EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
With that, some of the things that I have been thinking about and trying to deal with in my head as to how we can strengthen our relationships better with each community because I really think that within the department, if we’re going to address health, we need to start focusing our energy and resources in keeping people healthy.
One of the means to plug into the communities as a department on those grassroots issues was to strengthen the roles of the Committees of Council that were established when the boards were dissolved. I think in the early start up, there was a bit of a hiccup in terms of that role and the function that those committees played.
I strongly believe that by focusing our resources in reviewing the terms of reference of those councils and strengthening their role that that will become one of the means for us as a department to plug into some of the priorities of each of the communities and so on, but we also needed to take that one step further in the department in that we needed to position the department in each region to also have a relationship with each of those committees in the communities.
As it has been, they were left to function on their own and report on an ad hoc basis on how they were doing.
Some communities have done very well and one example, the one I know of, is Cambridge Bay’s model and they have been very active through the hamlet, through their wellness centre and so on, but that involved a very strong commitment and support from the municipality in that they made wellness their top priority.
A community like Cambridge Bay is a model that we can share with communities and not every community is there.
One of the things that I have tasked my department is to try and fix the process of providing the support and receiving those feedbacks on a regular basis from the Community of Councils because that’s the only way we can stay plugged in, not just from the angle of when people are sick, but rather on the ideas of where we should be focusing our energies in the area of prevention.
So that work is still progressing and I can only see a positive feedback coming from the Committees of Council, some of the challenges will continue to be there, but it allows us a means to receive the feedback on a regular basis as an organization to continue to focus our resources and energy where it’s most needed.
Can the minister tell me how many Committees of Council exist in Nunavut?
There’s a committee in every community in Nunavut.
How much funding does each Committee of Council receive for their operations?
The total funding I believe is $200,000 and that varies by community.
If the Committees of Council wants to retain the services of some experts to help them do a special project, where would they turn to for additional funding?
Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Peterson. Madame Minister.
Depending on the project itself, I think some Committees of Council have been active in accessing funding through youth projects, as an example, or elder projects to pay contributions, but depending on that, if it is health related, then it would have to come through the regional office and we would look to see where we would be able to provide that assistance to that committee.
Mr. Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have no more questions.
Chairman: Thank you. We are on page H-5, H-6, and H-7.
Health and Social Services. Branch Summary. Directorate.
A short question, Mr. Curley.
Mr. Curley: Very, very short.
Could the minister or his officials outline the Nunavut Arctic College program CHR?
It’s not all that clear to me exactly which program funds individuals and communities. It also says, “Teaching communities to improve lifestyle.”
I’m not at all too sure that they can achieve that with that amount of money.
So could the minister give us an example of what type of venues they use to...I know it’s an important program, but I think it is under-funded.
I’m not sure whether all the committees if they contributed, received funding from that contribution fund.
Could the minister at least explain to us about how successful that program is?
It’s unfortunate that he wasn’t here when I explained that earlier, but I’ll do it again.
The Community Health Representative Program originally, when it was designed, it was designed to try have at least one CHR position in every community. The program is offered in different communities every year. Last year, I believe it was in Pangnirtung and I think this year it’s here.
The program is delivered through Nunavut Arctic College. I can get the program guidelines for the member, and I think it’s also available through the college booklet.
The idea was to train individuals as CHRs for positions within every community in Nunavut. Most communities have at least one CHR.
I’ve committed to re-examining the positions, not only just this position, but in social work, as an example; the impact that population growth has had in our communities in the service industry side.
So that is in the works.
I don’t know if that answers the member’s question.
Mr. Curley (interpretation): I’d like to thank the minister for providing that information. Is my question too short?
Chairman (interpretation): No. (interpretation ends) We are on page H-5, H-6, and H-7.
Total Operations and Maintenance. $22,154,000.
Chairman: H-8, that includes H-9 and H-10.
In H-8, it’s very difficult to say.
First of all, I’d like to welcome the minister and her officials.
In the Pangnirtung dialect, I will be asking some questions on social workers because they do heavy work; very stressful.
Even though it is costing a lot of money, we can make improvements.
In Pangnirtung, with the population growing, of course I know that their jobs are very stressful, but I regret to say I don’t know what the other community situations are so I can’t make a comparison from one community to my community of the social workers.
I’m pretty sure other communities are like that. They have a heavy workload and there are two social workers. Those two social workers try and deal and help the people in the community with problems, and have appointments and they have to try and prevent things.
