I don’t anticipate that at this time, but as we roll forward and create this new system, new principles and ideas might come forward that might result in a change in how we’re doing business. I don’t anticipate that, but it would be foolish to say that change is never going to happen.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Green.
Thank you. My next question has to do with the golive date for the system transformation. Can you confirm it’s still August 1st? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Green. Mr. Minister.
Yes, absolutely, Mr. Chair. August 1st is still the golive date, but I want to be very clear that this is a date in a process, in a timeline. As we move forward, we go live. There is still going to be some changes, some evolution that’s happening at the regional and community level as we’re formulizing and making this new relationship a reality. I anticipate there will be some growing pains. I anticipate that it will take a couple years to really roll things all the way out to make sure that we’re getting all the benefits of a single unified collaborative system, but the boards, the wellness councils will be in place. The CEOs will be in place. The base structure will be in place as far as making the improvements that this structure will allow us to make. Those will take time.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Green.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am wondering what the department has set up to proactively monitor the system transformation as it takes place in order to address issues that might come up? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Green. Mr. Minister.
Yes, absolutely, and for that detail, I will go to the deputy minister, but just related to the last question, as I have indicated previously, there will be a bunch of functions coming out of the department, functions that are providing sort of core servicetype services. These are going to be in the authority rather than the department. The department is going to be a ministry. We are going to phase in some of those functions from out of the department into the authority. We anticipate that phasein is going to take about two years, but as far as monitoring evaluation, I will go to the deputy.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Deputy Minister DeLancey.
Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. we are actually just finalizing an evaluation and monitoring approach for the initiative that will have a number of components. One obvious one will be simply tracking the financials that Members have asked about, additional costs, and we are keeping very careful track of how we are spending the federal funding and also tracking the cost of moving to the new structure. Secondly, we are putting together a proposal for an implementation evaluation, so after about 18 months, we will work with external evaluators to take a look at whether the evaluation has gone as we thought it would, had there been unanticipated problems. The joint leadership council, the new board of management for the authority will, of course, be giving us feedback in terms of what the regions are hearing through the regional wellness council, so if they don’t think it’s going smoothly, we will hear about it. Then finally as part of our funding agreement with Health Canada, we have been asked to work with one of the Pan-Canadian health organizations to do an outcome evaluation, so we will be developing a proposal to work with the Canadian Foundation for Healthcare Improvement three or four years down the line and take a look at are we seeing a change in health outcomes and the services that are delivered to people, because that’s the driving argument for making this whole transformation. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Deputy Minister DeLancey. Ms. Green.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am happy to hear a comprehensive system of evaluations is going to be developed that don’t only consider the financials but also the patient experience and hopefully the benefit of having everyone together. My last question in this section is when the Minister expects to announce the regional wellness council memberships. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Green. Mr. Minister.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I anticipate to give the MLAs a heads up hopefully by the end of this week, and after that, we will notify the successful candidates, two, three weeks.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Further questions. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a couple of questions. Regarding the organ and tissue donation onetime costs, has this been paid to Alberta already? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. Minister.
Not yet.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Where is this money being held then, if it’s onetime payment? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Normally, because it was O and M dollars, it would lapse, but given that these dollars are going to be used for a technical or a project infrastructuretype thing, we’re looking to have those dollars rolled over into capital, and then we can roll them over into the year or to the next year so that we can continue to work with Alberta.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thanks for that clarification. I was a little concerned if we would be rolling over O and M every year and it’s good to see that it’s going to capital. If we’re still having the challenges, we’ll be there. In regards to your answer to Ms. Green there about ministerial role versus authority role or core functions, and you talked about the ministry or the department shrinking a bit, with authority, is the department and authority actually shrinking, or is it we’re going to still have the same amount of staff, just that one will be a ministerial role which would be smaller, and then authority will cover the carrying, the rest of staff. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think the Member described it pretty much exactly right. The department will become a true ministry focused on bigpicture policy, big Ptype initiatives. Anything that is considered operational or will have direct impact on client delivery will become authority. It’s not a matter of shrinking. It’s a matter of aligning it in the appropriate area. Ministry will be smaller. Authority is going to have some additional functions, some things that are currently delivered either at Stanton or in the department, which really should have been operational to begin with.