Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I'm not sure if the Minister of Health wants to address this in further detail, but I certainly can give a bit of an overview.

There's been increased infection prevention and control measures in long-term settings. And what that means, Madam Chair, is support for some additional positions in the form of licensed practical nurse and a residential care aide. Also increases in the availability and the replacement where needed for medical equipment in longterm care settings. And also work being done on a national scale to ensure there's some standardization of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, our approach in terms of dealing with contractors is quite similar to the federal model and they too are applying their own policies more expansively and to include contractors. The goal, again, is to ensure that all of the public that's being served on behalf of the GNWT has the benefits of this policy and the benefits that we believe it brings as far as providing all the different tools to prevent transmission and exposure to COVID19.

I suppose it's an honor system in the sense that we are requiring at this point contractors who have existing contracts to...

Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. right now the project is as far as Lockhart Lake. Again, I was about to start getting my binder out from the capital estimates. I didn't, I probably should have, but I'll just see if Minister Archie could confirm if my recollection is correct on that, please.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, on the left Deputy Minister, Department of Finance, Bill MacKay. And on the right are legislative drafter, I believe, Sherry Giroque although I guess yes, she's nodding at me.. I didn't have her title with me, I apologize.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, every department certainly does have to justify if the actuals that they're incurring are significantly different from what's been budgeted. They certainly have to provide an explanation for that. But, again, it's going to be project by project and department by department because there's different reasons. And in fact, some projects have more than one reason why they may be experiencing a delay. So, you know, that matter of going through each one, I'm certainly happy to provide that further detail. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I didn't bring the mains with me either, Madam Chair. But it looks like Minister Thompson might have some information he can offer.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the vaccination requirements are not different are, again, asked please, first of all, please go get your vaccine. It's your best way to protect yourself and to then provide that.

What does change department or division by division is in fact the specific guidelines around personal protective equipment. That's to accommodate the fact that certain different workplaces will have different levels of need or different levels of potential exposure to members of the public or to one another, you know, an office environment versus a frontline environment. But all...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, at this point the studies there are studies that are being done, geotechnical, the traditional knowledge studies, there's rooting studies. There's certainly also a fairly significant amount of outreach that needs to occur with Indigenous governments and certainly some visioning in terms of how we'll be structuring relationships going forward on the project. So all of that work is underway. It's just that not all necessarily happening within the current fiscal year and so that's where some of the money that's being allocated is being moved into coming years...

Thank you, Madam Chair. So, again, Madam Chair, it's not new money, it's not unanticipated money. It's not unexpected money. There's no new money. There's no new debt. It's the costs of the road and it's the cost of incurring the expenses on the road. What was different was in terms of the timing of when the expenses are showing as having been incurred based on the periodic completion leading up to today, which was always the expected date. And it takes there is a lag, you know, there is a lag in terms of when invoice's received. I've come to discover that it's at least a month by the...

Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair.