The Department of Environment and Natural Resources, we have a longstanding relationship with the Inuvialuit Water Board as well as with the other Water Boards across the Northwest Territories. It is extremely important that we work closely with them to advance issues. They work cooperatively on a number of public outreach activities such as regulatory guidance, training, and education. At this year's World Water Day in Tuktoyaktuk, ENR staff will actually be going into Mangilaluk School with staff from the board and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, to provide education outreach to students grades one through six.
Masi. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the response. Getting back to water boards, environmental boards, they carry a lot of Indigenous knowledge and are very key in the role that they play in decisions on major projects across the territory. Mr. Speaker, I acknowledge that, and I respect that, and kudos in involving them in the decisions moving forward. Mr. Speaker, ENR is to lead on some very important water management work, including trans-boundary water agreements. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister tell how Indigenous governments and traditional knowledge are incorporated into this work?
The GNWT has signed three trans-boundary water agreements with its neighbouring jurisdictions. In 2002, we signed one with the Government of Yukon. 2015, GNWT signed trans-boundary agreements with Alberta and British Columbia. Under these agreements, traditional local knowledge is a cross-cutting theme. Traditional local knowledge is important for setting and assessing trans-boundary objectives and forming all aspects of learning plans, informing long-term monitoring, and informing decision-making under these important agreements. Mr. Speaker, also in 2015, the GNWT signed an intergovernmental agreement which outlines the role of Indigenous governments in implementation of our trans-boundary agreements, including Indigenous representation on established bilateral management committees. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A follow-up to my Member's statement, I have a few questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services. I'd like to ask the Minister: how did this outbreak of measles happen? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The case involves an individual who travelled from an international destination to Inuvik by airplane. The journey returning to Inuvik took them through Yellowknife and Norman Wells on February 13th. Prior to contacting, the department has actually begun that, and has started to reach out to everybody that has been contacted as part of our normal protocol when there's an infectious outbreak. We've been working to follow-up with everybody that was identified as a possible contact. The chief public health officer issued a public health advisory on February 22nd regarding the one confirmed, laboratory confirmed, case of active measles in the Northwest Territories. A second advisory was issued on February 24th to provide some additional information to residents across the Northwest Territories so that they understand what possible contact locations may have been and what actions they can take to protect themselves and their families.
Right now, how many cases of confirmed cases of measles are there in the Northwest Territories?
The last update I had, and I believe it's still current, was on February 24th, and at that time, there was one laboratory confirmed case of measles in the Northwest Territories.
What can unvaccinated people do if they suspect they have been exposed to the measles virus?
Obviously, we'd encourage everybody who isn't vaccinated to get vaccinated. I know that, for children under 12 months, they can't be vaccinated until they reach a year. If somebody feels like they've come into contact or they feel like they're having symptoms or if unprotected people actually develop the symptoms, they should remain in their homes and call their health centre immediately. Calling a health centre in advance ensures that the health centres can take the precautions necessary to prevent additional transmissions or additional contacts and reduce the number of people who may be affected. High-risk individuals who are exposed to measles should immediately contact their health centres and healthcare practitioners to figure out how best to engage assistance and make sure they get the supports and care they need.
Masi. Oral questions, Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister answered a part of this next question, but I'll ask: what can people do to protect themselves from the measles virus?.
Frankly, the best way to protect against measles disease is to get immunized. Children 12 months of age and over and adults born after 1970 and onwards should have two doses of the vaccine. Immunization is available in all communities, all community health centres or local public health units. Measles can be dangerous for infants, and I think we really need to be concerned for those who are unvaccinated under 12 months. Pregnant women are also at risk. Those with weakened immune systems are at greater levels of risk. For these higher-risk individuals, a different form of immunization reduces the risk if given within six days of actual contact with somebody who has a laboratory-confirmed case, so there are other options. Measles-containing vaccine is available to all NWT residents. It's free, and it can be obtained at local health centres, public health units, and other places, so please get yourself immunized. If you have symptoms, contact your health practitioners right away. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A number of people have reached out to me recently and asked what was happening in regards to the Department of Health and Social Services' commitment to traditional names being allowed on NWT birth certificates and other forms of GNWT identification. Can the Minister advise us where the status of this commitment is? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. November 4, 2016, this Legislative Assembly passed Bill 5, which was a bill to amend sections of the Vital Statistics Act that would allow us to use traditional fonts on legal documents such as birth certificates and other vital statistics documents. This is a commitment we made. This is a commitment we intend to and will live up to. Our ultimate goal is to be able to have traditional names on our birth certificates, on our vital statistics documents, using the traditional font, which is truly the only way to recognize a traditional name. At that time, I said it's going to take a while for this to happen because there are multiple things that need to happen. One of the first things that we need to do is to develop a transliteration guide which will allow us to work with other jurisdictions like the federal government so that we can use our traditional font and our traditional names and have them used on things like passports, documents, and other things outside of our jurisdiction, outside of our responsibility.
