EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
A constituent, a person with disabilities, came to my office whereby they noted that the public entrance was not conducive for people with disabilities since it was not easily accessible for people with wheelchairs.
First of all, I would like to thank the officials because they identified parking spaces for people with disabilities immediately as a pressing need, which should be within close proximity to the public entranceway. I would like to thank the officials for identifying that pressing need immediately.
However, the ramp that lowers to allow people in wheelchairs to enter in and out of the vehicle has to be repaired. I was wondering if this ramp will be repaired in the short term so that everyone who wishes to enter may do so at their leisure.
We want this facility to be open to all of the public.  I wanted to ask these questions while the officials are presenting before the committee.
We have included these items in our plans, as well as all of the items that need to be repaired or replaced. We also hear from the members about issues that need to be addressed.
Thank you. I will have the Clerk respond to your question.
The one item that we are waiting for is an estimate and whether it can be done this year on the ramp itself where it has to be turned completely around or whether we can cut part of the ramp and have another part added onto it in the parking area.
I am just waiting for that information and if it can be done before the snow flies, we will do it.
If not, then it will be one of our first projects as soon as spring comes up.
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) I just noticed outside that it is snowing today, so I guess we will wait another year, but at least it is in the plans. So I appreciate the fast action by the staff of the Assembly for trying to accommodate one of my constituents.
It is not just my constituent; there are other good Nunavummiut who should have access to our building. (interpretation) Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I do not have any more members on my list for general comments.
Now we will proceed to page-by-page review of the department estimates starting at page A-3.
Branch Summary. Assembly Operations.
Capital Expenditures. Total Capital Expenditures. $980,000. Details on A-4.
Any questions or comments? Agreed?
Chairman: We will go to page A-5. Office of the Legislative Assembly. Branch Summary.
Capital Expenditures. Total Capital Expenditures. $12,000. Details on A-6.
Chairman: Now we will go back to page A-2.
Department Summary. Office of the Legislative Assembly.
Detail of Expenditures. Capital Expenditures. Total Capital Expenditures. $992,000.
Chairman: Does the committee agree that we have concluded with the Office of the Legislative Assembly?
Speaker (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, my colleagues.
Here at the Legislative Assembly, we are trying to renew the equipment and furniture.
We are also trying to keep our equipment updated.
Now that our capital estimates have been approved, I thank you as we will be able to deal with these issues.
I thank my officials for being here with me.
Chairman: I would like to thank the Speaker and his officials.
Will the Sergeant-at-Arms please escort the Speaker and officials out.
Bill 38 – Appropriation (Capital) Act, 2011-2012 – Consideration in Committee
Chairman: Members, please refer to Bill 38 in your white legislation binders, and that’s Bill 38 in your white legislation binders.
We will go to page 1. Bill 38.
Alright, we will go back to Bill 38, Appropriation (Capital) Act, 2011-2012. Clause 1. Do you agree?
Chairman: Go to the Schedule on the next page. Schedule.
Vote 2: Capital. Total Capital. $122,476,000.
Chairman: Total Capital Appropriation. $122,476,000. Do you agree?
Chairman: Now we will go back to page 1 and we will go to clause 4.
Chairman: Does the committee agree to Bill 38 as a whole?
Chairman: Do members agree that pursuant to Rule 62(2) that Bill 38 can immediately be placed on the orders of the day for third reading?
Now we can go to Bill 39, Supplementary Appropriation (O&M) Act, No. 3, 2009-2010.
I would now like to ask the Minister of Finance, Mr. Peterson, to make his opening remarks.
Bill 39 – Supplementary Appropriation (Operations & Maintenance) Act, No. 3, 2009-2010 – Consideration in Committee
I am pleased to present Bill 39, Supplementary Appropriation (Operations and Maintenance) Act, No. 3, 2009-2010.
Bill 39 addresses additional funding requirements for the previous fiscal year, 2009-2010, where currently approved appropriations have been exceeded as of the date of the 2009-2010 interim financial report. The funding requirements are:
$7.0 million to the Department of Health and Social Services for out-of-territory hospitals;
$600,000 to the Office of the Legislative Assembly for the Members Retiring Allowances Fund; and
$214,000 to the Nunavut Housing Corporation for the Oqota Homeless Shelter for Men in Iqaluit.
Hon. Keith Peterson: Mr. Chairman, to my right is Deputy Minister Peter Ma and to my left is Jeff Chown, Director of Expenditure Management with the Department of Finance.
Chairman: Thank you. Do members have any general comments?
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) I know that we will get into the details, but before we get there, I just wanted clarification on the Oqota Homeless Shelter here in Iqaluit. I believe there is already core funding provided, so what are these additional dollars for?
That is what I would like to clarify first. (interpretation) Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Those are additional expenditures incurred during 2009-2010.
