EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
Like I said, I have been sort of stumbling through over the last year and I have tried to be as careful as I can with any information that people give to me. I know, in dealing with your office specifically, when I received emails or letters back, no private information on patients is in there and I know it’s there for a reason.
It’s not that I want to know the private information, it’s just that I want to be able… I guess for any new MLA in the next Assembly, it would be nice to have them come in and be able to look up this policy and follow it instead of having to sort of fumble through it and possibly make mistakes.
That’s what I’m trying to get at, if the minister could commit to something like that.
Hon. Tagak Curley: Mr. Chairman, I don’t want to be advising the member on a particular sensitive issue, but I was a regular MLA for a long time and one of my sources for any advice when I was confused or needed assistance was the Law Clerk of the Assembly, a very useful individual to have when confused with a certain protection and interest on sensitive issues related to privacy and so on. They are there to guide the MLAs and I took advantage of that.
But for us to commit to something that would really be bordering on the patients’ rights of privacy related to complaint aspects, I think, is really complicated. I don’t know whether my deputy minister has any further comments on that one, but I would like to invite him at least.
Normally, many of the complaints that we receive from individuals, from my office particularly, without commenting, a lot of times, we just pass them on to the department because they are sensitive, they must be protected, and filed accordingly and properly.
So I would like to have the deputy minister share some of the issues on this.
I don’t have anything to add. I think the minister did an excellent job in outlining the process.
Mr. Elliott: I guess I’ll ask this question because I know Mr. Okalik had brought it up before and he’s not with us today. He was mentioning and we were just talking about privacy and people’s information and how the health centres in the smaller communities seem to go on the radio and call people to go in for their appointments.
I’m just wondering if there has been any update as to whether the health centres have been notified about this or if you have checked back to see if this is an infringement of privacy.
I’ll have Alex Campbell respond to that.
Yes, we did follow up on this issue from our appearance at standing committee.
We have talked to a number of communities. The use of community radio has been a long-standing practice that has been used by local radios.
We find that it’s not revealing the person’s illness or the state of the call.
It’s just to alert people that are either on land or we can’t get a hold of them by phone, they don’t have phones.
Local radio is a good way to communicate and say, “We’re looking for you. You have an appointment at the health centre.
If you want to come now, you should come to the health centre.”
That’s the response that we get from the communities when we did follow up on this particular issue. We were also advised that the individuals in question had given permission for people to get a hold of them by radio.
Any more, Mr. Elliott?
Mr. Elliott: In the opening comments, Mr. Campbell mentioned something about being fiscally responsible and pulling back on service contracts and before contracts actually going out, he wants a business plan and a business case before it’s approved and before contract services are awarded.
Does this go all the way up to the top in terms of ADMs and DMs as well?
I’ll have Mr. Campbell respond to that.
The answer is yes, it goes right to the top, including myself as deputy minister, the ADMs, the executive directors, and the directors of the organizations.
They get the same directive.
We’re supposed to follow the rules of engagement that are approved by cabinet and FMB.
The Financial Administration Act, the procurement procedures of CGS, and all of those instruments that are supposed to guide us are adhered to, but there is always a qualification for that.
There are some instances that we do have, particularly our department, a lot of sole source contracts that we issue primarily to service providers down south. When patients are in urgent need of services, we do refer them to services down south that are not on our standing offer or where we have to go through a sole source.
In terms of spending within your office as the deputy minister, do you present your business cases, your sole source contracting, and your contracting to the minister himself for review and then he approves it to go through just to continue along with the fiscal responsibility?
Alex will respond to that.
The deputy minister is the chief executive officer of the department, so I do most of the approvals in the department.
The minister does approve my travel when I travel out of the territory, or travel within Nunavut, or travel out of the country.
In some cases, other executive members approve travel out of the country for certain reasons.
For all other issues, I do have a process in place in the department.
I do have an executive committee that comprises of the ADMs and the directors of policy, and the executive director of corporate services. Before things come to that level, they come from the senior management group. After reviewing the process, the senior management group recommends initiatives to the executive management group.
Before it comes to the senior management group, there is a leaders and partnership committee that is composed of all managers in the organization having an opportunity to participate and input into a recommendation of a policy that needs to be made or if there is a business case that they have developed.
As an example, if they want to develop a treatment facility, I highly encourage and direct my staff to work through the department to make sure that we consult within the department as well as other departments to make sure that we’re not overlapping.
There are various checks and balances in the system.
Debora Voth is the comptroller for the department. She makes sure that she provides the advice and she flags things that are not consistent with the Financial Administration Act.
There are rules of engagement within the system that have some checks and balances to make sure that we are all managing our finances in a prudent manner.
I would like to remind all of the members that electronic devices are not allowed in the House over here and make sure you have them turned off.
