EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
I may have some concerns about the minister’s opening comments about the boarding home.
I first started asking questions about the boarding home when I was the mayor back in the year 2000, and I’ll continue to ask questions.
It was supposed to be ready by the fall of 2004, and it was supposed to be ready this year, and then January 2006. Now I’m hearing early 2007.
I know that’s an integral component of the overall ‘Care Closer to Home.’
I would be interested in hearing from the minister during questions how they anticipate having the patients who come in from the different communities accommodated as part of that overall facility.
The residents of my community have raised concerns over that in the last year and a half, and I mentioned it before.
We have a group home in Cambridge Bay and I think there are only six beds.
So we have to foster a lot of kids in our community and there’s concern about that.
I would be interested in hearing if the minister has any plans to construct a larger group home in Cambridge Bay or anywhere in the Kitikmeot.
I also had elders or their children approach me talking about continuing care for residents in my riding.
I know I had a daughter of a constituent last summer who was very distraught.
She was trying to find accommodation for her mother who was suffering from Alzheimer’s and it was quite a traumatic experience for her.
I think she eventually ended up in a facility in another region for a few months and now she’s back in her previous situation.
We have people as well down in Fort Smith where we have to send relatives to visit. I know your department allows a visit once per year for one relative to visit these people.
It’s very stressful for my constituents and their families when they don’t get a chance to visit their relatives, and for the relatives are down south.
I’m not sure how we are going to deal with all that; I know it costs a lot of money to make those arrangements.
My community, the hamlet council, and the wellness council have been making very good use of the existing boarding home, we call it the old hostel, but it will be renovated into the boarding home for the new health facilities.
They have been using that facility for putting on workshops for alcohol treatment and anger management.
When that facility becomes unavailable, it’s going to make it difficult for the community to put on those workshops.
From all accounts, from talking to the people who’d be on these courses; I mean the building is right across the street from my constituency office, so I get quite a few of the folks come over there every day for coffee or tea and chat about how successful those courses are.
If we can’t use that facility any more, then we’re going to have some difficulties having those very successful courses.
I know the hamlet is very concerned about what the future holds in that regard being that there aren’t that many facilities in Cambridge Bay to put on these types of workshops for people who live in the facility, in particular, in the alcohol treatment courses, especially for the ladies.
Welcome Ms. Aglukkaq, Ms. Brown, Mr. Blais welcome. Just a short comment, Mr. Chairman, in regard to my constituents’ concerns of the Department of Health and Social Services. During this session I will have more questions for the minister’s department.
But today’s concerns come from my communities, for those people that are disabled and cannot speak English who have to go down to the southern medical centres. Sometimes they don’t have interpreters or escorts. Sometimes they get assistance from people that are down there, that are already down there to hold meetings.
But I think this has to be done a little bit better. The elderly people that go for medical treatment down south have a lot of problems especially when they have to go see specialists. Sometimes there are specialists that come to Iqaluit and the people in my community have to travel from the High Arctic, and sometimes their flights don’t come on time so they are too late to see the specialist that is here in Iqaluit.
So they have to go down south to get specialty treatment, such as people with heart conditions and other patients that have to see a specialist. Perhaps it would be cheaper for the government if the specialist were to come to the communities rather than the patient going down south because that specialist is only one person and it doesn’t provide much of a problem for them to travel up north.
Other problems that we encounter are with boarding homes or the facility that provides boarding for the patients. This has been mentioned by the people, my constituents.
There are not enough people to escort those patients and the people have to write a letter requesting that somebody escort them. The nurses in the communities were talked about as well, like to have them change community location rather than having those same individuals over and over again. For them to go to other communities and to experience other people is one of the things that my constituents talked about.
Those are some of my comments and I will have more questions later on.
I would like to welcome the Minister and her officials. Some of the concerns that my constituents relayed to me were about the Winnipeg Boarding Home. The people that use the Winnipeg Boarding Home wanted to know who provides the purchasing of the food because sometimes Inuit people have different ailments.
They wanted to find out about the food that they have to eat because sometimes when you’re sick you have certain cravings, but at the boarding home, they usually provide the same kinds of meals even though some patients want to eat a certain kind of food.
Because of the sickness that they have it does not go with their body and they have to be healed.
Mr. Chairman, I just wanted to find out if the boarding home could serve food according to the condition of the patient.
I wanted to find out if the Department of Health and Social Services can contact the boarding home to provide a better meal service for those people with certain illnesses, and to ask the boarding home management to be able to provide the patients with the certain kinds of foods that they request.