They have to make reports to the courts, and they have to deal with family violence.
There are a lot of different things that they have to deal with. It becomes very stressful.
I want to know if they can be supported further. If that’s only the case in Pangnirtung, I’m not sure. I wonder if they can at least be supplied with an office support worker for making photocopies, answering phones, and doing the correspondence.
If they can get an assistant in the office because they have to deal with a lot of things and we heard that in this House, it was mentioned that even though they have a very stressful job that we don’t show enough recognition to them. To show them appreciation for what they have done, maybe we can provide them with an office assistant.
My question is: the social workers in Pangnirtung, is that the only case?
I believe there should be an office worker in the offices because the social workers...I want your department to check to see if they can get an office worker in their office.
I would just like to remind everybody that when somebody is talking, please try not to disrupt. If you have to meet, go have a chance to talk because when there are people talking around, it gets very distracting, and the person asking the question and the person who is listening can’t really hear each other.
Thank you, Mr. Kilabuk.
I would like to thank my colleague, Mr. Kilabuk.
In terms of the member’s concern in regard to the holistic approach as far as social services is concerned, we want to help the social workers because of their workload.
In terms of when the Government of Nunavut was formed in 1999, there were a lot of barriers that these social workers had to face, but now their barriers have seemed to lessen.
We still continue and want to continue supporting our social workers.
They have a tremendous workload. This is something that we want to continue working on. So I’ll continue to communicate with my colleagues in terms of how we are supporting our social workers because it is a tremendously stressful job.
In terms of Pangnirtung, we want to, as far as I’m concerned as the minister, I want to work with the communities in terms of supporting our social workers.
I would like to thank the minister for recognizing that there should be an office worker.
Before she changes her mind, I’ll move on to something else.
This is very interesting to hear; on H-10, for the council, I think it deals with the Embrace Life Council.
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: I don’t think there was a question.
Yes, we are page H-8, H-9, and H-10.
I try and support the council as much as I can; the Council for the Disabled.
My question is, as I raised it earlier, people, in regard to the motorized wheelchairs.
If we are to provide them with motorized wheelchairs, would that council be included if they’re going to make changes, or would it be done just by the Department of Health and Social Services?
The wheelchairs are covered through the Non-Insured Health Benefits Program, based on patient need.
I guess just very shortly then, if the department is going to revisit the issue of wheelchairs and looking at providing the disabled with motorized wheelchairs, will the department allow the input from the Council for the Disabled on that and other issues surrounding disabilities and their equipment?
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Kilabuk. Madame Minister.
I’m open to hearing recommendations or suggestions from individuals that require equipment of this nature, and am willing to work with any agency and work with the Non-Insured Health Benefit Program to include some of the equipment that is needed by individuals with disabilities.
Mr. Kilabuk: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’ll end my questions there, but I thank the minister and staff for the response.
We’re on pages H-8, H-9, and H-10.
Total Operations and Maintenance. $42,410,000.
I wanted to ask the minister about dental care.
I see on page H-17 of the business plan, the budget for dental services decreased by a small amount.
Last summer Mr. Chairman, residents from my riding and residents from Kugluktuk had to come to Iqaluit for dental treatment.
It was very difficult and we discussed that in the House in November.
There is a large backlog of dental care patients across Nunavut. I would like the minister to give me an idea of where Nunavut stands in terms of working their way through the huge backlog of dental patients that require surgery.
I am just looking through my notes.
I recall the concerns of the members traveling from the Kitikmeot traveling to Iqaluit for dental. The backlog at that time was quite high.
As it is in 2004-05, we’ve worked...there are approximately 747 clients that are on the waiting list for dental restoration, extractions, and are being treated.
That is a significant improvement from previous years.
What we were trying to do at that time was because there was such a long waiting list to get the treatments in Yellowknife, or Hay River, or one of those places, we had made arrangements to try and utilize these dental services here in Iqaluit to try and address the long list of individuals now waiting. Other services are provided in Churchill, Hay River, as well as Yellowknife.
Can the minister tell me how many of those 747 folks are from the Kitikmeot?
In 2005-06, we’ve dealt with 104 patients from the Kitikmeot for dental. The number of people that are waiting right now are 44.
Is it still the intention of the government to bring the 44 people on the list to Iqaluit for dental surgery if they require it?
Any new cases are screened and they are prioritized for the type of treatment that the individual would need. We would try and get that service at the nearest centre if possible, whether that would be in Yellowknife or here, depending on, again, whether those services are available. So a bit of a combination of different things that we need to look at but the idea is to provide the service.