Any other questions, Mr. Elliott?
In the department’s business plan under page H-3 for the priorities, it talks about the Nunavut Integrated Electronic Health Record System. It will be implemented in four of the communities.
Is it ready to go? Is everything on line in terms of infrastructure for that?
Hon. Tagak Curley: Mr. Chairman, the information that I have is not good, but Alex will explain exactly what’s involved in this particular project.
In response to the member’s question, yes, we recently awarded a contract to a provider to start working on the process.
We should be working with the four regional offices to try and set up the electronic health records system in the regional centres.
It’s our plan that all 25 will eventually be on the electronic health records system at some point in the next three years.
As I was reading through the different parts of the business plan, it talked about different information that’s going to be collected on patients who go into the health centre and people who receive service from the health centres.
I can see the need for the collection of that information because it helps access for funding in different areas and it also gauges in statistics.
Are the clients who are being served told that? In terms of their privacy and in terms of their personal information, are they being informed and told that this information is being collected on them?
Alex again will respond to that.
Yes, all patients will be advised of the privacy obligations and commitments that we have to make and they will have to fully understand what the electronic health records system will do to provide a better quality of care for the patients.
I have a question about one of the priorities as well talks about the development of a health services strategic plan based on the results of the Health Services Evaluation project completed in 2009-2010.
Just as a question to start with: has that Health Services Evaluation project been completed in 2009-2010?
Mr. Chairman, Alex will again respond to that.
There are two parts to the answer.
Over the past year, we have been working on getting a solid inventory of what is out there in all communities with respect to the infrastructure and the services, particularly the level service that we are currently providing.
We had a team of experts going around to every community. I think there are still four communities that need to be visited, Arviat, Kugluktuk, Kugaaruk, and one other community. That is the inventory part, doing an in-depth analysis on what is out there.
Over the past year, we also have engaged the team of experts from across Canada to do an evaluation on the system that we do have. The plan is that I would be making recommendations to the minister and to the cabinet at some point in the next year on the results of that work and to provide some recommendations on the strategic directions and a strategic plan for the department.
That is where we are at with that, Mr. Chairman.
Realistically, will this be completed in the 2010-11 fiscal year?
The plan is to have the work completed in the next three months, make some recommendations, and then hopefully get to the point where we can make some recommendations to fit into the main estimates next fall. That is the whole plan that’s in place right now.
Also on page H-3 in the business plan, one of the priorities talks about strengthening, empower, and support community health committees.
I’m just wondering if he could expand or if the minister could expand on how they are going to attempt to do that over the next fiscal year.
I responded in part to Moses Aupaluktuq’s comments on that, mostly in Inuktitut, I believe, but I think it’s important that at least the department establish a much more solid partnership arrangement with the community health representatives.
In view of the fact that we have some aboriginal and public health-related funding programs that tend to be moved or transferred through this government and administered in a number of ways by this government, I believe we have a real case to establish a much more solid relationship with health committees on exactly how it is going to shape.
It’s probably a bit early, but our officials are going through options at the moment. In terms of a timeframe, I believe that we should have completed all of that work in 2010 for sure and I would like to keep you at least up to date on what’s happening.
We have learned now that we need to have a much more solid working relationship rather than a token one, as it appears to have been for so long. I believe that having a proper relationship with them perhaps can help some of the comments like James Arvaluk was making in a case earlier.
I think they can all be incorporated so that they can become awareness groups as well with some of the public health issues that many of our communities are facing.
So I guess what the minister is saying is they’re just going to try and increase communication with the health centres or there is no firm plan as to “This was the capacity or these are the shortfalls that we saw in health committees across Nunavut and we’re going to provide some type of gap training to build the capacity within the communities.”
That hasn’t been done. It’s sort of at the infancy stage is what you’re saying, where you’re just going to start phoning up the health committees and ask them how they’re doing.
Hon. Tagak Curley: Not quite because I don’t think I would go for that kind of approach personally.
I have billed some institutions. I have billed some very important… including Nunavut. I don’t play around with those stuff.
I think James Arvaluk knows that quite well.
When we say that we’re going to review them, we’re going to strengthen them, we’re going to give them some teeth so that they can play a role, but I would separate the public health aspect to medical. Medical care should be continued by the health centres.
I think that there is a tremendous role that the committees can play. Whether we want them in the same capacity or not is something else. Surely, I think that we can give more training to them.
There was already some funding available for training. We do have officials and personnel to do that right now, but we need to do more.
We need to actually give them some programs that they can deliver within their community. After all, it’s their communities and the department is there to serve and provide resources to them.
How it’s all going to shape out will remain to be seen, but we are committed to giving them more resources and responsibilities.
Exactly how the program will shape up will likely take a bit of time.
We’re not just going to do it on the telephone either; we will have people visit communities to work with them.
