Masi. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I made the commitment while we were meeting with committee in Committee Room A that we would do the work in analyzing the effects that it would have. Historically, we have always been able to accommodate a lot of those folks that have been affected in moving them to other departments, and we are continuing to do that work. We will continue to keep committee apprised. In the briefing that I had with committee the other day, I did make a commitment that we would come before committee every Monday and give them an update on the work that we are doing to accommodate all those that are affected. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you to the Minister for that response. We all know that loss of jobs in the public service ultimately results in loss of jobs in the private sector as customers move away or they stop spending. I have heard that for every ten government jobs cut in our economy, five jobs will be lost in the service sectors. What multiplier did the government use to evaluate the impact of government job losses into the private sector in the wider NWT economy?
We are doing what we can to mitigate the impact of the reduction exercise that we are going through. I think we have been fortunate so far. We have been able to accommodate a lot of those folks that have been affected. I think the number is quite low right now. I did share that number with committee the other day. As I said, we will continue to update them on the work that we are doing to accommodate those few government employees that are left.
I don't think I actually got an answer on the question about multipliers. But I also want to ask the Minister what this government has predicted from the job cuts in terms of losses to personal income tax, payroll, and other taxes and then the territorial transfer payments.
Mr. Speaker, I did make a commitment in the past that we do our work in trying to analyze the effects that it has on the NWT. We will continue to do that work. We share that with committee. For the particular detail on that, I don't have that detail right now as to what do I think we are going to lose if ten people leave the Northwest Territories, but we are doing what we can to mitigate the effect on the NWT as a whole.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I want to thank the Minister for his response. It is helpful to tell committee but I would prefer that he actually table that information in the House. Lastly, I want to ask about the job losses and if the Minister would be willing to table in this House a list of the communities where the cuts will be made and how many jobs will actually be lost in each community. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
I would be willing to share that information. I think I have shared it in the past. As we go through the budget, the committee of the whole process, I think there is an opportunity there too where a lot of the positions would be identified. I will commit to gathering the information and sharing it with the Member. It will be out there in the public as well.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in my Member’s statement, I talked about the Cancer Strategy for Department of Health and Social Services. I have questions for the Minister. I would like to ask firstly, Minister, were there action plans put in the Cancer Strategy, action items that will be done this fiscal year? Thank you.
Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Cancer Strategy actually does come with a number of items that are falling from the strategy itself. The strategy includes specific supports to help communities, help individuals, make healthy choices by focusing on healthy eating through gardening and education, continuing to hold sharing circles, which we have seen has been quite effective in helping people deal with the issues. We do have funding that we have provided to different communities to support tobacco prevention for youth. The strategy commits us to find ways to increase education awareness so people can take advantage of cancer screening at the end of the day. Mr. Speaker, it is going to be incredibly important for people to attend the Well Man and Well Woman clinics to get early diagnosis. Early diagnosis is going to give us better results. There are a number of things that are direct actions that are available to communities and regions to help us fight and prevent cancer as much as possible. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, within those action plans, I would like to ask the Minister: which particular preventive measures does the department see as a priority within the Cancer Strategy?
Mr. Speaker, the evidence shows that one of the best ways to combat cancer is to prevent cancer, which is why we are focusing on healthy eating initiatives and encouraging people to get their exercise. We are doing this in partnership with a number of different groups. There is fantastic work being done by sports and recreation, Sport North, the Department of MACA, to encourage people to be active. ITI is doing a number of fantastic things with respect to supporting agriculture as an economy, but also supporting small local gardens. We have had a number of individuals apply for money through the anti-poverty funding to support community gardens. We are trying to encourage people to eat healthy, be active, and live healthy. But also, we are encouraging people to get early screening. We are working with communities on finding ways to encourage people. What is it going to take to encourage people to attend the Well Woman and Well Man on a regular basis in order to get that screening done early?
I would like to ask the Minister if he can direct the department to do some specific work with the community of Fort Resolution in developing an action plan to augment the Cancer Strategy.
Mr. Speaker, I hear the Member. I think it is important for us to be in partnership with Fort Resolution, but I wouldn't suggest that we should be developing the action plan. I think it would be better if we work with the community through their community wellness plans, work with them to develop a strategy that works for them. We could develop a strategy, but I would hate to impose it on any community. I would like to sit down with the Member and maybe the representatives from the community and talk about how we can work through the community wellness plans and build upon the important work or good work that has been done in other jurisdictions. By way of example, Fort Good Hope has done some incredible work around sharing circles and cancer circles that the community of Fort Resolution could seriously learn from. A real opportunity to build upon the good work that has been done, but also tailor something specific to a community. I won't commit to developing the strategy or an action plan, but I sure would like to sit down with the community and see what opportunities we have to work together to support them in the development of a plan that meets their needs.
Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I am happy with that response. Can the Minister provide me a timeframe as to when the department can start working with the community? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I do believe the community and the department already work together through the Aboriginal health and community wellness division on their wellness plan. We do have a significant amount of people working on the Cancer Strategy. What I will do, Mr. Speaker, is I will ask the Member through you to maybe work with the community to get in touch with us and have a conversation. I couldn't tell you the timeline because we have never been contacted to this degree in this nature. I think there is an opportunity here. I would say let's work together. If the Member can put us in touch, we can start having discussions, work out a timeline together. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for the Minister of MACA. Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned in my Member’s statement, a 911 emergency telephone service has the potential to be an important public safety measure. Such a system would be available for a relatively low initial cost and a relatively low annual operating cost. The risks of not having such a system are clear. During previous Assemblies, the government has engaged key participants in a 911 stakeholders group and engaged a study which concluded that the NWT is well positioned to implement 911. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to ask the Minister, would the government be willing to restart the discussion with Members about this important basic public safety measure? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs.
Mr. Speaker, 911 has been on the radar for the past assemblies and it received a lot of attention. There's a lot of work that's gone into it. We had a working group that was set up to analyze the implementation and how we could work 911 into the system. That work is being done, as the Member correctly stated, but to his question, 911 is not really a part of the NWT mandate, the mandate we just put together, but recognizing that it is an important safety service that's required across the NWT, I will commit to the Member that we will continue to have discussion on 911 service and how we can get the necessary funding to implement this so the discussion will carry on, Mr. Speaker. Thank you very much.
Thank you to the Minister for his reply. That appears to be a positive response. Mr. Speaker, would the Minister be willing to engage with other stakeholders to seek support for funding and partnerships to make a 911 service viable?
Mr. Speaker, absolutely, if there is opportunity for us to find other stakeholders or other community governments and that, we can partner up with them and we will explore all options in how we can move this forward. We have done a lot of work across the jurisdiction, across the country to see what their successes have been with the implementation and which systems might work best for up here. I think we have basically come up with a plan. The next step now is to identify finances, to try and implement across the NWT, and it's one of the reasons we go through the exercise that we go through so we can free up some funds that we are able to invest into initiatives like 911.
Finally, Mr. Speaker, will the Minister then commit to revisiting the possibility of establishing a 911 emergency telephone service for the NWT during the life of this Assembly? In other words, what would be the expected timeframe to actually have a service in place?
Mr. Speaker, the Member has already raised it as an issue that continues to be on the radar. We have had a lot of the work done, the research work done, and so we know where we need to go. We know what it's going to cost, so our challenge now is to come up with the funding to try and implement this, see where it's going to work best. But as far as during the life of this Assembly, it would be ideal to… Because this work has been going on, I think, for the last eight, nine years… So if there is an opportunity to do it during the life of this Assembly, we will certainly explore that.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Hay River North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier I spoke about the long-term care bed situation in Hay River. Earlier the Minister of Finance mentioned that the Woodland Manor expansion, as we call it, is going through. I have some questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services. This might be more of a public works question, but I think the Minister probably can answer it. I was wondering what the status of this project is? We know it's going through, but when is construction scheduled to start? When is it expected to finish? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the plan is to build a 10-bed facility; including nine long-term care beds as well as a respite bed, for a total of 10 beds and that respite bed can be used for long-term care actually dependent on the needs, so it's actually a 10-bed facility, not a nine-bed facility. A contract has been signed with a proponent who is in the process currently of developing a schematic, a design, as well as putting together the costs of the project moving forward. We anticipate getting that shortly or, rather, Public Works and Services anticipates getting that shortly. If the project is within budget, we will be moving forward. We're hoping to have ground broken by the fall/late summer should they, like I say, contract come in on a reasonable price with completion in 2017 so that we can move from H.H. Williams into Woodland Manor.
I guess my government math was wrong; it's 10 beds, not nine beds. Regardless, even if it's 10 beds, it still isn't going to address our needs. It's going to replace what we have now. This piece of land, it can't accommodate an expansion; there's the manor there, there's the hospital there, there's the ravine there. Is there another piece of land in Hay River that's suitable? By suitable, I mean large enough to build on and economical?
Mr. Speaker, the Member's exactly right. I mean, this building doesn't address our future need; it simply keeps us at status quo in Hay River. We do know from the long-term care review that by 2026 we need 30 more beds on top of the ones we already have and will have with this new building in the community with respect to long-term care. More needs to be done; we're currently doing our review, our report, coming up with an action plan, how we can facilitate beds across the Northwest Territories by 2026.As it currently stands, there isn't significant room on the current Woodland Manor site; there's enough to fit this new 10-bed facility, but what we're looking at today, Mr. Speaker, is we have a much larger campus there that does include the H.H. Williams building. We are looking at possibly taking over that property and utilizing it for expansion for long-term care. We have a lot of due diligence we still have to do, but we see a real opportunity to expand into that site and make a real long-term care campus in that particular area. It's a good area. It's got the electricity, the plumbing already built into the site and it's already got some parking. It would take limited site prep. It's close to the independent living as well as the long-term care, so it could be an ideal site. We are going to put a reserve on that site for Health and Social Services so that we can keep options open to us moving forward, and hopefully we will be able to address our 30-bed shortage in that community by plan during the life of this government with build before 2026.
