EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
The nurses, in total there are 169 in Nunavut and 123 permanent resident nurses, indeterminate nurses and there are 62 nurses that come as agency nurses.
I can’t respond to you whether there was per diem.
That information has never been given to me so therefore I cannot respond to the per diem issue.
Chairman: Thank you, Minister Brown.
I would assume I guess, then that the contract hasn’t changed with the agency nurses and those things are all still covered off in that.
More, for, clarification for the Minister of Finance, I wasn’t saying that they get VTA’s, but these agency nurses, ones that I’ve talked or have to talked to about what other indeterminate nurses say that they can pick and chose when and where they want to go.
If they want to come up for six weeks to work, they get their way paid up and their way paid back.
They get their accommodations and they had their accommodations paid for and they got per diems.
It was basically like the equivalent of a VTA of being able to hire from down south, brought up to the north to work and then flown back down south again and plus receiving a higher pay than an indeterminate nurse that is here and made that commitment to live in Nunavut.
My question, really I don’t know if the Minister of Finance or the Minister of Health was saying that 62 agency nurses are costing over $1 million.
This is to provide $1 million for the increased costs associated.
What is the total cost that we’re looking at for agency nurses.
Just to follow up on the earlier comment, to hire agency nurses, yes we do have to pay for those individuals to go from their point of hire to the community.
They are not indeterminate employees, so the agency nurses, the individuals themselves, pick and chose when they want to work and when they don’t want to work, and select communities, so that is correct.
The airfare alone, I would not equate that to be equivalent to vacation.
I would equate that to be more in the area of duty travel.
That’s part of the reality.
We have to ship these individuals to the northern communities where we have vacancies to provide health care services.
Unfortunately, due to a shortage of staff, that’s what we have to resort to.
The other area, in terms of the $1 million, this is in incremental dollars to the existing budget.
The fiscal year 2003-04, the health covered $6.5 million for agency nurses.
So, if that 2003-04 figure of $6.5 million for agency nurses, I wouldn’t mind knowing how many that covered or was that just the 62 or less than 62 because there is more of a demand this year.
It’s over $1 million in nurses.
Maybe I should become an agency nurse.
Some people might think I look nice in one of those uniforms.
With this increase of $1 million in this year, would one be correct in saying then that they’re looking at a total of $7.5 million so far for the 04-05 supplementary that we’re looking at.
The amount is 6 and not 7.
So it’s down a half a million dollars from last year.
Is that what the minister is indicating.
Chairman: Thank you. Madame Minister.
For this year, that is the estimate.
Is it up or down half a million from last year.
With this million dollars, is it going to be $6 million estimated this year.
Yes, Mr. Chairman, that is what I am stating.
Maybe there was a wish or a hope on behalf of the Department of Health that they were going to continue to not need as much agency nurses as they were before, so therefore they budgeted for less than they required last year.
Again, I know it’s a question that Mr. Peterson asked in other different areas.
Is this going to be a permanent increase to their base, or is it going to be something that will be cut again next year and then another supplementary for it possibly in the time to come again.
I believe I responded to Mr. Peterson’s question on that earlier.
For this particular year this is what we’re requesting.
Further review will be done on the Department of Health and Social Services base budget for the next fiscal year, but at this time, the request is that million.
I know Mr. Chairman, the minister had indicated that the agency nurses get to pick and choose where they want to go and for how long they want to go.
Do they have any information on how long the average turn over rate is for these nurses.
Are they coming for a month and going away, taking six weeks off and then coming back again six weeks later to work in a different community.
Do they keep track of that kind of information.
I guess the simplest way to explain agency nurses is that they are like contractors.
They, as a contractor, would decide what projects to take and which one not to take.
It is very similar to that, in terms of how many days or months they are here. I don’t have that information.
The Minister of Health and Social Services may have that information but I don’t have that type of statistics for the Department Health and Social Services, on agency nurses.
Minister Brown, do you have a supplementary.
Hon. Levinia Brown: Thank you.
It’s no different from any other department, where they have a lot of casuals, if they don’t enough permanent workers.
It is manned the same.
The only thing is in the communities we don’t have a lot of nurses that are available so, we have to go through contract and put down agreements with that contract person to hire nurses.
The other part to that is that I believe the department would have that information that the member is asking about, about the travel and what the turn over rate is or how long they would stay.
We would have that information.
Would the minister commit to providing members with that information and also, do they keep track if, say if this certain particular agency nurse comes in and does a six week tour and then takes six weeks off because her contract is only for six weeks, I understand it’s all done on a contract basis.
