Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister of Health and Social Services some questions on medical travel. Firstly, I just want to wish all Members of this House a boo-tiful day.
---Laughter
I have had constituents from Nahendeh contact me on the medical travel issue. The issue is about when they get here, they are here for a day trip. The flights from Nahendeh come here in the morning and they depart in the evening. Their appointments are usually in the morning, but for the four or five hours in the afternoon, the medical travel clients have nowhere to go, nowhere to wait. Do we have anything existing to help our clients of medical travel that are here in Yellowknife for the day? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don’t believe that we have a day program for the patients that come here for medical and get their appointments and have a lot of time on their hands before the flight, but we would be pleased to work with medical travel people to see if something can be developed. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, sometimes they are housed here overnight and their appointment is in the morning, and then they still have to wait a long day as well. In fact, I had a resident actually ask the hotel for a half a day rate, but the hotels in Yellowknife don’t do that.
Is the Minister willing to talk with the Hotel Association in Yellowknife or something to allow half a day stays and somewhere they can relax? Often they are travelling with children or elders. They just have nowhere to go during the day. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I have no issue with the medical travel people talking to the hotels to see if something like this can be established for our medical travel patients. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I’m glad that the Minister will get that medical travel staff to engage in discussions. When can the Minister initiate such an action and start discussions for us with the Hotel Association, or is he looking for alternate places where people can sit and relax for the day while they are waiting for their late evening flights? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I can request the information back from the department to have that discussion with me by the end of next week, and then within the next couple of weeks, if something can be established and that the medical travel people think they can make some headway with the hotels to establish this into their policy, then we will try to have it done within the month of November. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m pleased that the Minister is willing to do that. Will the Minister advise me when they begin those discussions? I will certainly share that with the constituents travelling from Nahendeh. Thank you.
Yes, Mr. Speaker, we can keep the Member advised. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
