I have a phase, and it's "phase right now." "Phase now." We need help. People are having to fly out. How much is it costing our government to fly people out into Yellowknife and into Hay River for the young children? Why can't we purchase portable units for those health centres across the territory? There must be portable units and some way to be able to provide that service. In regard to that, why is it taking so long? As a government, we have to cover the cost because I have a T in front of my healthcare number. They have to provide service. $38,800 a year we are provided for each resident in the community across the territory. Why is this service taking so long? One year.
At the Department of Health and Social Services, we really prioritize the safety of our patients. Where facilities were not meeting infection control and ventilation requirements, work could not be done in those facilities. This is not a long-term ban on dental services in these communities, but it's my understanding that teams are now working through potential solutions. The Member has mentioned a couple of potential solutions and maybe they are solutions, but nothing is going to happen with putting portable buildings into Ulukhaktok at this time of year. What is going to happen is that there will be this assessment done by the end of June and a plan developed then. Unfortunately, the residents of Ulukhaktok are going to wait longer for dental services to resume, but that is not because of a lack of money; it's because we want them to receive those services safely.
I am not asking for a portable unit, Mr. Speaker. I am asking for a portable air exchanger into the building, portable, being plugged in and able to provide service for dental, for air handling. I want commitment from this Minister, Mr. Speaker, in regard to improving dental care in the communities, all 27 communities and my four communities that I represent. We need help, Mr. Speaker. This has to be dealt with. We are not going to wait another year. It's costing this government numerous thousands and thousands of dollars to ship people out when they could do something simple, portable air exchange units. Is it possible for this Minister to commit to getting that done right away?
Among my many, many, many accomplishments, engineering is not one and so I cannot actually make a commitment to providing a portable air handling unit for the Member's health centres so that dental services can be resumed. What I have told him, and he is not satisfied with, is that there is an assessment that will happen within the next four months and a plan will be developed because, obviously, it is very important to a person's overall health that they have good dental health. The department does not argue with that. I know the Member is really big on "right now," but unfortunately, this is not a problem that lends itself to "right now."
Final supplementary. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want a commitment. Government has to come. The six communities that get dental services, all the power to them. Our communities are hurting, and it always becomes the communities are an afterthought in this government. Is that the way we are going to keep on going for something like this under COVID-19? How many studies do you have to do? Get a portable unit; give it to the dental team; fly them in. We need help. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Generally, Ulukhaktok has two dental visits a year, so at this point, they would have missed two. My hope is that that's all they are going to miss. There will be two more dental visits in the next fiscal year. I want to just correct the perception that it's only big communities with dental services. The Fort Providence health centre, the Fort Simpson Health Centre, the Fort Resolution Health Centre, the Norman Wells health centre, and the Aklavik Health Centre have all had dental visits within the last two months. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of human resources or Finance. What is the GNWT doing to eliminate systemic racism in its hiring practices? Will the Minister commit to setting numerical targets for the hiring of Black, Indigenous, and people of colour within the GNWT at senior levels of management, not just in entry-level positions? Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Great Slave. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I had indicated earlier in my Minister's statement, I have two things I want to say. Firstly, is rolling out a very express anti-racism campaign, really speaking to the idea of challenging all of our own mindsets about what is racism and what is anti-racism, as a starting point. That is just one small starting point. Getting to the rub of what I think the MLA is asking me about targets, Mr. Speaker, I have also spoken in the House frequently about the Indigenous recruitment and retention framework that is being developed and put into place over the course of this next fiscal year. It will include targets. The idea of even including those targets is exactly that, that it's more than just the entry level; they are targets that are going to apply to each department, that each department is going to have a responsibility for, but that it will be coming back to human resources so that there is an overarching approach to what is happening in each department.
Mr. Speaker, although this is the Indigenous recruitment and retention framework and we are starting there, this is meant to be really a change of mindset in the way that we are -- representative of the way people think about the government, the way people think about public service, and it's only a starting point. It is really meant to be one that is going to make us more inclusive and more representative of Black, Indigenous, and people of colour. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
All great news I am glad to hear. I just hope things go more quickly rather than dragging out. In our current Affirmative Action Policy, Indigenous Aboriginal men are not designated as a distinct priority group under that policy. Will the Minister commit to including this as part of the upcoming review of the Affirmative Action Policy, including the Indigenous retention and recruitment framework, and ensure that this should lead to ensuring that there is an increased representation within the GNWT itself for Indigenous Aboriginal men?