It's good to hear that there is a plan to expand, that they're looking forward at that. What I'm hearing is that the H.H. Williams site, I'm hearing it referred to as a site, not the building, so I imagine that the building is not going to be on this site when it's expanded into. There’s been some apprehension to utilize this building, and there's a lot of people in town who want to use this. There's lots of needs and we just don't have the space. People have been coming to me wondering what's going on with that building. I'm just wondering why the government is averse to using it. Are the costs just too high or are there structural issues? Are there high operational costs? Are there deferred maintenance costs that the people need to know about?
Mr. Speaker, all the answers were in the Member's question. The Member has actually hit it on the head. That building costs us about $600,000 a year just to heat and provide electricity. On top of that, the Hay River Health and Social Services Authority does provide minor O and M. Public Works and Services is always monitoring the condition of that building. Should any catastrophic incidents happen in that building, a failure of the sprinkler system by way of example, as long as we're occupying, we would have to do that upgrade. The building was reviewed several times prior to the final decision to move forward with a new standalone hospital in Hay River. It was determined that based on the high level of deferred maintenance required on that building it was not economical to move forward with a repair or retrofit on that building. The same is still true. It does not meet the needs moving forward for a long-term care facility. The deferred maintenance is quite high. If you look at the building, if you walk at it from a certain angle, you'll notice that there is some real irregularities in the building itself. We are looking at getting out of that building as quickly as we can so we can stop paying those high costs for occupying this building that is certainly questionable. But we are looking at utilizing that site for a possible long-term care expansion to meet the long-term care needs of Hay River in the South Slave. We believe there's an opportunity here. We believe we can do some real positive work on that site and meet the needs of the community and the region.
Oral questions. Member for Hay River North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think the Minister has cleared up a lot of the lingering questions we've had. I know the Minister doesn't have a long-term plan yet, they said they're working on the action plan to address the needs by 2026. I'm just wondering: when can we expect to know. And I understand there's needs all over the territory, there's 286 or 256 beds needed across the territory, and so I know Hay River is not the first in line. When can we expect to know when a solution will be presented? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, we intend to have an action plan moving forward to outline how we're going to address the need over the next 10 years early in the life of this government, hopefully within this fiscal year, barring any unforeseen circumstances. In the meantime, we're also going to be taking some short-term, medium-term and long-term actions to start addressing these issues. We do know that one of the largest needs is actually here in Yellowknife. There's very little capacity, we're very stretched in Yellowknife. We also know there's significant need in the Beaufort Delta. We have people actually living in the acute care units rather than in the long-term care units, which isn't ideal. Long-term care is supposed to be your home. We do believe we're going to have a little bit of reprieve in the Beaufort Delta when the Norman Wells facility opens, but we still have challenges in Yellowknife, and that certainly doesn't exclude Hay River where we know we need 30 beds by 2026. We intend to have the plan moving forward, our action plan moving forward, early in the life of this government. I don't have a defined date. As soon as I have a defined date, I will certainly share that with the Member and all committee members.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in follow-up to my Member's statement, I have some questions for the Minister of Housing Corporation. I'd like to ask the Minister: with the community meetings that the department held in Fort McPherson, what concerns has the community brought to the NWT Housing Corporation and how is the Housing Corporation addressing these issues? For example, relocation, landscaping, local hiring. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of NWT Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A couple of the issues that were brought by the community actually in Fort McPherson with the seniors facility, one was the location. We've done many, many consultations within the community and talked to them about the facility, the location, the site, and the community seemed to be in adherence to the proposed plan; then just a couple months ago we got some complaints saying they weren't. We went back actually on April 6th. We had another meeting in the community and again, we talked about the location. Within that meeting Chief William Koe confirmed that consultation has taken place and that they're okay with the location as it is. We've dealt with the location, which was one of the issues. The other bigger issue was the infiltration of water. In July 2016, we noticed that there were some issues with water and the piling, so we needed to do some additional engineering services for that. All the piles were completed in February 2016. The ones that were installed in 2015 had to be tested, which was completed again in April 2016 and the piling has passed the test, so we're going to move forward. The water issue has been…We've talked with the Hamlet, and the Hamlet is going to address any issues that may come up with the water at this time. I guess that would answer the question on what are some of the issues that have arisen in the community. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, just for the record, it's William Koe, Chief William Koe.
---Laughter
My next question for the Minister is: what has caused the recent delays in the construction of the Fort McPherson elders' home, as we are almost a year into construction and only pilings have been in place?
I believe the question is what caused the delays? Again, as I had spoken before, there were some issues regarding the water, and so we had to make sure that the piles were engineered safely. We just completed that work. Now that is in place, we're ready to roll.
Mr. Speaker, you know, my last visit to the community, and everybody in the community has noticed there is no material in the community, except some roofing. Usually you start at the foundation and work yourself up. I'd like to ask the Minister: is construction on track to be completed by November 2016? Also, when does the Housing Corporation anticipate that residents will be able to move into the completed units?