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) Did the rates provided to the shelter go up or was there capital that had to be expended?
What was the purpose of the increase?
The additional funding, I believe, is O&M to allow the Salvation Army to continue to operate the homeless shelter for men from April 1, 2009 to December 31, 2009.
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you. (interpretation ends) So I take it that the rates have gone up for the shelter to be operated by the Salvation Army. Are those rates going to be adjusted for future years?
I don’t have the information that the rates increased, just that the costs of operating that facility increased.
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) From what I understand, the costs have increased by $214,000.
How much are we talking for the operation of the shelter at the moment?
Can Mr. Okalik clarify his question?
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) According to the minister, the rates were increased for operating that facility.
I understand that the facility already gets core funding from our government. Has operating the facility gone up by $214,000? So that’s tacked on to what’s provided already to the Salvation Army, for example. (interpretation) Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The information I have only indicates that operating expenses increased. I have no information on increased rates.
Mr. Okalik: Mr. Chairman, there is no explanation as to why this amount has gone up.
So what are we supposed to approve if we don’t know? I just want to get an explanation as to why it has gone up. Operating has gone up.
We will probably be asked to approve additional dollars for future years.
It would be nice to get an explanation because we go through a budget exercise and explain what the money is for.
That’s all I ask, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation) Thank you.
I appreciate Mr. Okalik’s question.
Costs have increased. I’ll just read the bullet here that may provide some information. The audited financial statements to December 31 were provided and additional funding requirements of $214,000 were identified over and above the core funding.
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) We have seen the value of auditors of late. How wonderful they work sometimes. It’s nothing against auditors; I just wanted to get an explanation on… .
I’m sorry?
I’m trying to speak, Mr. Chairman. I would appreciate some support there.
Anyway, I just want to get to the bottom and find out what the money is needed for, what increases have taken place, and it would be nice to get an answer. (interpretation) Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Yes, we’ve got to keep it quiet here. He’s asking a serious question.
I appreciate Mr. Okalik’s questions.
Unfortunately I don’t have the audited financial statements in front of me. We can get those audits to him and certainly we can provide him detailed information to review.
If I had that stuff here, we would certainly be able to give him that information.
Mr. Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) Okay, I just wanted to get an answer.
We have been asked to approve these line items and everybody knew that we would have to vote on these.
It would have been nice to have some information to be able to vote on these.
That’s all I ask. (interpretation) Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Again I appreciate Mr. Okalik’s concern. If you give us time to get the audited financial statements, we can provide that information to Mr. Okalik.
Any other comments on the opening statements?
I have no more members on my list. We will now proceed to the page-by-page review of the supplementary estimates starting with page 4.
Operations and Maintenance. Office of the Legislative Assembly. Not Previously Authorized.
Total Expenditures on Behalf of Members. $600,000. Total Department. Not Previously Authorized. $600,000.
Chairman: Now we will move on to page 5. Health and Social Services. Operations and Maintenance.
Not Previously Authorized. Health Insurance Programs. Total Health Insurance Programs. $7 million.
Chairman: Total Department. $7 million. $ 7 million. Not Previously… sorry. Mr. Elliott.
I was just wondering, in regard to the $7 million, if the minister could explain what some of those expenses went to in terms of out-of-territory hospitals.
Is it specifically billed by hospitals and why did it take so long?
Mr. Chairman, I believe the departments of health in different provinces and territories have what you call reciprocal jurisdictional agreements.
In other words, if we send someone to a hospital in Alberta, they would eventually bill the Government of Nunavut’s Department of Health and Social Services for the out-of-territory costs.
Quite frankly, some of the bills come in way after the accounting period and, in some cases, I don’t know, 12 to 13 months.
It is not a situation that is unique to Nunavut; it happens to all of the jurisdictions.
That’s essentially what happens.
They are out-of-territory costs that hospitals are going around and billing us, and now we are paying the bills.
My understanding of the Non-Insured Health Benefits, do we not, as the Government of Nunavut, put the money out for these expenses and then ask to be reimbursed, or send that to the Non-Insured Health Benefits and then get that money back?
If that is the case, then why would we need the money?
Mr. Chairman, not all of the bills would be Non-Insured Health Benefits.
Mr. Chairman, just further information on my earlier comments, 61 percent of the invoicing and payments occur after the end of January, so it is quite late.
Is there a timeline in terms of how long we have to be able to claim claims under the Non-Insured Health Benefits to get the money reimbursed back to the Government of Nunavut?
I believe that you have six months after the fiscal year to get your claim in to Health Canada.
With that said and the time it took for the other jurisdictions to bill the Government of Nunavut, is there anything that the Government of Nunavut is doing in terms of Health and Social Services to make sure that those bills come in before the cut-off date?
