Robert Hawkins

I appreciate that answer. I respect that. We certainly want to be very inclusive on specific legislation like this, because it’s very important to us. When can I expect that type of communication and consultation to come out to the general public?

Mr. Chairman, I’m just trying to get a sense of all of this. We have a Telehealth coordinator in headquarters, and that makes sense to me. As to whether we need a coordinator or not, I’m not in a position to say yes or no. But then we lose the Telehealth person at Stanton. I’m just trying to follow the format here. That’s not seen as a position that needs to be kept, but the duties could be spread out.

Again, I’m not necessarily speaking for or against the reduction. But then we lose one in Inuvik and it gets reinstated because the program can’t run without that person, but then in the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today I spoke about the need for the SCAN legislation to be returned in some form or another. As far as I’m concerned, our law-abiding citizens’ quality of life is still put in jeopardy.

My question for the Minister of Justice is: what is his plan in regard to potentially bringing back this bill, bringing it back to life to ensure that our citizens’ quality of life is protected?

How long has this been going on, in the sense of this training process? Have we lost any who had to return to their home position per se? When I say “Have we lost any,” I mean: how many have we lost who have gone back to being RNs, unable to practice as an NP, and how many have left the North because they couldn’t find an NP position? Furthermore, what protects our investment on that, if we’re training nurses who won’t go to a community, and there are no existing NP positions they will take and they end up leaving?

Thank you. I’ll accept that. On the positions that were deleted, could you highlight exactly what positions they were? If I understand it, the Aboriginal Wellness came in and two new dialysis positions. Were there any losses in this calculation, just for the official record? I was having trouble hearing that.

The question is still outstanding: do they lose their credentials if they’re not in a practitioner position?

Thank you, Mr. Elkin, for that. I have to tell you it got muddled in there. I was trying to get a sense of the dialysis positions. Were they lost or gained?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If I may seek some clarity on the Nurse Practitioner Program that we started: I don’t think I received a full answer in regard to how many we train. It may have been picked up somewhere else through another person’s question. My question specifically — and even if it’s for my own benefit, that is, Mr. Chairman — is: does the Minister know how many nurse practitioners we continue to train, and how many we have positions available for? The reason I’m asking it in that way is.... Are we training more nurse practitioners than we have positions available for?

How many unfunded positions do we have?

I thank the deputy minister for that detail. As I understand it, for better or for worse there are nurse practitioners out there on term positions. They haven’t been made permanent, in other words.

That said, I’m under the understanding that this section, through this type of program, goes out to continue to find more potential nurses to become nurse practitioners who we don’t have jobs for. As I understand it, the situation is that you need to be a practising nurse practitioner in order to keep your credentials active and useful. It’s not a question of losing typical RN status. It’s more in...