills and other matters: Tabled Document 188-17(5), Northwest Territories Main Estimates 2015-2016; Bill 38, An Act to Amend the Jury Act; and Bill 41, An Act to Amend the Partnership Act, with Mr. Dolynny in the chair.
Good afternoon, committee. I’d like to call Committee of the Whole to order. What is the wish of committee? Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We’d like to continue with TD 188-17(5), continuing with the Department of Justice and, time permitting, start on the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. With that, we’ll turn it to the Minister for the Department of Justice to see if he has any witnesses he’d like to bring in. Minister Ramsay.
Yes, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister Ramsay. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. Sergeant-at-Arms, if you can please escort our witnesses into the House.
Mr. Ramsay, if you would be kind enough, for our record, to introduce your witnesses to the House, please.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. To my right is Ms. Sylvia Haener, deputy minister, Department of Justice, and to my left is Ms. Kim Schofield, our director of corporate services with the Department of Justice.
Thank you, Minister Ramsay. Ms. Haener, Ms. Schofield, welcome back. We’re always happy to have you here.
Committee, we are on general comments. With that, I have Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Now that the wellness courts have been proceeding forward, I’m wondering if the Minister can provide some statistics or stats as to how it’s been rolling out and the success of it. I’ll start with that one.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Minister Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We made a commitment, I believe it was to Ms. Bisaro yesterday, to provide the statistics. We have some. We’re going to compile those statistics and get them to Members. Just since October 2014 the Wellness Court program has had 13 referrals. At this point there are five clients currently in the program, two clients undergoing the assessment process and three potential clients, three clients have been removed from the program. But again, there’s a lot of other statistics here. So we’re going to get that and get it to committee members. I made a commitment yesterday, by the end of this month we’ll have that information. Thank you.
I suppose this next question could be asked on the page, but I’ll just sort of speak generally to it, which is the rentals office. Not so much particularly a budget line item, so that’s why I’m going to ask it here. What type of community outreach does the rental office do outside of Yellowknife? Does it get out there, does it advocate, does it meet in community meetings to remind people what their rights are? Thank you.
That’s something we can potentially work with the GSOs to help us with, but currently that service is available online and information is available online to residents and folks anywhere in the Northwest Territories.
So, is the Minister saying that there is no sort of public relationship that it would have through getting out to ensure people know their rights? Is that what he’s saying? Thank you.
No, not currently. Like I said, there’s the Internet and phone line. That’s the service that’s provided right now. Thank you.
What communities has the rentals office travelled to in the last fiscal year? Thank you.
They have attended for hearings. To get that level of detail, though, we’ll go back and find that information out for the Member. Thank you.
Just to be clear, four hearings as in four opportunities for various cases, or four individual cases. Just so I’m clear.
Just to be clear, it wasn’t the number four and we will get the information for the Member.
Thank you. So I guess Hansard will ensure they spell it F-O-R.
Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you. One of the issues I’m hearing is there are various communities that don’t know enough about the rentals office, and I’ve tried to point them in the direction of this office through the Internet and tried to encourage them that they need to learn more about their rights. They’re not in my constituency of Yellowknife Centre, but trying to point them in that direction. In some cases they actually have problems with the Housing Corporation or, more specifically, the local LHO and through that they do not know their rights. So I would wonder if it would seem reasonable for the Department of Justice to have the rentals office to work through the local LHO so all tenants are aware of their rights.
It’s easy to say to go to the Internet, but if you live in Tulita, Wekweeti or you live in other remote communities, first of all your access to Internet is limited and challenging on a good day and it’s one of those things where you have to know about your right in order to be able to look it up sometimes. So the education of this particular problem needs to get out there.
So I guess what I’m driving this towards is that I see a problem and an opportunity to encourage the rentals office to work with the LHOs to ensure their tenants are familiar with their rights and certainly their ability to challenge them. Does the Minister see the issue similarly as I’m trying to describe and does he see an opportunity to work with the LHOs?
Thank you. I do see an opportunity here as well. As I mentioned earlier, we have GSOs out there. We should be working with our GSOs. Also court workers, and I know the Member has brought up the LHOs. So we will communicate and try to collaborate with the Housing Corporation to see how we can continue to work together on trying to get that information out. So I thank the Member for the question. Thank you.
I think that pretty much covers the area I have of concern under general comments. Thank you.
Thank you, Member Hawkins. We’ll turn our attention to Mr. Blake, go ahead.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have two concerns to bring up. As I mentioned earlier in some questions to the Minister, policing is still an ongoing issue in Tsiigehtchic. In the past we did have RCMP in the community, and ever since, I believe it was the late ‘60s, early ‘70s, that was taken out of the community. Since then the community has wanted to have the presence of the RCMP back in the community. We feel that if we could have RCMP in a community half our size, there’s no reason why we can’t have RCMP in our community.
Thank you, Mr. Blake. Minister Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. There are a couple of things that we need to continue to work on, and that is trying to find accommodations. As I mentioned to the Member, the RCMP are working with the community. The Member advised me during debate in the House earlier today that the RCMP was requesting the community supply that accommodation in kind. That was the first that I had heard about that. So we are going to go back to the RCMP and discuss that with them.
You know, the cost of accommodations in a community like Tsiigehtchic shouldn’t be an impediment to having Members overnight in the community, so we’ll look at that.
Also, the discussion about detachments and new detachments in communities that currently don’t have detachments, the formula has changed. The Government of the Northwest Territories is now responsible for 70 percent of the capital costs of those new detachments. We have some money earmarked for a refurb of the detachment in Inuvik and also the one in Behchoko, but no new detachments. A new detachment, just to ballpark it, is somewhere between $7 million and $10 million, $7 million and $11 million, in that range. So we have to ensure that we have the capital dollars before we can make commitments to building detachments.
Thank you. Just under the wilderness camps that were mentioned earlier with corrections, I was hoping to see more funds in there, but I’ll get into that later as we go through the department. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Blake. I didn’t hear a question and we’ll get to that detail. General comments, committee. Is committee prepared to go into detail?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. Direct your attention to page 289 in your main estimates. We’re going to defer this page until consideration of the activity detail. That said, I’d like to turn your attention to page 290, revenue summary, information item. Any questions?
Agreed.
Seeing none, thank you. Page 291, active position summary, information item. Any questions?
Agreed.
Thank you. Page 293, community justice and policing, operations expenditure summary, $5.096 million. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