Mr. Chairman, the Department of Health and Social Services is starting to track the services that are requested a lot better. So they know to call the other provinces for the invoices so that they can pay them.
Mr. Curley, would you like to make a comment?
Hon. Tagak Curley: Yes. Thank you.
I think the minister is doing a good job here.
There are interdepartmental committees that work together with the provinces and certainly our finance officer behind me is well aware of that.
She had worked previously with the Manitoba government.
With all of the provinces like Alberta, Ontario, as well as Manitoba, there are various working groups that try to ensure that billings and final billings are sent in time, but provinces also have financial staffing challenges. We are not unique in this part of the world here.
They are doing everything possible to try and have all of the billing arrangements sent in time, but it is complex.
I have been briefed on the fact that they are attempting in every way to try and keep the provincial health systems sending bills on time, but with the challenges that we face as well, financial reporting systems are in such a way that it is also quite complex occasionally.
That’s why the minister indicated to us that it takes about 60 days after the billing dates and closing of the accounts that we finally would get the bills.
So that’s part of the whole reason, but we are keeping tabs on trying to improve the arrangements we have with the provinces.
Mr. Elliott: I was finished with my line of questioning, Mr. Chairman.
That was Mr. Ningeongan.
The question I would like to ask was partially answered.
After the Auditor General audit and in her report, she noted that the Department of Health and Social Services has continually gone over budget and has required supplementary funding.
I was trying to read the information in front of me, so I did not pay attention as to whether this question had already been asked.
Mr. Chairman, I want to get information as to what types of action the government has taken to curb the overspending by the department.
That is the question I would like to ask.
I thank Mr. Ningeongan for that very good question.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to defer that question to the Minister of Health for a detailed answer.
Again this is a very complex situation. It is quite complex to break even at the end of the year, obviously, with health.
A lot of it has to do with unexpected increased health services that we have, including medical travel, medevacs, and all of that. This is a huge, what I would call the large, financial situation that we normally face.
At the same time, the resources that we have in Nunavut are really quite limited as to how much we can spend with each department.
The Department of Health and Social Services, at every call letter throughout with the financial budgeting process, we tried every year to accurately put forward a budget, but like many departments as well, we have to normally settle with what we have.
In many cases, it’s really not enough to what we think we need throughout the year and predictably, at the end of the year, we will fall short of the actual costs that we incurred.
If we had enough resource revenue, we would be able to have more cushions with our budgets.
So that is normally the main point or part of the reason that I’m attempting to explain.
We have a number of actual spending that we normally use throughout the previous years, but in the end, it’s what is available with all of the departments that normally dictate to us exactly how much we are allowed to spend in the year.
At the end, again, unforeseeable costs and financial situations occur. Therefore, that particular kind of example comes through.
I appreciate the fact that we talk about complexity and so on as our rationale not to go moving forward, it seems at times. The expectation is that the government really ought to try and go beyond that.
As regular MLAs, we’re trying to ask question and we’re trying to become an instrument in becoming part of the solution rather than being part of the problem.
So I think the expectation is what initiatives are being rendered after the Auditor General had come by and suggested that corrective measures be done.
If we’re going to be told every time that it’s so complex that we’re not able to do anything, it really doesn’t sit well with me.
We’re expected to go beyond that as a government.
We’re expected to dig further with our counterparts, the federal government, if we are finding we’re coming short of money that we actually need.
Mr. Chairman, what I have the most trouble with too is that we keep hearing that there are shortages of staff to enhance and become effective.
So I would think that rather than using complex factors as a rationale to keep going back to the same measure every time, it’s beginning to bother me a little bit.
So I would very strongly suggest that, perhaps, a stronger effort is needed by the cabinet to pursue and present the real issues more aggressively. That is just a comment, Mr. Chairman.
Minister Peterson, would you like to comment on that?
Hon. Keith Peterson: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate Mr. Ningeongan’s comments. He makes some very good comments.
They are well taken.
I would like to share with members that, as the Minister of Finance, I have had conversations with my colleagues across Canada. All of us agreed to a person that health care costs in all provinces and all territories are unsustainable.
One of my colleagues from Saskatchewan, the finance minister there, asked Minister Flaherty that we have to start putting on a national agenda to discuss and find solutions.
I know my Deputy Minister, Mr. Ma, attended a recent conference in Halifax with the Deputy Minister of Health, for example, to find out first hand what some of the issues are and what some of the possible solutions are.
I know that the Department of Health is working very hard to nail down their costs.
They are implementing better tracking methods in the department. They are going to electronic health records. They are starting to identify price and volume changes.
I believe Minister Curley will be tabling, at some point, a report on the work that his department has done to respond to the Office of the Auditor General’s recommendations.
We have talked about this in the past. I know that when I was a regular member, we used to ask the same questions.
