Moose Jaw North MLA Tim McLeod says Wednesday’s Throne Speech had a lot to offer for Moose Jaw.
McLeod serves as the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, Seniors, and Rural and Remote Health.
“We’ve got the expansion of Rapid Access Counselling for children and youth. That’s a service that we’ve been offering in 24 communities for adults to access to Rapid Access Counselling,” he explained. “We’re expanding that to 13 of those communities for children and youth. One of which is going to be Moose Jaw. We haven’t made that announcement formally yet. We’re looking forward to doing that announcement here in the next couple of weeks.”
The government intends to expand mental health services to children and youth in thirteen communities including Estevan, Weyburn, Carlyle, Oxbow, Regina, Saskatoon, North Battleford, Humboldt, Prince Albert, Kindersley, Yorkton, Swift Current and Moose Jaw.
Another highlight for McLeod was the investment with regard to the 120 new permanent emergency shelter spaces that were announced as part of the Provincial Approach to Homelessness.
“Those shelter spaces will be in Regina, Saskatoon, Prince Albert and Moose Jaw as well as other communities based on their need,” continued McLeod. “That’s going to mean that this winter there will be approximately 500 permanent emergency shelter spaces across Saskatchewan and some of those will be in Moose Jaw.”
McLeod was also excited about the expansion of the Mental Health Capacity Building initiative, which is currently offered in a total of 15 schools across the province.
“We’re expanding that with the goal of making sure that at least one school in all 27 school divisions in the province offers that service for the students,” he noted. “I think it’s a very important service and currently it’s available in 10 schools. We’re expanding that by 5 more this year and again over the term of the new Action Plan for Mental Health and Addictions, the target is to make sure that at least one school in every school division has that Mental Health Capacity Building available to students.”
There was also some good news for local nurses in the Throne Speech as it was announced that the Nursing Loan Forgiveness Program will now include Prince Albert, Moose Jaw, Swift Current, Yorkton and The Battlefords.
In response to Canada’s Online News Act and Meta (Facebook and Instagram) removing access to local news from their platforms, Discover Moose Jaw encourages you to get your news directly from your trusted source by bookmarking this page and downloading the Discover Moose Jaw app HERE.