I have previously said we are going to take a review of the Affirmative Action Policy. Those reviews have been done many times and many ideas brought forward. There does need to then be collaboration on all sides of the House about bringing forward the actual changes and seeing them through. If, in the course of that review, it's brought to our attention that Indigenous men are a group that requires some specific attention over and above Indigenous persons generally and over above Indigenous women, I am open to receiving that feedback. For the time being, Mr. Speaker, again, I am going to say that going through that process of reviewing that policy is the direction I am going to go, and that is where we will see where that takes us. If, in fact, this is a group that is distinctions based, that requires specific attention. Then again, that review is underway.
I did not have the luxury of listening to the Minister's statement ahead of making my questions. Some of it might get a bit repetitive, but that never hurts, to repeat ourselves if we want to be heard. Often as MLAs, we hear of direct-appointment hires or non-hires for that matter, that seem to directly contradict the GNWT's own Affirmative Action Policy. Will a fairness review of direct-appointment hires be implemented as part of the new Affirmative Action Policy to oversee the ministerial appointments? What sort of corrections or sanctions will be built into the policy for individuals who do display racial bias in their hiring practices?
There are a couple of questions there, Mr. Speaker. I want to address the second one first, about people having sanctions for displaying racial bias in their hiring. There should not be racial bias in hiring. There should not be racism in hiring, and if that is happening, I want it brought forward. There are meant to be teams who work together. Human resources is involved precisely to ensure that the process is fair and that the policy of affirmative action is applied fairly and appropriately.
With respect to the first question, whether or not there will be some changes or a fairness review, again, Mr. Speaker, I made a previous commitment this session that the direct-appointment process is one that needs some information and some information-sharing, and I would like to bring that to committee. The direct appointments process right now has very specific rules, very specific targets of what is allowed and not allowed and right now actually achieves a higher percentage of affirmative action candidates than the usual hiring processes. All that said, though, to the extent that a fairness review should be part of it, that is still between the Affirmative Action Policy review that we are doing and the recruitment framework that we are doing. That is something that can be included in either one of those.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. One of the ways that I get my opinions into those types of policies, reviews, et cetera, is to bring them up here in the House. This one is a little bit more on the philosophical plane, but we often hear that increasing the population of the Northwest Territories is a great way for us to increase our revenues by upping the number of transfer payments that we get from the federal government. However, our priority is to increase our local employment and hiring and keeping with northern businesses, et cetera. My question is: does the Minister find that these two goals are somewhat contradictory to each other, and if so, how do you plan to address that in your upcoming affirmative action and other policy reviews? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I think that is exactly the kind of question that should be debated in the House, and I am pleased to have it brought to the floor and, frankly, pleased to have it come back, if necessary, for reconsideration or further discussion or debate. I don't think that they are necessarily in conflict with one another. I don't think they should be in opposition to one another. As a government, we want to do everything we can to ensure that Northerners have the skills, the training, the education, the underlying health, the housing, all of the parameters that are going to allow them to apply for any and every job in the public service. At the same time, I am well aware that, in this moment, we bring teachers, doctors, nurses, and various other professionals and individuals to the North to fill the positions that we are still not filling from amongst northern graduates.
I don't think they are mutually exclusive. If we're doing things right, we are creating a public service that is inclusive; we are creating communities that are inclusive; and we are building an economy that can grow so that everybody can be welcomed, so that every one of our graduates has a great job to go to, and so that people can continue to move to the North and stay here as residents, and not just come up as visitors. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation. I am wondering if the Minister will commit to removing the community residency requirement that is currently used by local housing authorities and local housing organization in communities across the Northwest Territories? Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Kam Lake. Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I hear the Member's comments about the residency requirement, but it does provide consistency for the Northwest Territories as to how we allocate units. We have a significant wait list, I do hear the Member on that. Looking at the tenants in the smaller communities, whether they are going off to school, fleeing a domestic situation, and they are wanting to return back to the communities, the Housing Corporation will work with those clients and there are specific forms and paperwork that they would have to complete and fill out just to maintain their housing unit in the smaller communities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I had the luxury of listening to one of my colleagues, the Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh, earlier today, and he had a quote that actually works quite well in this moment in time: "This policy is actively contributing to the social and economic disparities of Northerners, and the harm currently outweighs the good." I appreciate the Minister's desire for consistency. I believe that this policy has run its course, and it's time to get rid of it. I am asking the Minister, in the interest of creating safe spaces for Northerners and ensuring that all Northerners have access to housing and returning to their home communities, if the Minister will please remove the community residency requirement currently used by local housing authorities and local housing organizations.