It takes a while to move systems over, but it is happening.
I know my officials in the Department of Finance are working closely with officials in the Department of Health to put better systems in place to track the expenditures, and then pay the bills faster and identify possible over-expenditure areas before the year-end happens.
It used to be in the past where we had to do supplementary appropriations after the fact to pay the bills for the previous year, and we’re getting away from that. It’s happening, but I know it’s just not happening fast enough.
Certainly, as finance ministers across Canada, we’re very concerned about the escalating health care costs in all of our jurisdictions and we have to find some solutions.
Just a point that I’m trying to make to the Minister of Finance is that when I was President of NAM, I used to get a reluctant feeling from our own territorial government when I tried going to Ottawa to lobby for Nunavut municipalities.
For example, I was using the per capita basis funding formula that the federal government used.
It was not adequate for Nunavummiut and it was not adequate for our population.
We have a very small population versus maybe Ontario or Quebec.
They would get a good chunk of their money, but for a population for the territory, we only got very minimal dollars and nowhere near meeting the actual costs that we have to render to be able to run programs and so forth.
So all I’m saying, Mr. Chairman, is that I think more visitations to Ottawa should be made, perhaps, as government reps to lobby and make Ottawa realize that it’s a very basic funding formula that we’re seeking, not overly strange compared to what our southern neighbours have to live by.
So we’re not asking for anything extraordinary, we’re just basically trying to convince Ottawa to provide us the needs that we actually have to have in order to be able to function properly as a government.
So therefore, I urge the minister and cabinet members to focus in on this effort to see what other avenues are there to try and keep moving.
I don’t mind merry-go-round riding and whatnot, but it gets tiring after a while.
I thank Mr. Ningeongan for urging us to do more in Ottawa. I believe the Minister of Health does quite a bit of lobbying. I’ll be doing lobbying.
I know the Premier does as well.
I recall just last year when we were lobbying as MLAs, we passed NAM’s resolution to ask the federal government to extend the territorial health assistance funding and extend it by two years to allot us some time to make some alternative arrangements for when that funding winds up two years from now.
We do have the Minister of Health for Canada as our MP, she’s well aware of our situation up here, and I know she reads the Hansard from the Legislative Assembly every day.
I’m sure when she reads tomorrow, she will be well aware of Mr. Ningeongan’s concerns and our concerns here with the requirement for additional health care costs for Nunavut.
Chairman: Thank you. Mr. Rumbolt.
Just one quick question with regard to the $7 million from out-of-territory hospitals.
Do the Department of Finance or Health and Social Services have any kind of accrual system set up so that, at the end of the year, you can better estimate these out-of-territory costs, so that budgeting can be more accurate, so that we can spend less money or there will be less dollars showing up in supplementary appropriations?
Mr. Chairman, that’s exactly what the Department of Finance and the Department of Health are trying to do right now.
They are doing it right now, so they have not been doing it in the past.
I thank Mr. Rumbolt for that trick question.
It has been going on in the past but not as well. As I said, we are trying to improve, and that’s to put a better tracking systems in and making the phone calls based on the information so that Health gets the bills in a more timely fashion.
Maybe just one last comment.
I have been involved with audits for the last number of years, many years, and it is common practice for auditors to accrue all of their expenses as much as they can by March 31.
So it only makes sense that if somebody is out in hospitals, whether it is in Edmonton or anywhere in southern Canada, that the department is keeping track of these people or any kind of happenings that’s out in other territories.
I think we just need to have a little more common sense at the end of the year and, if we know these expenses are coming up, at least accrual a lot better than what we are doing.
I totally agree, Mr. Chairman, but the Department of Health has to make the phone calls to find out what bill they may anticipate receiving.
That’s what we are trying to work towards.
We will continue with page 5. Total Health Insurance Programs. $7 million.
Chairman: Total Department. Not Previously Authorized. $7 million.
Nunavut Housing Corporation. Operations and Maintenance. Not Previously Authorized.
Nunavut Housing Corporation. Total Corporation. $214,000.
I just had some questions that sort of fall upon what Mr. Okalik was asking earlier during the general comments.
This specific organization is funded annually and it receives core funding annually. Is that correct?
I believe it did receive annual funding.
It used to be through the Department of Education. There was approximately two hundred thousand dollars, but it wasn’t specifically earmarked for shelter funding, and then that funding was transferred to the Nunavut Housing Corporation.
In terms of being fiscally responsible and whatnot, do we just hand that core funding over to them or do they have to create a business plan with a budget and a forecast of what expenses they will have for the year?
I thank Mr. Elliott for that question. Mr. Chairman, they do prepare a business plan. It goes to the Nunavut Housing Corporation and they will review and approve it.
Is there a process for accurately… ?