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you for that answer. with this authority, are you going to bebecause right now, we have all these authorities and they don’t actually report to the Minister. Will this authority now be reporting to the Minister and with these other authorities, or is it a chain of command where it goes to the boards and it was just a relationship with the chair and the Minister. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I’ve committed to providing the Standing Committee on Social Programs or Social Development, or whatever it’s called today, sorry, a comprehensive briefing on health transformation, at which point we’ll be describing this. But in short, and we will certainly go into more detail, some of the changes that we’re seeing are a result of an audit that was done by the Auditor General of Canada that said basically our system lacks all accountability and that there is no real solid reporting mechanisms, just streams. The board reports directly to the Minister. The Minister does have an ability to provide direction to the board in the new model, which means the Legislative Assembly has the ability to provide some direction to the board on a territorial model. There are some direct links as far as reporting information, data, and answering questions from CEO through the Minister and through the department. There’s more lines of accountability, more clearly articulated lines of accountability in this new structure, but we’ll go through all that detail in much greater detail when we meet with Committee.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Hopefully, this will be my last question. I realize that you will be trying to get a briefing. But there seems to be about three or four other briefings that you’ll be in front of us on, so I think that one may be a little bit behind. I’m just a little concerned with this authority. If we have issues, will we be still going to a public administrator or will we be able to fix issues beforehand, and so we continue to, you know, have a better system in place so we don’t have to bring in public administrators? Because that does concern me. Then the regional boards do not have the say and the power to do things. Is that the rationale or is it one of the rationales to making sure that we don’t have to bring public administrators in? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. Minister.
Thank you, Chair. Mr. Chair, in the new model there are no public administrators with the exception of Hay River until such a time as Hay River comes into the single authority. There are board chairs and there are regional advisory committee members. Those individuals are intended to help us, you know, make sure we’re hearing from the people of the ridings, of the communities, bringing their information forward, helping us tailor programs to fit communities and regions. The chairs of the regional wellness councils are the board of the new authority. I’m answering the Member’s question. I’m not sure I totally understand the Member’s question. But there are clear lines of accountability outlined within the legislation, who’s responsible for what, and it’s articulated in the legislation.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Maybe I didn’t explain myself clear enough. With this new authority and that, will we be required to bring public administrators in? Because I know right now you’ve said we’re getting regional boards and that, and Hay River has the one until they become part of it. In the past with authorities you’ve had to go in with public administrators. Will this new process ensure that this doesn’t happen again? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. I’m going to allow a reply, but we seem to be leaning more towards page 168 and 167 on the organizational chart and getting beyond and outside page 176 and 177. I’ll allow the Minister to reply, thank you.
Still not 100 per cent sure I understand the question, Mr. Chair. Under the legislation there will be board chairs for each of the regional wellness councils. Those board chairs are going to form the territorial authority, there is one authority. Other members will form regional wellness councils. In the legislation it allows us to basically keep Hay River as they are until such time as we roll them in. As a result, there will be a public administrator who is technically acting in the capacity of chair of the regional wellness council that we’ve established in Hay River, but will still maintain the public administrator role until such time as we bring Hay River in. In all other authorities, with the exception of Tlicho, which is defined under the Community Services Act, it’s going to be board members and Members providing advice and guidance on the regional operations and chairs providing advice and guidance at the territorial level. There won’t be any more public administrators, except for Hay River.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Further questions to page 176? Moving on, 177. Go ahead, Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. French language services in 2014-15 had an amount of $215,000. Last year and this year is $856,000, an increase of $640,000. Can the department speak a little bit about what is included in French language services, maybe why there’s nearly a million dollars required every year to deliver French language communication? Maybe we’ll start there. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. These dollars all flow to the authorities for the provision of French language services during the provision of health care. This is a direct result of a court case against the Government of the Northwest Territories which the GNWT lost, and it was negotiated how we would meet that ruling in that court case which resulted in significant dollars following into not just Health and Social Services, but all the departments; Education, Culture and Employment, to ensure that we can provide services to our residents in French.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess that explains to some degree why the increase to $640,000 from 2014-15. Would it have been that the court case ruling came after that 2014-15 fiscal year? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Minister.
I can’t remember the exact date of the court case, but it was actually a number of years ago. It took the Government of the Northwest Territories a couple years to actually figure out how we’re going to bring in this or meet our obligation under that court ruling, and we rolled it out during the 2014-15 fiscal year.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Does the department have any particular obligation as it relates to Aboriginal language communication services throughout the department? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Minister.
