Thank you very much, MP Idlout.
I appreciate your passion for keeping families intact and elders at home.
It's not just in Nunavut that I hear this concern. I hear this concern across the country. I even hear this concern from remote and rural communities that are sometimes four hours away from an urban centre and non-indigenous communities where elders are isolated from families. It's tragic because of course we know that connection to family, to culture and to language is part of the quality of life that I think we all deserve in our last years.
We are working closely with the Government of Nunavut, which has the jurisdiction over health care, including long-term and continued care. We are looking at ways we can create a strategy together to help build the capacity to have people cared for closer to home, whether that's better at-home care—I think everybody would say they'd prefer to be at home as long as they can—or supportive living closer to community.
We have to do better for our elders. Hopefully one of the eye-openers for all of us during this pandemic has been just how much our elders, regardless of where they live in this country, struggle when they're isolated and away from family.