Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talked about the airlines and our lack of morning flights, with the exception of Saturdays. I know that Canadian North recently announced that they’re going to be putting some morning flights in on Saturdays and Mondays, and maybe possibly some other days. My question is for the Minister of Health and Social Services. I understand that the airline that we use for medical travel is First Air. Can the Minister confirm that for me?
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As far as I’m aware, we don’t have one airline that we use. We use all airlines available. Canadian North just instituted morning flights for four mornings out of the week. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
That’s not the answer I expected. I had received information from the Department of Human Resources about medical travel saying that we’re committed to our northern providers, which are Canadian and First Air, that our primary contract for medical travel was actually First Air, and Canadian North was only used when we couldn’t get appropriate flights on First Air. Frankly, I’m totally stunned that we use all the providers. I mean, WestJet and Jazz aren’t northern-owned or operated. That is stunning to me, as a matter of fact.
With respect to what I believe to be true with the fact of medical travel and the fact that First Air is our provider, First Air used to provide morning flights. They don’t provide morning flights anymore, except for Saturday. I think this is going to cause us a problem with respect to the cost of medical travel, because people are going to have to stay down in Edmonton when they go for appointments as opposed to flying back in the evening. Has the department engaged First Air or any of the airlines about morning flights, specifically, our contractor First Air, to see if there’s any opportunity for them to reinstate some of these morning flights and save us some money? Thank you.
I need to confirm that. I don’t know where the Member got that information. I’m not at all aware and I don’t believe that we use only one northern airline. We use both and we use smaller airlines as well, community airlines if they are available for medical travel, because we have people travelling from all over the Territories to Yellowknife and then on to Edmonton. Mr. Speaker, we use First Air and Canadian North to facilitate medical travel.
I’m aware that we use different airlines to travel to Yellowknife with the small airlines. It’s pretty much one of the only ways we can get into Yellowknife from some of the smaller communities. I’m talking specifically, obviously, of Yellowknife to Edmonton.
Morning flights have been an important part of medical travel in the past and I’m concerned that with currently no morning flights, that the costs are going to peak. I’m just curious what kind of action plan the department is putting in place. I know that there’s a review being done by the review office in the Executive. I’m wondering what types of plans are being put in place to help us control some of these costs, which can be blown up, of having to house people in Edmonton for longer than we have in the past. What is the department doing to help us reduce our medical travel costs?
Our staff that organize medical travel arrangements from Yellowknife to Edmonton would use the most economical means of booking those flights, but as the Member is well aware, some of our medical travel is time sensitive and we can’t be going for the cheapest flights.
I just want to confirm again that, as far as I am aware, we use both First Air and Canadian North. They are both northern airlines. Canadian North introduced a morning flight for Monday mornings in September, and on February 3rd they announced that they will reinstitute morning flights from Yellowknife to Edmonton on Tuesday, Friday and Saturday. So we have four out of seven days of morning flights. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. Your final supplementary, Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think some of those dates don’t take effect until April. So we’ve had a couple months here where our costs have probably been higher.
I go back to my original question on what are we doing to control the cost of medical travel in the Northwest Territories. We do have a lot of our residents who go down for short appointments. I know there’s always the other circumstance, always the one-of’s, but a lot of our residents go down for short appointments, and now our costs are going up. My question still stands. What is this department doing to help us, with the help of the Program Review Office, to control our costs on medical travel? Thank you.
That is part of our daily business, to manage our medical travel budget wisely. As the Member is aware, medical travel is under review from a couple of points of view, but from a daily arrangement for our residents who need to go to Edmonton, they are booked for the services they need. It is true since they’re having less flights and less direct flights and less turn-around between Yellowknife and Edmonton, we have seen the costs go up, but we have to do what we have to do for our residents. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.
