Nunavut suicide prevention plan languishes in “stalemate”

Tagak Curley, the health and social services minister, enters the Legislative Assembly during the winter session this past February. Curley’s department is under increasing pressure to release the action plan for Nunavut’s suicide prevention strategy. (PHOTO BY CHRIS WINDEYER)

(updated June 11, 11:58 a.m.)

Frustration is mounting over the delayed release of Nunavut’s suicide prevention strategy action plan.

The strategy was tabled in the legislature last year, and a plan to implement it was supposed to be in place by the end of January, 2011.

In the Legislative Assembly June 9, health minister Tagak Curley told MLAs he’ll table the plan during the fall sitting of the legislature, nearly 10 months behind schedule.

And that promise, in response to a question from Quttiktuq MLA Ron Elliott, came on the last day of the spring session, after it became obvious the plan would not be tabled before MLAs rose for the summer.

“I would just like to remind Mr. Curley that during the winter session, he had committed to tabling the action plan during the spring sitting,” an increasingly exasperated Elliott said in the house June 6.

A draft copy of the action plan, obtained by Nunatsiaq News, includes a raft of bureaucratic changes intended to improve the way various Government of Nunavut agencies work together to prevent suicide.

It also includes plans to expand mental health services, including more psychiatrists and psychologists, culturally-appropriate grief counselling in the communities, more suicide intervention training and expanded hours for the Kamatsiaqtut help line.

It also calls for a set of new information resources, best practices for government, a “social and emotional learning” curriculum for Nunavut elementary schools and more alternative sentencing for people with mental health and addiction problems who end up in trouble with the law.

The action plan is supposed to be overseen by a working group consisting of representatives from the Department of Health and Social Services, Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., the Embrace Life Council, and the RCMP.

Natan Obed, director of social and cultural development for Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., said the working group last met in late February.

He said the process bogged down because of a dispute over Health and Social Services’ decision to take over $300,000 federal funding for aboriginal youth suicide prevention from the Embrace Life Council and the department’s refusal to allow NTI to join negotiations for a new community health funding agreement with the federal and territorial governments.

That second agreement is a $15-million deal between the GN and Health Canada meant to fund eight local health programs aimed at Nunavut children.

“We just felt that was really at odds with the spirit of our partnership on the suicide prevention strategy,” Obed said, and that’s why we wanted to make a point of saying we’re not going to move forward and support this action plan unless we really know that we’re partners.”

Obed said NTI is prepared to give a conditional okay to the plan as long as it receives assurances from the GN that its concerns are eventually addressed.

But the situation grew even more confused when NTI vice president Jack Anawak, apparently without the approval of president Cathy Towtongie, wrote Curley telling the minister NTI was “pleased to sign off” on the action plan.

At any rate, the ball would appear to be in the GN’s court. Nobody from Health and Social Services was available to comment for this story by deadline, but Nunatsiaq News will give the department an opportunity to reply later if it chooses.

In the assembly, Curley appeared to hint that HSS is actually waiting on other members of the working group to approve the plan.

“The department has recommended this winter that the action plan is now ready from the department’s side,” he told MLAs during question period June 6.

Suicide researcher Jack Hicks, who sat on the working group as an individual after finishing a contract providing suicide intervention training, said he walked away in disgust this past February after the process became bogged down in what he characterized as bureaucratic turf wars and incompetence at HSS.

“There’s no sense of urgency that you can save some of these people [who die by suicide] and you can save their families the scorching pain,” Hicks said.

Hicks and Obed said the new initiatives contained in the action plan need to be put in place soon.

Obed said new early childhood development programs are especially important in helping vulnerable kids steer clear of suicidal feelings as they grow up.

“We want to break the historical trauma cycle,” he said.

Hicks said the delays are undermining the GN’s efforts to train suicide intervention trainers [a process the government calls “T for T”]. Would-be trainers need to take three workshops to become certified.

“Some of the people they trained up are now being decertified, because nobody’s organizing workshops,” he said.

Obed said he’s frustrated with the delays because the plan’s research component should be starting now.

He said the strategy itself is a “landmark document” that’s already garnered interest from other Inuit regions looking to emulate it.

“The longer we wait on this, the more time it’s going to take to actually combat suicide and help people in the territory lead better lives,” he said.

“We can’t just leave this to be the never ending stalemate.”

CORRECTION: The community health funding agreement between the GN and Health Canada is for a suite of eight health programs, not programs in eight communities, as originally reported.