Not to dwell on this too much longer, but I’ve received clearer direction from my constituents that they don’t like to come to Iqaluit for dental surgery.
After the folks that came here last summer had their difficulties, the word spread in Cambridge Bay that it wasn’t a very pleasant experience.
People are asking me why they can’t get dental treatment in the Kitikmeot. If they can’t get it there, why can’t they get dental treatment in Yellowknife?
The individuals that traveled from the Kitikmeot to Iqaluit required surgery.
There are dentists that travel to each community, based on our contracts, but the particular individuals that travel to Iqaluit for treatment required surgery that we couldn’t get from the Northwest Territories. We couldn’t get the surgery time slot through Stanton for those services, so we chartered the individuals to come to Iqaluit for that treatment.
The treatment itself, the surgery was good service. There were a few glitches at the airport, but the quality of service provided to those individuals in surgery is, in my opinion, excellent.
We have to try and balance the need of the patient and the timing that patient requires in medical attention and had we not chartered the aircraft to Iqaluit, those individuals would wait at least two years for that treatment in the Northwest Territories based on the backlog.
And the other thing, we talk about the issue about ‘Closer to Home.’ We are trying to examine services that are available within Nunavut to Nunavummiut.
So attempts are being made to try and provide more services in Nunavut and that is one of them.
So, again, I think what I need to clarify is that this particular treatment required, it was a surgery treatment, and the dental team does travel to various communities.
I suppose part of the solution would be, as you mention in your main estimates, dental activities that include promotion and treatment. So before they have to travel for dental surgery, a lot of that could be prevented if there’s a little bit of education or promotion about the dangers of not looking after your teeth.
I know the minister handed out, I think there was a kit there in November that we all took back to our ridings; toothbrushes and things like that and some educational material.
Can the minister comment on how that program is working in terms of educating parents to look after their children’s teeth so that they can avoid unnecessary surgery at such a young age?
I say young age because some of the kids that had to come over here were very young; two and three years old. That’s very young for dental surgery.
There are currently two pilot projects related to...I believe that kit that we distributed and those are one in the Keewatin and one in Igloolik.
The whole prevention side, again, is very important and we try and provide as much information as we can on prevention through our CHRs and this is where we go back to the role of the community health representatives, the role of the committees of council in promoting healthy living, healthy lifestyle, but also the prevention of issues like this.
It’s a concern to us in that over 200 kids a year still need surgery within Nunavut and we are trying to address that through prevention and education of mothers and young mothers and so on. We are focusing our energies to try and get that information out. But it’s an ongoing effort.
We hope that we never have to have children go through surgery, but it’s something that...we are not there yet and we will continue to work and develop programs and prevention plans.
I’m wondering if I could get some information on social workers in Nunavut.
I wonder if the minister could give me an idea of how many social workers are required in Nunavut.
We have 25 communities; how many social workers would be required in all those 25 communities?
I spoke earlier in regard to reviewing the workload of every social worker.
The numbers that we have by community in Nunavut have not changed since 1999. That is a concern that I have in that we need to examine the work that those social workers are carrying in relation to the population growth that we are experiencing in Nunavut.
I think that that is an area that it’s very important that we look at and I had directed my staff to start examining, not only the workload, but the compensation to those individuals.
As it is right now, there’s no magic formula that is used to allocate the number of social workers by community, or by population, or by caseload, and so on.
It is something that we need to examine internally to ensure that the workload and cases handled by our social workers is somewhat consistent across the territory.
I have a copy of the Annual Report of the Director of Child and Family Services 2004-05.
In there, Mr. Norman Murray, he commented on social services’ big picture. Approximately 51 front line staff and supervisors serve all of Nunavut.
There are also administrative supervisors of each key base staff; program heads, and senior management who support us.
Frontline staff and supervisors are exceptionally busy given the many and varied duties that a social worker is expected to deliver; adoptions, guardianship, family violence response, response to suicidal ideation, services to aged and/or infirmed, child protection, foster care services, and community correction services.
When I read that I was astounded that a social worker has to do all that, and probably be on call 24/7.
It hit home that this is probably one of the reasons why we have such a high turnover of social workers in Nunavut.
It is very difficult to keep some social workers longer than six to 12 months.
The concern in many communities that I traveled to is that people don’t see a social worker. There’s no continuity developed. A new social worker comes in and they don’t know the community; they don’t know the people.
It’s a big concern in my community and I’m sure in other communities.
