Robert Hawkins

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I seek unanimous consent to return to item 8 on our agenda, oral questions. Thank you.

---Unanimous consent denied.

Mr. Speaker, I think we could have saved five minutes by just saying nothing. Mr. Speaker, honestly, this is very upsetting and certainly shameful. The Minister will keep telling this House and the people of the North that the silent majority support her. Mr. Speaker, I was camped out in front of the post office, Shopper’s Drug Mart and a few other places having people sign post cards. Lots of people signed it to tell the Minister to revisit this policy, Mr. Speaker. I only had maybe one or two people said they liked the direction. Mr. Speaker, there is not a silent majority on this issue...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On Tuesday, May 11th, I asked a question to the Minister of Health and Social Services regarding Section 5, in a very similar vein as Mr. Abernethy has. I asked the Minister of Health and Social Services, has she ever taken back some of these issues to Cabinet to revisit this change to the policy of supplementary health. In her answer on page 31, she remarked outstandingly with a clear absolutely. Mr. Speaker, of course, later during the day, I had asked if she could table those facts. Of course, she began to tell me no, how she can’t. Today in answering Mr. Abernethy’s...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When will the Cabinet be moving forward on some type of initiative that will stop them from making serious substantial Cabinet directions and changes while any government is out during an election period? Thank you. When?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today I talked about an unaccountable legacy provided by the previous Cabinet. Mr. Speaker, the issue really is that former Cabinet has made substantial policy initiatives and changes that have affected the incoming government. Mr. Speaker, my question will be to the Government House Leader, Mr. Miltenberger. Would he be willing to address this issue and pass a Cabinet directive to ensure that no future Cabinet can pass substantial changes to government policy while there is an election period on? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, at one time there was a Compassionate Travel Policy and it was stopped. It could well be suited for particular cases like this. Would the Minister reinvestigate it from that point of view, from a compassionate point of view? I mean, all I’m asking her to do, and I want to be absolutely clear, Mr. Speaker, is I’d like her to do an analysis and we could cost it out and take it from a compassionate point of view when these situations are very dire, as the old Compassionate Travel Policy allowed. Would the Minister reconsider this under that circumstance? Thank...

I’m not sure that’s necessarily right. The reason I say that is because one policy is great when the questions are simple. But in this particular case and other cases that have been presented by this House, our questions aren’t typically black and white. They require a lot of melding and forming to and fro. The Health Minister is correct, we do have a Medical Travel Policy, but people have been refused even with doctors’ notes. That’s why I’m suggesting that could an analysis of this particular situation, which has not been done, be considered at this time and we could examine what the true...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to use my Member’s statement today to further talk about the transplant policy I raised before. The reason I want to talk about it is because certainly things aren’t going very well. I think our Territory, I believe in it very strongly and I believe in the passion people have who work here and develop policy, but as I talked about it before, we need respite for mothers or perhaps fathers that are sitting by their child’s side through these horrible processes, but we don’t have a policy that occasionally unites the family through those special visits.

I can tell...

Mr. Speaker, this isn’t about one family, and I want to make sure that that’s absolutely clear. You know, it may be about one family to the Minister, but as I proposed it, and the Minister has discussed with me that there are other families that this could apply to, so you can’t say it’s one family only.

I’m talking about when your loved one dies in Edmonton and we have to leave their family here in Yellowknife or we have to leave them in Inuvik, we have to leave them in Fort Smith, we have to leave them wherever, that we don’t unite the family. We don’t have any kind of policy. And that does...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the House I talked during my Member’s statement about our Territory needing a transplant policy that is clear, that can help northern families keep the family unit strong and united during those darker periods of life that no one certainly wishes upon them. My question to the Minister of Health and Social Services in the past is, would you look at this and it has been an outright no, feeling that we don’t have the money or whether the existing plan doesn’t really allow it or whatnot. That’s not so important as the question today, which is simply if the Minister of...