When a person is sick sometimes the patients are sent home before they heal. That’s the type of concern that I heard from my constituents. Then they have to fly to Sanikiluaq for many hours and the aircraft is very small and it does not have any washroom facilities.
It’s not very convenient for those patients that have to travel back home and it’s very uncomfortable for those patients.  Perhaps if you can think of those conditions, of the patients, and the long flights that they have to take, and with the new contract that is coming I would like the minister to consider making changes.
It would be good if they can have it in the contract whereby the problems that my constituents experience are considered.
Yes, I understand the member’s concern.
I have just a short comment Mr. Chairman and I would like to welcome the minister and her officials.
This has been a concern of my constituents as well, in regard to the health facilities, especially in the community of Repulse Bay.
The health centre in Repulse Bay, the renovations, or whatever they were going to do, have been delayed for quite some time and a lot of people have been ready for the health facility to be built. I think it was before 2004 when they expected it to be built.
I have talked to people in the communities that have no decentralization.
Sometimes they plan for things to be built in the capital estimates or in the five-year capital estimates and they keep on deferring it to the future.
And sometimes, some of those health facilities are very old and they need renovations and there is not enough room because the population is growing, too, in the smaller communities.
People are moving into the smaller communities.
I will be asking questions about the health facilities that have been deferred, I don’t know for how many years now.
We have yet to see a health facility but it has been deferred again for what reason I don’t know.
Maybe the people of Repulse Bay are not vocal enough.
Maybe that is the reason why they keep deferring it.
As I said Mr. Chairman, I will make a short comment.
I will be asking questions of the department and I would like the smaller communities to be considered as well, like the larger communities, when it comes to better health facilities because my constituents will want to understand what is happening.
Mr. Arreak (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to welcome the Minister of Health and Social Services and I expect that she will do a good job.
When we go to our communities or are seeing our constituents, one of the things the people talk about most is the boarding home.
The boarding home in Iqaluit is not big enough and they expect with the population growing it is definitely too small and those people that have to see a psychiatrist also stay in the same place.
It has been considered that it should be in a different boarding home.
This has been a concern from my community and in her opening remarks the minister indicated that the health centres in the communities, a majority of them, are new except for Qikiqtarjuaq, which is 33 years old.
It is an old trailer and it is not in very good condition.
What I would like to see is one built in Qikiqtarjuaq and those are the concerns that I will be bringing up.
I like to welcome the minister and thank you that you were able to come to the Keewatin to come to the opening and to your staff. Welcome Rosemary, I’m so happy to see you and that you’re doing fine.
I would just like to state that these were in the old five year plan, I’m not sure if they were in the old five year plan under capital projects but in the Baffin Region it’s incomplete.
The Qikiqtani General Hospital is not completed and it’s supposed to be finished in 2007-08.
These are the concerns I have that the Cabinet Ministers, and their regions, and their constituents are spending millions and millions of dollars.
If we were to break it down; headquarters, $350,000, Kitikmeot, $4 million, and the hospital is completed. On top of that it’s $4 million. Qikiqtaaluk, $18 million, Baffin, $80,000.
And the $8 million was allocated to the regional hospital and in the Keewatin there are seven communities and there is only $100,000. So my colleague from Naujaat has indicated that their health centre is very old.
It doesn’t seem to be on their radar screen.
So it seems like the smaller communities are getting a lot more things outside of Keewatin and looking at the regions, yes, we’re happy about the hospital in the Keewatin but the smaller communities should also be looked at closer even though they’re outside of the headquarters.
I will be raising these concerns as we go through them because they’re due to the lack of agreement for this. I have a concern about the boarding homes in Rankin Inlet and in other communities.
There doesn’t seem to be a program from the federal government so I would be interested to hear if the federal government will provide that, and also, health insured benefits, whether we should expect that in the near future or in the long term?
That’s all I have for now. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman (interpretation): Mr. Curley, Thank you.
I would like to welcome the minister, Mr. Blais, Ms. Brown, to the witness table.
I had some meetings with my constituents in the last month.
They were quite concerned with a lot of things on health and also social services.
I will be asking some questions later on, on some of the things that were brought to my attention from the community.
I was quite happy when we had the opening of the hospital in the Kitikmeot and I’m sure that the Kivallirmiut had a good time at the opening of their health facility in their region.
There are quite a few concerns about escorts and for those under16 years of age.