That’s what I was hoping to get.
I don’t know if the minister misunderstood what I was asking, but to me, it says in there, “Strengthen, empower and support Community Health Committees.”
I’m starting to get frustrated when government officials and ministers continue to say that, “We will work on this. We will review it. We will come up with a strategy.”
I wanted some specifics in terms of what are you talking about. We’re passing millions and million of dollars on lots of reviews of things and continue things, and then we’re told, “Sorry, we didn’t get that done, so we’re going to do it again this year.”
I was hoping for some concrete things.
You mentioned programs.
You are going to offer programs and you said built up Nunavut. You said you built up different organizations.
Well, you must have had a plan in place to make it happen that said… well, again maybe the suicide prevention strategy, it says, “The ASIST workshop is something that we see needs to be put in there, so that’s what we’re going to do to help combat that.”
I was asking for specifics in terms of how you are going to strengthen community health committees.
So far you said, “Yes, we will travel around to communities.”
I was able to get that out of your answer, I was able to offer them programs.
That’s what I was actually asking the minister. I was asking for specifics.
You didn’t say that?
I thought you said that, I’m sorry.
Anyways, I’ll ask the question again, because obviously, I’m confused and maybe it’s because it’s the end of the day and I’m not listening very well.
I could have sworn that I heard the minister say something about programs. I could have sworn he said something about travelling.
My question again is: what are you going to do to strengthen, empower, and support community health committees?
Hon. Tagak Curley: Mr. Chairman, first of all, the government is committed to helping the community health committees in strengthening and giving them all of the support that they can get, providing that we can afford it.
Obviously that, it’s going to be. We are making a commitment through this line item that we are committed to improving relationships with them.
If you want to take my word for it, it’s all going to differ from community to community. Some communities will be a lot more advanced than some.
So therefore, it’s difficult to pre-plan exactly what we’re going to give them. Otherwise, that I would call top-heavy, ‘This is what you are going to do.’
We’re going to have to meet with them. We’re going to have to work with them.
We’re going to have to see what kind of strength and capacities they have in their communities.
One thing for sure is we would like to improve relationships with them. As we develop those plans for each community, we will make announcements in this House and perhaps publicly within the communities.
We are committed to improving relationships with them so that they are not left hanging out there, being a committee without much to do.
In terms of the community health committees, does the community health representative, who is employed by the Government of Nunavut, who works under your department, who is also mandated to provide programs within the community and help the community develop; are they required to be a part of the community health committee?
Your time is up after he answers the question. Your ten minutes are up.
First of all, the community health representatives do a very fine job for the department in a number of communities.
I can specifically say that we have been very pleased with Arviat.
For a long time, they have had very effective community health workers. It has been more like a tradition in Arviat that they do that.
I was also impressed last year when we were in Cape Dorset. The community health representative was very effective in giving support to those elders who were not able to get their medication directly themselves, particularly also with the tuberculosis that was quite prevalent at that time.
I was very happy to see the community health worker doing a great job.
To answer the question, they are not necessarily a part of the health committee, but we will make sure that they have a relationship with the health committee.
That’s one thing that we committed to doing and we will like to certainly at least clarify the roles so that they don’t overlap but maybe share resources at the same time.
It is a project that we have committed to and we certainly will keep the Members of the House informed as to what kind of progress we are making throughout Nunavut.
I would like to thank the minister and your officials, and I guess we will be back at it tomorrow afternoon.
Mr. Schell: Mr. Speaker, your committee has been considering Bill 22 and the main estimates, and would like to report progress. Also, Mr. Speaker, I move that the Report of the Committee of the Whole be concurred with.
A reminder that there’s a meeting of the Regular Caucus at nine o’clock tomorrow morning in the Tuktu Boardroom.
There was a typo on my paper.
This House stands adjourned until Tuesday, March 9, at 1:30 p.m.