No, I will not commit to that. I will not remove the residency requirements for local housing authorities. We have to maintain and make sure that, if we have a housing list in one of our smaller communities and we have new residents coming into the smaller communities and they are able to get on the housing list while we have a housing list that has already existed, the Housing Corporation has to maintain consistency and maintain how we allocate the units at the local level. I do want to keep in mind that I do know that we have a wait list of 900. We need to get houses on the ground, and with that, we're looking at partnerships at the local community level. With that, the Housing Corporation has made a significant impact throughout the territory, and we are working toward putting houses on the ground; slowly, but it's coming along.
One of the things that the Minister referred to was making sure that she maintains fairness within the housing lists. The housing lists that are created are created on a first come, first served basis, and then people are prioritized within those lists based on their needs. I feel that, if it's based on need and it's based on first come, first served, you are still maintaining the integrity of the process, but what you're allowing people to do is to access education. You're allowing them to access healthcare. Maybe somebody has a child, and they need to come to Yellowknife in order to access inclusive schooling opportunities that aren't available in their home community. Potentially, somebody could be moving to Yellowknife in order to access Aurora College, or they could be moving to Inuvik for that same reason.
When we're going out to communities and we're talking to our constituents and we're wanting people to take advantage of different opportunities and to bring those opportunities back to their home communities, we also have to make sure that they have the housing available to do that. What I am asking the Minister is: how does she intend to get around this policy so that people can access different opportunities and bring them back to their home communities?
As an Indigenous woman who comes from a smaller community and has relocated outside of my home community and tried to look for career opportunities in order to become successful on my own and represent my people at this level, it had taken me to move out of my community. Returning back and looking at the housing wait list and looking at if I were to relocate, the Housing Corporation is not the only housing solution that is available at the community level. Right now, the Housing Corporation is working toward looking at our Co-investment Fund applications and encouraging Indigenous groups to come forward. Not only that; I do hear the Member talking about the domestic violence and the tenants who are wanting to pursue educational opportunities. The Housing Corporation has developed I want to say a formula, almost, an application process that, should the applicant be wanting to exit the community for a number of months, there is an opportunity for them to return and the house will be available for them upon their return.
The other thing is that I don't want to discourage local individuals from leaving their community to pursue other goals and other education opportunities and other positions and looking at that. I will be bringing this back to my department, but then, I'm not going to be removing the residency requirement.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Just listening to my colleague from Nunakput, I know that has been an issue that I have raised in the past on NIHB and dental services in the communities, and I know that NIHB pays 100 percent for people with a T and who are First Nation status, all the travel costs for dental, just from my past career. However, I do know that they have really stringent travel criteria for travelling for medical emergencies. That's one of the problems. Another problem is that, when they access emergency dental care, they don't have it, so they go to the health centre. They go there usually after hours or during regular appointments, and the staff don't always realize what the process is because, as a health practitioner in a health centre, it's a non-insured health benefit. It's not an insured service, so sometimes, they turn them away or tell them to call the Inuvik dental clinic, for my region. That's what usually ends up happening, and then it ends with that. Then we get the call.
My first question is: will the Minister have her department or her working group that she had mentioned reach out with NIHB to come up with a plan to allow for a quick and easy process to access out-of-community dental services, as needed, and possibly lightening up some of those restrictions, knowing that we haven't had dentists in over a year? They have bad teeth in the communities, and a lot of them are on wait lists for oral surgery. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the Member mentioned, this is an NIHB service and the travel requirements are their travel requirements. I do not have an opportunity to address those requirements. Thank you.
I just want to advise the Minister that the NIHB, actually, we have a department in Inuvik in the office, an NIHB office, that gives money to pay for travel for the travelling dentists, so we are kind of involved with this. I think that having that discussion at that table, again, I will ask the Minister to commit to having a discussion with that NIHB office about the travel restrictions and the criteria so we can access dental services for the people in the communities that don't have it.