But then they’re coming back again in six weeks.
Is it a different community or the same community, the same person.
Is that type of information that the department keeps track of, and if not, could they also provide that information to the members.
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: I believe that question was directed to the Department of Health.
Yes, we can look into that.
We’re on page 24.
Total health insurance program, $9 million.
Chairman: Health protection.
Total health protection, $166 thousand. Do you agree.
Chairman: Treatment programs.
Total treatment programs, $3 million 539 thousand.
Chairman: Total department, $15 million 831 thousand.
Chairman: Turning to page 25.
Environment, operations and maintenance.
Total Corporate Management, $413 thousand dollars.
Chairman: Program Development.
Total program development, $481 thousand.
In here there is an interdepartmental transfer of $11 thousand to Community and Government Services.
I’m just wondering, is that just a transfer of existing dollars for that position with the transfer of that function going to the other department, or is something else in there.
From what I understand it’s a transfer to cover the cost of leasing.
But is that $11 thousand what it costs to lease that facility per year or is it an additional cost.
Is it a straight transfer because of a transfer of responsibilities from one department to another, or is it an increase cost.
If it is an increased cost, why are we seeing an increased cost.
Did they get a bigger office.
I’ll let Bob Vardy respond to that.
Mr. Vardy: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The $11 thousand is a transfer from Environment to Community and Government Services to cover the leasing costs this current year of office spacing in Chesterfield Inlet.
There is a new wildlife office being built, but it won’t be ready for occupancy until next year.
So, was an office there before that they supplied or is this a new office space.
It is my understanding that it’s space that they already occupied.
There has been a delay in building the new wildlife office to accommodate the wildlife officer in that community.
So, if I’m interpreting what this fine young man is saying over here, is that they had planned to be in the new facility, they only budgeted enough lease cost until they anticipated that the new facility would be ready and therefore, they wouldn’t need that lease anymore, but because the new facility isn’t ready they have to extend the lease on the existing facility.
Is that a correct interpretation.
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: That would be correct.
We’re on page 25.
Chairman: Total department, $594 thousand.
Chairman: Turn to page 26.
Community and Government Services.
Total directorate, -$99 thousand.
Similar to my last question, there is $471 thousand here being transferred to the Department of Economic Development and Transportation to complete the departmental reorganization for NNI function.
Again is this just a straight transfer of already budget approved dollars for a function that has been, now is the responsibility of a different department and there’s no change in the originally budgeted numbers.
In the document there is an interdepartmental transfer, that would mean that the funding had already been appropriated in the previous list, but where there is a change from one department to another, we have to show that in the books as an interdepartmental transfer.
At the end of the day, there is another side to deal, but it is to complete the reorganization of the department as indicated in the supplementary bill.
The other part of that is there is no increase at all.
It’s the same amount that was budgeted in the other department.
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: It is just a transfer.
My question is pertaining to the $150 thousand that’s being transferred from the operations and maintenance budget to the capital budget within the Department of Community and Government Services for the operation of the Panniqtuuq Sewage Treatment Facility.
Can the minister tell us if this is a one time expenditure.
Can the minister tell us what accounted for the extra costs.
It’s a fairly significant amount and you would think that the department would have budgeted for those costs.
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: Thank you.
From what I recall, it’s an interdepartmental transfer, again, going from CG and S operations and maintenance to operations and maintenance from capital.
It went from operations and maintenance to capital.
That’s basically what it is.
Can I go back to $471 thousand.
Does the government know the final costs on what it costs to complete that reorganization last March.
When the premier announced the restructuring of the government departments he stated that there would no additional costs, but rather interdepartmental restructuring and dollars being transferred from one to the other.
Perhaps the minister could just remind me how much the total cost was for the government to complete that reorganization.
I have to clarify, what was the cost for renovations, the total final cost.
I had stated earlier that there were no additional costs to complete the restructuring of the department.
In terms of the question he is asking about renovations and what not, from what I understand, there had been no additional cost associated with that.
We are on page 26, (interpretation ends) Directorate, Total Directorate, -99,000 (interpretation) agreed?
Chairman: Community Support, Total Community Support, $406,000, (interpretation) do you agree?
Chairman (interpretation): Turn to page 27 it’s the same branch, Community Services, not previously authorized, oh, Government Services, sorry, Total Government Services, Mr. Peterson.
The Minister of Finance, there is $1,676,000 that has been requested for the continued investment of the telehealth network, is that for the other 10 or 11 Telehealth sites that you mentioned earlier in the meeting?
