Mr. Speaker, today, my statement was in regard to the COVID pandemic and how it changed communities in Nunakput. I am wondering: I am asking the health Minister if she could possibly look and work with me in regard to putting a team together to go to my communities and across the territory if possible, a grief counsellor, a few counsellors, to go into the communities for four or five days to actually sit with the people and listen to the hardships that they are going through and try to work with them to help them. I am hoping the Minister and maybe even the MACA Minister team up to find the funds so that it is possible to do something like this across our territory. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Nunakput. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I thank the Member for Nunakput for his question. Mr. Speaker, we have a Community Counselling Program available in every community, who would be able to provide this service to residents. They would not have to wait for a travelling team. They could connect with the Community Counselling Program and arrange to either have a socially distanced appointment or a virtual appointment so that they could get the kind of help that the Member is talking about. Thank you.
Our counsellor just left Tuktoyaktuk. He has gone to Behchoko, so they took our counsellor, but good for him. I am happy. He wanted a change, right. As MLA for Nunakput, I am obligated for the health and safety of my people that I represent. I am asking the Minister: Could we find, through the COVID secretariat, through MACA, is there a possible way? I used to take people, athletes, to go up and do hockey schools and talk about bullying and stuff like that in my communities, but this is different. This is more a thing we could work towards, of getting somebody professional into the communities instead of tel-emerg or telehealth or whatever you want to do. You have to see the whites of their eyes, I guess you could say, to actually try to help. I think something like this is going to be really good if it's possible to hit even the Beaufort-Delta, our communities in the Beaufort-Delta, where people in the small communities are really hurting with different types of grief and depression because there is nothing going on. Mr. Speaker, I am asking the Minister to try to work with me, with the MACA Minister, the Premier, to try to get something like this started for the region.
Again, I thank the Member for Nunakput for bringing this forward. It has been a very difficult time. We know that. There have been many deaths, not because of COVID necessarily but just in the natural course of doing things, and because of the limitation on funerals, the grieving has not taken place in the way we are accustomed to. This has left people feeling at a loose ends. I cannot promise to bring resources to his community, but what I can say is that we will endeavour to fill that counselling position as soon as possible and that, in the meantime, there are phone and video resources available. If anyone is able to drive into Inuvik, they might be able to make an appointment there and see a counsellor. We have instituted a new process for taking people into counselling, where there is no waiting list. There is no waiting time at all. You can be seen on the day that you make your appointment.
The only people who could drive in are from Tuktoyaktuk. I represent the most northerly riding in the territory. Our government gets $38,000 per year per person to provide services. Our government is obligated to provide service in regard to that and to our communities. I really want our government to take this recommendation seriously, to try to work with me. Just say yes. I will use some of my constituency budget when we fly into the communities to go and do it with them. I really want to know. The pandemic changed everything. To try to fly into Inuvik to see a counsellor would be, from Sachs Harbour, probably $700 to $800 one way, from Ulukhaktok, a thousand, so we can't do it. It's too expensive. We need help. Communities need help in the delta. Communities need help in my riding. My people need help, so take my recommendations and just say yes.
I do appreciate the Member's passion for helping his constituents, and I do appreciate that three of the four communities in his riding are not accessible by road. He started off by talking about his own community. I have to say that it's easier for his constituents to use the helpline to make a virtual appointment for counselling than to wait for Health and Social Services to fill empty positions in the community or to gather the resources together for a travelling team, so I really encourage him to contact me about the resources that are available right now that he can refer his constituents to.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I thank the Minister for that, but I just want to remind the Minister and the government that they are responsible for all people in the Northwest Territories. During this COVID-19 pandemic, please provide services to my people who I represent in Nunakput and across the delta. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. I take that as a comment.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