Mr. Speaker, one of the biggest challenges of doing this work, and it's the right thing and we need to do it, is not producing documents with Aboriginal or traditional fonts, but it's actually the systems that we use, things like EMR, things like PeopleSoft, things like student financial assistant systems, our database systems that track information and allow people to get registered for health procedures and education, these types of things. Every one of those systems will need to be updated to recognize the traditional fonts in the Northwest Territories. Health and Social Services alone has over 40 systems that will have to be upgraded to recognized traditional fonts, and, across the government, over 400 systems will need to be updated to recognize traditional fonts. This is an incredibly expensive undertaking. I'm not saying that it shouldn't be done because personally I believe it should be done, but we need to make sure that we do it right and we get it right. We are making progress. The transliteration guide is under development. ECE has taken the lead on that. They have pulled together language experts to help them with that work. They are hoping to have the draft transliteration guide done in 2019, at which point we can present it to the federal government, and then we will begin the negotiations about trying to make sure that they can accept it and use it, so that we can pursue other documents. So it's still under work. We are still making progress. It is going to take a bit of time to realize this important commitment. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I thank the Minister for that detailed answer. That's greatly appreciated. One of the things he talked about was an acronym, EMR. Can the Minister explain what EMR is, because I didn't understand what that acronym means.
Sorry, I was just using that as one of the examples of the systems that are used by the Government of the Northwest Territories. EMRs are electronic medical records. Right now, EMR and every other system we have only recognize the Latin alphabet, so if an individual were to be using their name and using the traditional font, which is where we want to get to, those systems would not recognize those names, and that's a problem. It means we could inadvertently adversely affect somebody's care, their ability to go outside this territory to receive care. This is something we don't want to happen. We want to make sure our residents have the supports they need and that they can receive their services, so we need to work on the transliteration guide. We are also going to have to update many of our systems over time so that they can recognize the traditional fonts, which, like I said, we know is the right thing to do. We're committed to it. It's going to take a bit of time to get this work done.
The Minister talked about a lot of work being done, so does the Minister and the department have a timeline of when things are going to be completed?
We have timelines on when we will complete the portions that we are working on at this point, but to roll out on the bigger level, to make sure that people can get passports and other things using their traditional names with the traditional fonts, I can't dictate that timeline. We will have the transliteration guide drafted with our partners and Education, Culture and Employment in 2019; we are thinking mid-year. From there, we will be able to present it to the federal government. That could take some time, to actually bring that to reality and make it reality. In the meantime, we will continue to figure out what capacity our systems have in this territory to recognize the traditional fonts so that we can continue to move forward. I can't tell you how long it will take to work that process through the federal government and other partners.
We need to be careful to make sure that, once again, we're not adversely affecting our residents. By way of example, when I travel, I always hear the people at the front of the counter saying, "Your passport or your documents must exactly match the ticket." If your document uses traditional fonts, but the airline has no ability to use traditional fonts, you're not getting on that plane. We want to make sure that that doesn't happen.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister elaborating and giving us the information here today. People have been asking: in the meantime, is the department able to look at having birth certificates display both names, whether they be in traditional names in brackets or underneath the bottom there somewhere, so that they can actually have the person's name in there? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I have directed the department to do some additional work in this area to see if that is a possibility. It was a question I asked when I brought forward the legislation the first time, recognizing that it is going to take a bit of time to operationalize this and make this official. At that time, the concern was having a legal document that had two names on it could be problematic, especially when it came to being out of jurisdiction or working with the feds on things like passports. I have asked the department to explore that and seek a second opinion on that because, in my mind, it's not two names; it's one name. It's one name that is using the traditional font, which is a true representation of the child's name, or the person's name, and a Latin interpretation of it. It's not a different name; it's a font issue. So I have asked for a second opinion on whether or not we can put the name twice, the same name twice, using two different fonts on a document.