>>House adjourned at 18:07
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Pages 1235 – 1296
Opening Prayer 1235
Ministers’ Statements 1235
Members’ Statements 1239
Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery 1243
Oral Questions 1244
Written Questions 1262
Tabling of Documents 1262
Notices of Motions 1263
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters 1263
Report of the Committee of the Whole 1295
Orders of the Day 1295
Tuesday, March 9, 2010 1235
099 – 3(2): International Women’s Day (Aariak) 1235
100 – 3(2): Search and Rescue Tracking Devices (Kusugak) 1236
101 – 3(2): Nunavut’s Participation in the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games (Taptuna) 1237
102 – 3(2): Knowledge Sharing Forum (Curley) 1238
103 – 3(2): Nunavut High Arctic Transportation Analysis (Taptuna) 1239
156 – 3(2): Cape Dorset Health Centre Replacement (Schell) 1239
157 – 3(2): Aspirations of Young Nunavummiut (Ningark) 1240
158 – 3(2): Team Nunavut’s First Medal of 2010 AWG (Elliott) 1241
159 – 3(2): Keeping Decentralization Commitments to Communities (Komoartok) 1241
160 – 3(2): Assistance for Polar Bear Outfitters (Arvaluk) 1242
238 – 3(2): Compensation for Polar Bear Outfitters and Harvesters (Arvaluk) 1244
239 – 3(2): $2 Million Financial Management Training Fund (Elliott) 1247
240 – 3(2): Government of Canada Dragging its Feet in Appointing NWMB Chair (Okalik) 1249
241 – 3(2): Status of Government of Nunavut’s Uranium Development and Mining Management Plan (Aupaluktuq) 1251
242 – 3(2): Update Following Meeting of Repulse Bay Mayor and CGS Minister (Ningark) 1254
243 – 3(2): Decentralized Positions in Pangnirtung (Komoartok) 1256
244 – 3(2): Cost of Trip to Copenhagen Climate Change Conference (Elliott) 1257
245 – 3(2): Delegation of Premier’s Authority during Trip to Vancouver (Okalik) 1258
246 – 3(2): Compensation for Polar Bear Outfitters and Harvesters (Arvaluk) 1259
013 – 3(2): Loans Made By the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation (Aupaluktuq) 1262
117 – 3(2): Wildlife Tracks (Shewchuk) 1262
118 – 3(2): Government of the Northwest Territories News Release Concerning Polar Bear Outfitter Assistance Program (Arvaluk) 1262
119 – 3(2): Agricultural Products Marketing Act Annual Report 2008-2009 (Taptuna) 1263
016 – 3(2): Moratorium on Purchase of Products from the European Union by the Nunavut Liquor Commission – Notice (Schell) 1263
Bill 22 – Appropriation (Operations & Maintenance) Act, 2010-2011 – Health and Social Services – Consideration in Committee 1264
Speaker (Hon. James Arreak) (interpretation): Before we proceed, I would like to ask Mr. Taptuna to say the opening prayer. Mr. Taptuna.
A very good afternoon, Madam Premier, Ministers, Members of the Legislative Assembly, and all Nunavummiut.
Going to our orders of the day. (interpretation ends) Item 2. (interpretation) Ministers’ Statements. Premier of Nunavut, (interpretation ends) Hon. Eva Aariak.
Minister’s Statement 099 – 3(2): International Women’s Day (Aariak)
Hon. Eva Aariak (interpretation): A very good afternoon, Mr. Speaker.
First of all, yesterday was International Women’s Day. I was going to make a statement on International Women’s Day, but it was budget day.
Mr. Speaker, yesterday was March 8, the day marked as International Women’s Day.
It is a day for celebration of women’s accomplishments and advancement towards equality.
Every year at this time, Canadians celebrate progress toward equality for women and their full participation in society. It is also an occasion for stopping and reflecting on the challenges and barriers that remain and to consider future steps to achieving equality for all women in all aspects of their lives.
It is appropriate that this year’s theme for International Women’s Day is “Equal Rights, Equal Opportunities.”
Over time, International Women’s Day has grown into commemorative events across the country and the occasion has been observed since 1911. Next year will be the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day.
We celebrate here in Nunavut as well. In Iqaluit this weekend, the Qulliit Nunavut Status of Women Council hosted a daylong event, starting with an arts and crafts fair, a talent show, and a concert. Other Status of Women Council members across Nunavut received grants to host events in their communities as well.
Mr. Speaker, as Minister responsible for the Status of Women, I would like to take this opportunity to recognize this important event and to acknowledge the contributions our mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters, and daughters have made to our Nunavut communities.
There are so many women in Nunavut who have dedicated themselves to create change in their communities, working on a range of issues that affect women and their families.
To honour these women and the contributions they have made, I’m also pleased to say Qulliit again presented the Wise Woman of the Year Award to a woman who has made outstanding contributions to women’s advancement in her community.
This year’s recipient is Dr. Patricia DeMaio of Iqaluit.
Please join me in congratulating her in receiving this well-deserved acknowledgment.
Mr. Speaker, I congratulate all Nunavummiut – women and men, girls and boys – for celebrating International Women’s Day and joining together to honour women’s achievements in our territory.
This week is dedicated to the International Women’s Day.
Minister’s Statement 100 – 3(2): Search and Rescue Tracking Devices (Kusugak)
I wish to say “good afternoon” to my colleagues and the people who are watching the proceedings.
Mr. Speaker, today, I would like to provide members of the Nunavut legislature with information about the SPOT locator devices that have been purchased for search and rescue.
It is called a SPOT locator and we got 500 of those to be distributed among the Nunavut communities.