I am wondering if the minister could comment on how the department would like to see, or strive to see the turnover of social workers be reduced so that communities are not left without coverage, particularly during the critical times of the year.
The report that is produced by the Superintendent of Child Welfare, under statutory requirements, does not paint a good picture of some of the challenges that we face.
Recognizing that the challenges that we face within our social workers, I think we need to address that whole issue on many fronts.
First of all, the focus of healthy communities involves many things. It is not just one department’s responsibility to develop a healthy community. Everyone has a role in promoting healthy communities or active living, or whatnot.
So it’s so broad and involves many partners, including Education, Justice, or the communities, or the hamlets, youth, and so on.
I’m saying that because the preventions side has to be a piece that we also put resources in, whether it be healthy lifestyle, but also promoting healthy lifestyles in the community level to try and minimize the challenges that we are challenged with within the system.
The issue around the high turnover of social workers, I think I spoke to earlier in that we need to examine, first of all, the functions carried out by the social workers and examine the population growth in relation to the work that’s carried out, the cases, and so on.
There is no magic formula at this place in time. The numbers pretty much remained the same in terms of social workers. And we need to examine all of those pieces to address retention, to address training, to address support, to address a number of things, but I recognize that that is an issue and that is an area that I think we need to do better in.
I mentioned earlier that we need to focus our energies on what we do well, but we also have to focus our energies in what we are not doing well. This is an area that I think requires our attention and I am completely committed to that.
Part of it will also be to talk to individuals that deliver this service on a regular basis and hear firsthand the challenges they feel and the support they need to carry out their jobs, whether it be logistics, as mentioned by Member Kilabuk, whether it would be administrative support to the social workers in each community, but not only that, I think we also have to examine what support or assistance we give to positions that are transferred to hamlets. We transfer positions to municipalities, but we cannot disconnect our connection to those individuals that provide social work services on behalf of us through the municipalities.
So there’s a bigger, broader issue that needs to be examined and we can’t continue to look at it in pieces, but we need to also look at how we can work with those groups within the department in the community and how they can better work together, whether it be mental health workers, the translation requirements they may need to do their jobs and so on.
So I am committed to examining that and I look forward to reporting those findings because I think it’s important also for Nunavummiut and members to be aware of the amount of work these individuals and these professionals provide on our behalf in child welfare cases and so on.
Unfortunately, those numbers are going up, I wish they were going down, but our social challenges are great and we have to respond by reviewing our caseloads, but at the same time, focusing our energy and resources in the area of prevention.
Mr. Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the minister for that reply.
Mr. Murray made an interesting comment in that section where he said the social workers provide community corrections services. I think that probably puts them in a bit of a conflict with some of their other duties.
If you have a situation where a social worker is probably acting as a parole officer for some individuals in the community where they were involved in some of these other things like family violence or maybe some other criminal activity where they served time, came back, and they are on parole.
I’m wondering how the social worker separates that function in their mind; from being a social worker then becoming a parole officer, community corrections officer; if the minister could comment on that.
How does the social worker separate the two functions in their mind?
I can assume that they’re dealing with an individual under different circumstances and respond accordingly, depending on the victim, or the patient, or the client, or whatever.
Again, that concern has been raised by the social workers and it is an area that we need to examine. The only way we can get to address those issues is to seek and speak to the professionals in those jobs for recommendations also.
I won’t be able to come up with that, but I want to hear, firsthand, from those individuals that provide that service. Yes, they do provide probation services and so on. That will involve speaking to the Department of Justice in terms of workloads and so on.
At this point in time, I can only say that that is an area that has been expressed and we will be reviewing those recommendations.
How many social workers across Nunavut would actually be performing community correction services?
From time to time, the social workers, at one point in time, will be required to provide those services through the agreement that we have with the Department of Justice.
Chairman: Thank you, Madame Minister. Mr. Peterson.
The agreement that you have with the Department of Justice, do they pay some of the salary O&M to support the social worker/community corrections officer?
I have to thank the Minister of Justice for providing all this information. From what I understand in terms of the arrangement is if there is a high caseload of people that require probation services; they have a dedicated person. Where there are no high caseloads that function is carried out by social workers through the arrangement.
I wanted to touch on Foster Care on page H-19 in the business plan.
Could you give me an update on what the foster care rates are currently for Nunavut?
If you allow me, I’d like to recognize the clock and report back on those rates tomorrow.
I don’t have that information in front of me so I can commit to providing that tomorrow.