That's not a solution, Mr. Speaker. I feel that that's a step to getting us to where we need to be. Ultimately, we just want to be able to have the one name using the one font, but, given that that is going to take time, I've asked them to explore the possibility of having the name on there twice, in two different fonts. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have more questions to follow up on the honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta on the measles situation. I'd like to ask the Minister: aside from the 1970s thing, how would an individual know if they have been vaccinated or not? Thank you.
Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. An individual's health records will identify when they were vaccinated and whether they actually received the two doses of vaccination. We strongly encourage anybody who doesn't know to get in touch with their healthcare system or the public health team, who will be able to verify your current status with respect to immunizations; for any immunizations, not just for the measles vaccine. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
What is the difference? What happened in 1970 that changed? Did they eradicate measles in 1970 and stop vaccinating people? I'm asking for an explanation from the Minister on that, please.
In 1970 the vaccine was developed and started to be administered to citizens across this country.
Then is the Minister telling me that, prior to 1970, there was no vaccination, so people born prior to 1970 were not vaccinated?
Unless somebody chose to pursue a vaccination afterwards, the answer is yes, you weren't vaccinated prior to 1970, because the vaccine wasn't really there. One of the challenges we had is measles is highly contagious; like, crazy, crazy, super contagious. It spreads very easily. The other challenge is, prior to the vaccine being available, the fatality rate of measles was about one in a thousand individuals who contracted the disease. When you say one in a thousand, it doesn't sound that high, but statistically that is a huge number of individuals dying as a result of measles. Since the vaccine has come in, measles in this country was all but eliminated, except for a few isolated incidents. Now that there is a movement by many people to not get vaccinated, we're seeing these things come back.
Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to ask the Minister if there would be any harm in being vaccinated if you've already been vaccinated and are not aware of it. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I don't actually know the answer to that. I'm happy to follow up with some medical professionals who would certainly be able to answer that question in an appropriate way. I'd hate to speculate one way or another and give false information. I will get that information for the Member.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Monsieur le President. In my Member's statement I outlined the great post-devolution resource giveaway through the issuance of 10 significant discovery licences by our government. Our government will get no revenues, generate no taxes, and ensure no employment and no benefits from these areas that are now tied up virtually forever. Can the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment explain what options he had available when applications for post-devolution significant discovery licences were received in his office? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When a significant discovery declaration is applied for by the proponent, we as a government, through the Office of the Regulator of Oil and Gas Operations, is required to review and identify the proponent's discovery and a declaration qualified as a significant petroleum find. Once they do that and it is deemed that, it has to come to my office, and as the Minister of ITI under the Petroleum Resources Act, I am obliged to issue an SDL, which is a significant discovery licence. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thanks to the Minister for that response. I take it, then, that he had really no options. Prior to devolution, the federal government issued exploration rights in the Northwest Territories, including exploration licences. In converting these exploration licences to significant discovery licences after devolution, were there any provisions available to the Minister to charge annual fees?
Given that the original exploration rights were issued by the federal government at that time, we had not yet begun our policy work on these types of things, on the Petroleum Resources Strategy, the PRA, and the Oil and Gas Operations Act, so the answer is no.
It has been the policy of our government to hold companies doing business here to the terms that they negotiated with the federal government, and future SDL rates were not stated in the terms and conditions of the original call-for-bid documents issued by Canada prior to devolution. The Government of the Northwest Territories would have been put at high risk for litigation and also communicated a message of uncertainty to industry if we had changed the rules without a transparent and open process.
Thanks to the Minister for that. I will pursue it with him a little later offline. It is my understanding that one of the ways to generate some benefits and revenues from significant discovery licences is to include terms and conditions in the original call for nominations and/or call for bids. Has the Minister considered this option, and are there any administrative policies or directives in place to allow for the imposition of annual fees for significant discovery licences that may be issued in the future?
Now that we have put some advance work into our policy and our direction of how we want to do this, we now have a fuller, more robust strategic framework on doing this. We will consider charging rental rates on future SDLs in the Northwest Territories. These things will be specified under the terms and conditions for future bids in the Northwest Territories when we do put out these documents for bids. Our administration policies allow us to do this going forward.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
