Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services. With the budget in the range of $650 million with hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of employees on the books both funded, unfunded, etcetera, Mr. Speaker, what does the department have in terms of jobs specifically that are targeted to analyze spending of the department in the context of an efficiency expert? Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Yellowknife Centre. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, within the department, we have the ADM of finance, policy and planning. Within NTHSSA, they have their own finance. And within the NTHSSA, there's also a sustainability unit that has been working through the NTHSSA reviewing all of the programs under the government renewal. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. With two CFOs, dozens of managers, directors, even bookkeepers for goodness sakes I'm sure, it's not a policy issue. It's a numbers issue. Why doesn't the department look at hiring someone specific to identify efficiencies with respect to costs? If health is so expensive, you'd be thinking health would be leading the charge to find the most efficient way to do things. And, Mr. Speaker, I believe in the department of health. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I believe in the department of health as well and all of the associations. And I know that, you know, given the Member, you know, highlighting the amount that it costs to run health and social services in all 33 communities, it is a high cost. The Member also stated that there are a lot of unfunded positions. A lot of those unfunded positions are third party funded positions which we get a lot of federal money for. Those positions -- and then there's -- because we have such a high number of workforce within, we have one-third of the employees as well. We do not, however, have one-third of all of the senior management of the government. So, you know, when you take in the size of the organization versus the senior management versus the staff that are unfunded, we also have a large population of our staff that are away for, you know, maternity leave, sick leave, education leave, so those also have to be backfilled because those positions are not -- you can't just leave those positions unfunded. So within the department, there is a lot of work going on within measuring all of our programs. However, a lot of our programs that are core, and then there's a lot of programs that we as NWT also support so that there's services. And those are the tough ones. Those are the tough ones. The core funding ones that we get core funding, it's all of the ones that are not core funded that we struggle to be able to maintain that stability, the sustainability. And so those are the things that you'll hear, and that's a lot of those discussions go on in this -- the floor of this House. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, again, speaking on the theme of being not confident to do change, Mr. Speaker, I believe in the department, Mr. Speaker. I know they have the skills, Mr. Speaker. And I hope the Minister wasn't suggesting she's going to hire more ADMs, DMs, and who knows what else.
Mr. Speaker, would the Minister have the confidence that I'm giving her -- would she take the leadership I'm encouraging her to take to hire someone from an auditor general point of view to do value for money audit on the work we do there in the department because of the inefficiencies of how the programs are currently being run, such as the example I talked about earlier today? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, you know when we hear inefficiency, you know, in our public service staff, especially in Health and Social Services, are run off, you know, their feet, then we say there's inefficiencies is -- you know, they're doing multiple jobs and they're providing frontline service. And I hear the Member, and I understand where he's coming from. That is why the Minister of health and I have had active conversations on where we are financially and, again, where those core programs are, where those noncore funded that we are funding from within that we're providing to the residents of the Northwest Territories, and are those sustainable with our fiscal picture. However, Mr. Speaker, for so long, you know -- and this is the thing is when I think of my computer that just updated, our health and social services authority, all the authorities, you know, every single year there's increased growth, costs, all these things, but not everything can make it through forced growth at the budget table. And so we have to prioritize. And then sometimes things get bounced back until then they become urgent and then they get pushed forward. So there's only so much money in the budget that we can do that. And so that is an ongoing battle. That is an ongoing -- not battle, but it is a battle within Health and Social Services as what we bring forward for forced growth. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Final supplementary. Member from Yellowknife Centre.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When the Minister of health said she has conversations with the Minister of health, I hope she wasn't having an out of body experience. And that's meant as a joke, Mr. Speaker, okay, in the nicest way. Because I believe in the health Minister. As a matter of fact, I know the health Minister has the ability and knowledge, rah, rah, rah, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, I didn't talk about any of that stuff about people running around. I'm talking about being efficient with our money, Mr. Speaker. I'm talking about value for money. Instead of sending people daily to Edmonton for rheumatoid arthritis, examine the business case of saying bring someone here. I'm not going to go through the rest of the examples; I've already made them, Mr. Speaker. I'm strictly speaking about value for money.
So, Mr. Speaker, my question to the Minister of health, again, is what about hiring some type of auditor who could examine the way we do businesses program by program to find more efficiencies within it, and then our staff won't be running their feet off. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, you know, and that was where this health sustainability unit came into play, and that was the expectation of that, and now that they've completed one part of it, that is the discussion that I'm having with the Minister of Finance, not the Minister of health, and does that department need to -- you know, is it continuing the way it's going to continue or does it need to do something else now. So thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services.
Colleagues, we would like to focus our questions and our answers a little bit more concise, please, so we can get through the process.
Members' statements. Member from Sahtu.