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: Sorry, Mr. Chairman.
It would be for all sites.
Mr. Peterson: Just to clarify, Mr. Chairman, is that 25 sites, or 15 sites?
I am trying to get a clarification in terms of exactly how many sites are up and running now, but I can ask Bob to respond to the second part of the question.
The Community and Government Services component is for the satellite costs and the telecommunications costs of the network.
The Department of Health pays for the hardware and the other costs within the department.
This is the additional amount of dollars provided to Community and Government Services for this service.
I am not sure if there was an existing budget for that purpose in the department.
All I know is this is the incremental cost.
Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Vardy. (interpretation) We are on page 27, Total Government Services, not previously authorized, Mr. Peterson.
I think the Minister of Finance could clarify this; is that for 25 sites or 15 sites?
I am going to ask the Minister of Health to clarify, once and for all, how many sites are in place now.
Minister Brown, could you clarify that?
Yes, there’s some, is this about Telehealth?
There is a completion, the information I got, the last one to be installed is in Whale Cove in Nunavut.
Everybody else has it.
With those amounts and the previous amount of over $1,400,000 it is going to be over $3,000,000 being requested in total in the supplementary appropriation bill for telehealth related health.
I am wondering if the Minister of Finance could confirm that these are all going to be one-time costs.
For this submission, yes, for the next go around, we will have to go through the base adjustment for the department.
I think this gets back to our earlier conversation that it’s going to be very important that we have a cost-benefit analysis done and see how Telehealth works.
Like I said, in theory it seems it should work here in Nunavut, but we have to start seeing some of that information to support these supplementary appropriations for this and other budgeting requests to confirm this major investment is going to prove cost effective for Nunavut.
Mr. Peterson raised an excellent point and the Financial Management Board had directed the department to come back to the cost-benefit analysis for that exact reason to invest in Telehealth, but with this type of money, we need to be able to demonstrate as well and evaluate the merits of it.
So, yes, we did request that and I mentioned earlier that we are looking to have that report completed and the other area I mentioned as well is we are looking to see areas where it can improve services to patient care, as well as part of the evaluation, not just the dollar side of things.
So, we are looking to that information and look into it forward and reviewing that information that I will share with the members once it’s completed.
There’s another significant note on that page. There is $2,000,000 for increased cost in utilities for Government of Nunavut buildings and it lists a whole lot of services or fees.
Do you have a regional breakdown for the $2,000,000?
The breakdown that I have, the shortfall for Baffin was 1.631 and in the Kitikmeot it’s 1.22.
Is there an amount for the Kivalliq region?
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: The other area was another 200.
There is no listing for Kivalliq on this information.
There seems to be a large disparity between our regions for some reason.
Baffin is higher, significantly higher.
Do the utility costs include costs incurred by any of the schools across Nunavut?
That question was phrased as well during question period and that adjustment will be made in the proposed adjustment, will be made in the upcoming main estimates to transfer as well to CG&S from the Department of Education.
Are those one-time costs or are they going to be costs added to the base budget for the department?
I notice that same question has been asked from each page and for this time, yes, and we will also review the base for that department in the upcoming year.
We are on page 27. (interpretation ends) Government Services, Total Government Services, not previously authorized, $4,003,000, Mr. Tootoo.
I just want to follow up on the minister’s response to Mr. Peterson’s question about the schools being included in there and she responded to that question in an answer earlier, but in interpreting that answer, I guess the minister is saying that those are not included in these numbers; is that correct?
From what I understand, Mr. Peterson’s question was: are we looking into dealing with education and the response was yes.
We are looking into dealing with that, not in this document, not in this supplementary appropriation bill, but in the base for the main estimates that will be released in February.
Then the question is: is any of this funding going to any of those utility costs in any of the schools throughout Nunavut?
That resource for education is still within the Department of Education today.
They are able to cover that.
Come the main estimates next year, we are looking at proposing that those security costs be covered and transferred to Community and Government Services.
A very nice answer, but a simple correct, yes, it’s they are not included in there was all I was looking for or none of it is going towards our schools.
Will the government then be looking at making any similar type of contributions to the Department of Education to offset those same costs that are borne by the schools and other educational facilities throughout the territory?
No request from the Department of Education has been made for incremental dollars associated with gratuity costs.
From what I do understand from the Minister of Education is that they are looking to transfer the responsibility of those utility costs to the Department of Community and Government Services.
It would be fair to assume that if all other government facilities are requiring a total of $2,000,000 to cover off increased costs for utilities that the schools would be in the same boat and
I know that the Education Minister and all the Members of this Assembly are saying that education is still one of the top priorities and keys to the success of our territory’s future.