I think they should be having escorts, and also for elders, especially the ones that don’t speak English. There was one concern that was brought up to me that this elder wanted to call home while they were in Yellowknife but she did not have an escort. She didn’t know how to use the phone.
This was brought to my attention by one of our neighbours from Kugluktuk who happened to be in the same boarding home. This concern was brought to me as to why our elders don’t get escorts, especially the ones that don’t speak in English and don’t understand English. This person couldn’t even call home because she didn’t know how to operate a phone and she wanted to find out how her grandchildren and her children were doing.
Also, I am sure that Health and Social Services provides taxi money from the health centre to the airport and from the airport on their way back home to her home. This individual had come to me and asked me why it is that some of the patients are getting taxi slips and we aren’t. She was one of the elders, too.
That was also brought up to me.
I would like to get right to the meeting and ask a few questions later on. I would like to welcome you here to the Committee of the Whole.
Mr. Alagalak (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Welcome.
We are happy to see you here, that all of you are here.
The member for Rankin North brought it up already but in Arviat we seem to have everything according to the eyes of the government but not as a resident and hearing the concerns from the community.
What we were talking about last year, the midwifery program, and that there was going to be some development in that regard. They don’t have any beds that are available. That was one of the concerns that I have and I will be pursuing this matter.
As you know by now, in Arviat, the population is growing very rapidly. Lots of babies but they are not my babies. You all know that there are a lot of Inuit in Arviat.
They say in Rankin Inlet the population is higher but not all of them are Inuit.
There is no dentistry program.
There is no dentist in the community. There’s no equipment but there is space and we should be helping the community of Arviat in that regard.
I am pretty sure that you have heard this concern for over a year after the completion of the health centre. The entrance of the health centre is in an area that has a high slope. It is about 45 degrees.
There is no parking space.
The elderly find it too slippery, especially if they are wearing kamiks.
They find it impossible so a lot of times they have appointments and they miss them because they have no means of transportation to go there.
Those are the areas that need to be improved and I will be bringing these up again.
Under general comments, under capital, if you could go up to page six, I’m sure there will be problems.
If you can direct your questions under capital because we will be dealing with capital instead of O&M.
Health and Social Services, (interpretation ends) under Health and Social Services.
Total Headquarters. $350,000. (interpretation) Do you agree?
Chairman: Thank you. Go to 7.
Tangible Assets. Qikiqtaaluk Region.
Total Qikiqtaaluk Region. $18,080,000.
I would like to ask the minister if she could give us some information on how the decision was made to select the two locations for the continuing care centre in Igloolik. I know there’s one in Gjoa Haven and one that’s to be determined - if she could give us some information on the criteria that the department uses to select those locations.
As far as I know, the decision to allocate the two facilities to Igloolik and Gjoa Haven was based on need and I’m going to have the deputy explain the procedure that was followed in conducting the research in determining those two communities as the ideal locations for those two facilities.
Chairman: Thank you. (interpretation) Mr. Peterson, anything else?
I think the minister was going to ask her deputy minister to give us some information.
Chairman: I’m sorry, please forgive me.
The needs assessment of the Government of Nunavut was basically researched from other jurisdictions and we tried to pull together every fact for what criteria is going to be appropriate and the one we established in the final analysis was looking at the age group of all of the people over 55 years of age.
We also examined the number of adults and children or youth that live outside the territory. We have approximately 52 clients out-of-territory and what jurisdictions or regions they were from was one of the other criteria.
We also looked at the social determinants such as unemployment and social welfare to determine whether we could also address economic needs of those communities as well.
And in the end, the criteria was weighted, there was a five-point rating for all of those, and it basically identified those two communities as the top of the needs assessment tool.
We also determined that initially the direction was for an elder’s care facility. Given the population of elders there were simply not enough elders in each of those communities or regions so we recommended to Cabinet that we build a continuing care facility for 18 years and over and because of the out-of-territory opportunity to repatriate some of our Nunavummiut back to the territory; we felt that there would be an opportunity to address that need as well.
So those were the criteria, basically, that were used.
Mr. Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman and I thank Mr. Blais for those answers.
Could the minister perhaps give us an indication of how many continued care facilities currently exist in Nunavut?
Chairman: Qujannamiik.
The list I have is, there are currently ten facilities in Nunavut that provide care for youth as well as seniors as well as people with disabilities.
Mr. Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the minister.