I can have that conversation.
Thank you to the Minister. Will the Minister also have a discussion with the department in the emergency, because I know the last time the previous health Minister had made the commitment and said that there are instructions on how to access emergency dental service in the health centres, and just make sure that I can get commitment that there is this information in the health centres and the staff are aware of it?
I do not have that information at hand, but I can find it.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services. The problem with sterilization equipment at Stanton hospital began in July 2020 and took almost six months to resolve. I do want to acknowledge that the new Minister certainly updated the public and myself more regularly when she took over the portfolio and did contact residents who were waiting, but I still have a basic question. What was the cause of the problem with the sterilization equipment, and has it been permanently fixed? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Frame Lake. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Stanton sterilization issue is actually two issues. The first is wet packs, and the other is mineral staining. I am going to talk about each one. Wet packs: once ideal humidity levels were achieved and sustained, the wet pack issue was resolved at Stanton, and that happened in the fall of 2020. As the Member said in his statement, the importance of this is that, if the instruments are not dry, they can attract bacteria, which would then lead to infection. This issue has been resolved.
Mineral staining is another issue, and it continues. The root cause is not yet fully determined, but sterilization and water experts who have looked at the situation believe that the staining is caused by mineralization in the water, specifically copper and iron. There have been very many investigations into this and how this water supply system can be adjusted so that the water no longer stains the fabric that the instruments are wrapped in when they are sterilized. There has been some improvement, and now the fabric has light-coloured stains, which are thought to be not an issue because the instruments themselves are not stained. What is really important to know is that we have a very rigorous quality-control process to do the sterilization of instruments that are used in surgery to confirm that they are, in fact, sterile and that people are not being infected by the instruments that are used in their operations. Thank you.
I want to thank the Minister for that. Of course, during the problems over the last six months, patients were often left in pain, and really, many surgeries were delayed. I just want to get some reassurance from the Minister whether there is still a backlog of surgeries and whether that has been cleared up.
At the time the sterilizer had to be shut down, there were 124 pending surgeries. They have now all been completed except for those people who asked for later dates in the spring. One thing that Stanton has done to address elective surgeries on the wait list, okay. I have to just start the sentence again. There came a point where they were not taking any more people onto the wait list because they had no idea when they could get through it, so there are an unknown number, unknown to me at this point, people who would have liked to have had surgery but did not get onto the wait list. What is happening now is that Stanton, instead of closing through March break, is open to catch up on any of those surgeries that did not make it even onto the wait list because the sterilization equipment was down. I hope that's clear.
I want to thank the Minister for that. It sounds like the backlog is going to be taken care of maybe before the end of March, and I really do appreciate that. These problems with the sterilization equipment, though, appear to have started soon after the new building was opened. Of course, this was a very large public-private partnership P3 arrangement, so I want to know from the Minister if she can tell us what the total cost of the investigations and delays were and who is responsible for these costs?
Just to clarify the timing here, the first hospital day was May 26, 2019, and the sterilization equipment functioned without any issues until July 23, 2020. That was the point at which they discovered that there were wet packs that were wet and material that was stained. What we do know is that Stanton has spent approximately $50,000 to date for equipment testing and consultant expertise. As a matter of fact, it could have been more but for the fact that the sterilizer manufacturer has been providing extensive support throughout this time, much of which has been provided at no cost. It's important for the Member to know that the materials, the equipment inside the building, is the responsibility of the NTHSSA and not of Dexterra, the P3 operator.
Thank you, Member for Frame Lake. Final supplementary. Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that financial information. Of course, finally, I think it's important to know whether the -- we have cleared up the backlog, but I just want to get some reassurance from the Minister that this is not going to happen again, so can the Minister tell me what the likelihood is that the problems will re-occur? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
The staff at Stanton would like to put this issue behind them, but unfortunately, this is historically a recurring problem that is most often occurring in April and May and aligns with the spring melt and the difference in the water chemistry. It has turned out to be a very unpredictable problem. It will appear and disappear, making it very difficult to investigate the root causes as much as we would also like to do that. What we have done, though, in preparation for this year's spring melt, is taken measures to mitigate potential future occurrences with the purchase of new equipment for the sterilization service in the form of new trays that will require less use of towels and fabrics. That should assist with the wet-pack problem, which is the problem that really reduced the number of surgeries. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