One would assume if nothing comes forward by the Department of Education that they are meeting that amount internally.
But would the minister commit to taking a look at that and seeing if they could, instead of having the department eat it internally, bring pay to subsidize those costs like they do to into every other department and allow those dollars to be put into the classrooms where they belong?
I said earlier, we went to the department and asked and to see if they required incremental dollars, like we ask any other departments before we bring forward the supplementary appropriation bills, the response was no.
The response in the House and the Minister of Education was that, in the next year’s main estimates, he will be proposing that the utility costs for education be covered through the Department of Community and Government Services.
I understand that and I recognize the minister’s response.
Even though they found a way to eat up those costs internally and not come forward for a request for additional dollars.
What I am asking for is: would the minister commit at approaching them again and asking them to determine how much more they had to pay for increased utility costs and like they do in every other departments, offset those and allow those dollars that they were going to eat up internally to go into the classroom for this year?
From what I understand from my officials, the question was very specific to that issue.
Do you require additional utility cost funding?
The response we received from the department is they have adequate funding.
So, I will leave it at that.
Then if that’s the case, one could assume that the Department of Education’s budget was the only accurate one out there because one would assume that all these other government facilities with other government departments are in all the same communities as the schools and yet the schools or the Department of Education are the only ones that had accurate numbers in there so they didn’t need to come back for extra money.
I guess that’s necessarily would be a correct interpretation of how this is unfolded and I guess it seems kind of ironic, too, that this comes on the heels of the Minister of Energy’s statement, in the Minister of Community and Government Services statement last week on the Government of Nunavut becoming energy efficient.
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think the issue here is that it’s not about whether it’s accurate or not.
I think has more to do with whether it was adequate or not.
That’s a very interesting response from the minister that government is putting forward inadequate budgets; is that what the minister is indicating by some departments?
Hon. Leona Aglukkaq: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I didn’t quite see what he interpreted.
We have to deal with the issues around increased costs as anywhere else, and like I said before, some departments were adequately budgeted for that other department.
So, we are trying to address through this issue.
We can debate that if the terms are accurate or adequate back and forth, but at the end of the day, those incremental dollars required to cover the utilities for facilities.
Then if that’s the case, that there were inadequate projections brought forward by the department and approved by this government, that the Department of Finance takes a lead in developing the main estimates.
That would, again, keep track of incidents to try and tighten up so that we will not have to look at these types of things.
There will always be some, but if we could try to find ways to eliminate some areas where there are weaknesses and deficiencies.
Like I said, if we are seeing something like this historically coming from a department that should send up some flags, if there are some lessons that could be learned there for future years’ budgeting practices.
I think in all cases when we try and put budgets together, we try and ensure that the information before us that we are working with is as accurate as possible, to try and project and put forward the information as adequately and accurately as possible to this House.
Occasionally, as you all know, we have to put forward supplementary appropriation bills to deal with some of the unexpected events that occur, not only in the areas of budgeting, but there are other things that do come up that we have to deal with, for example, the Iqaluit school fire.
These are things that you can’t plan for, we can’t project these things.
So, everyday, as much as possible, and every department is responsible to try and put as much accurate information forward to the Department of Finance in taking the coordinating role in monitoring all the information that is presented to us and try and verify that along with the departments and work with the departments and try and put that forward.
It’s always an ongoing budgeting practice that is in place, but if the deputy wants to elaborate more on that, I will let him.
Just to add a couple of comments to what the minister has already said, the situation we are dealing with here is the result of increased world oil prices and the Department of Finance and the Government of Nunavut don’t have a lot of expertise in forecasting world prices of petroleum products.
The prices that have come in over the last while are higher than anyone has projected, even oil companies themselves, in any of their annual reports or any of the top economic think tanks in the country.
So, the fact that we didn’t have allowances built in our budget to cover high costs of petroleum products that were higher than forecasted by everyone, I don’t think it makes our budget inaccurate.
Whether some department got enough money in their budget to cover off this increase, and some others don’t, it’s an adequacy issue.
In the specific case of education, they indicated that they got enough money in their budget for utilities to cover the increase.
The other areas of government indicated that they needed more funds.
As always, we try to forecast every unknown, but something like the world price of oil, I don’t think we can be faulted much for not predicting where the prices are right now.
I do appreciate that and I guess maybe the people budgeting for the Department of Education should be doing some work with some of the other departments because they seem to get their numbers right and the other departments didn’t.