Could the minister give me a list and provide a list of the locations of the facilities you just mentioned?
The list I’ll provide. It includes individuals, seniors or youth homes, but the continuing care facilities in Nunavut are four and I can provide the list to the member.
I can go down the list now.
In Arviat, we have a facility in Arviat, Baker Lake and there are two facilities in Rankin Inlet, one in Chesterfield Inlet, which is the Naaja Isabella Home, which we opened this summer. In Iqaluit there is the Pairijiit Centre and another one in Iqaluit. There are actually four in Iqaluit and one in Cambridge Bay, the group home.
I thank the minister for that quick information. It’s nice to have that stuff at your fingertips and not have to wait for a day.
How many people would be able to be accommodated in these new continuing care facilities in Igloolik?
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, It would be 10 to 12 individuals.
Similar to what we’re experiencing in Cambridge Bay with the new health facility, do you have to provide government housing for professional staff to look after the patients in the continuing care facilities?
Just to clarify the question, is he asking me whether it is individuals looking after the facilities that will have to live in the facilities or is he asking whether we provide government housing to individuals that reside in the community and provide for or work in those facilities?
For the benefit of all, can you just clarify your question?
I thank the minister for asking me to clarify my question.
I’m assuming that the people who are providing professional care to the patients in the facilities are going to require housing, whether hired locally or hired from outside. If they’re hired from outside, will the Department of Health or the government have to provide the employees with staff housing to support the operation of the continued care facilities?
Miss Minister.
In some communities, where we have those centres the people that work in the facility live the community and live in their own homes or in public housing and sometimes some individuals will live in government housing.  And, in some instances, the actual group home parents live in the facility where the children reside.
Mr. Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the minister for that answer.
That’s how it works in Cambridge Bay, but similar to the problems we’re experiencing with the health centre in Cambridge Bay, we’ve had a shortage of housing for nurses and doctors. I’m just trying to project ahead and anticipate if we’re going to have problems providing housing for any of your professional staff in these communities.
I’m going back to my days when I was trying to find out all this information as the mayor of Cambridge Bay from the Department of Health. It seemed to me that they didn’t at the time have this all figured out. They were doing one thing but not planning for another thing, not planning for the boarding home, and not planning for the housing.
They’re working on their health facility so I try and anticipate if there are going to be any problems three and four years out, in terms of, you know, if we’ll have to provide housing. If you do, then you’re going to have to come back to this House and we will have to deal with it.
We are already experiencing that with other departments. I am just trying to get a sense of where we are heading with these facilities. I am sure we are talking about two facilities but you are planning to build one facility per year in terms of this Assembly so it’s not just related to Igloolik but every community where you are going to put a continuing care facility.
If the minister can give me a sense of where the department is in terms of thinking on providing staff housing three or four years from now.
I guess to answer the question is we dealing with it today.
I could say for now we are okay as it relates to staff housing. Down the road I can only assume. I can’t assume or predict what the future will hold, but one of the things that we are looking at trying to do in the communities and in Nunavut is to provide training for Nunavummiut.
One example is training nurses, social workers as well as mental health workers, home care workers, and a Midwifery Training Program so that we are able to hire more people locally and hopefully to minimize our needs for staff housing.
As it is right now we are looking, first and foremost, to try and hire locally for those two new centres that the member referred to earlier, but where we will be four years from now I cannot predict the outcome but what we can say internally is that we are trying to tackle the issue of filling the health care provider positions on an number of fronts and one includes local training.
Mr. Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the minister for that response. It is refreshing to hear that answer.
We’ve talked about the new health facilities or the hospitals. I know I have talked to your deputy minister in Cambridge Bay and he made presentations in terms of nurse training. That leads into my next question.
The Qikiqtani General Hospital, are the plans to use that facility similar to Cambridge Bay, to provide nurse training or any other training of medical professions instead of having to bring everyone from down south to train them here and putting them out into the communities?
Sometime during the session I plan to announce some initiatives that the department is undertaking related to training. I am quite excited about the new announcements that we’ll be dealing with this year, but of course, the facilities will be used to provide training of nursing students in Nunavut and it would be through the Baffin hospital here and eventually I hope down the road at Kivalliq as well as Kitikmeot health facilities. At the same time I am hoping that individuals from those areas are more encouraged to take on professions in the area of health care as they play a very important role in our community.
Yes, the health facilities will be used for training. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the minister for that answer. Has the department carefully looked at what their total savings are going to be from all these facilities when they come on stream?