Bill C-56 (Historical)

Fairness for the Self-Employed Act

An Act to amend the Employment Insurance Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Employment Insurance Act and other Acts by establishing a scheme to provide for the payment of special benefits to self-employed persons who are not currently entitled to receive them.

Fairness for the Self-Employed Act

[Merv Tweed, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Where did the adscam money go?

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

I will tell him that too, absolutely.

Mr. Speaker, I do not mind being harassed. The problem is, when they hear the facts, they cannot take it. The fact is that the member for Edmonton—Sherwood Park, who was asked a similar question, was intellectually dishonest with his response. I know I can use that word. Why? The member for Cape Breton—Canso and the member for Mississauga South asked him a very simple question. Were the EI premiums, under Liberal administration, ever increased? In those 13 years that we served in government, did they go, as the member for Cape Breton—Canso clearly stated, from $3.18 per $100 to the $1.72 per $100 that it is today, saving employers and employees just over $14 billion?

Why could he not be honest enough and say, yes, they did go down? The Liberal member, and I have to stress, the good Liberal member for Cape Breton—Canso, simply asked a question. Where did the money go? Why did the parliamentary secretary mislead this House? If this Reform, now called Conservative, Party wants us to co-operate, the least thing they could do is be honest with us.

For example, the other day, the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development was on television being asked questions about Bill C-52 and she really could not give answers. All she said was, “We will see” or “We do not know”.

It reminds me of what Kim Campbell said before the 1993 election. She said to reporters that she was not going to answer the questions then, she would answer them after the election.

No, Canadians are not stupid. Canadians want to know now, before they make decisions. That is why we are asking these questions.

The member for Edmonton—Sherwood Park talked about entrepreneurs and independent business people, the self-employed. An independent entrepreneur, an independent business person does not become a self-employed independent because he wants to become unemployed. He is an independent entrepreneur because he wants to continue earning a good living to support his family and his surroundings.

An independent business person, a self-employed person, does not become self-employed because he wants to become unemployed to collect EI.

My father, God rest his soul, told me a story as I was growing up. He said that when he went out looking for work he did not ask how much the job paid. He simply wanted to work. He was not concerned about how much EI would pay, he was concerned about whether there was work.

A self-employed person does not become self-employed because he plans to be unemployed. He plans to be gainfully employed for as long as he can.

Catherine Swift of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business said that the bill makes it voluntary for self-employed Canadians who want to opt in and it fixes a “glaring gap” in the program.

The government cannot give us statistics such as who, how many, what the uptake is going to be, what the cost is going to be, et cetera.

I do not know what the gap is all about that Ms. Swift is talking about, because what is going to happen is that the people who are working are going to be taxed. We know that because hidden in the government's budget--

[Merv Tweed, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Be truthful.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

I am being truthful, Mr. Speaker. The member can read it if he would like to. I will get him the page number.

The truth is that the government has inserted in its economic stimulus package close to $15.5 billion in EI premium increases. When the current Prime Minister was in opposition, when he was actually just a member of Parliament before he became the leader of the Reform, the Alliance, and then the Conservative Party, he said that a tax, EI, is a job killer, that it destroys jobs. That is on record. It can be seen on video and can be researched today with the technology that we have.

What did the Liberals do? We listened to employers in 1993 who said that if we lowered EI premiums they would invest in hiring. That was one of the first things we did. It is in our red book and people can look that up.

Year after year the Liberals lowered EI premiums, as the member for Mississauga South and the member for Cape Breton—Canso pointed out earlier. For the record, that reduction totalled over $14 billion.

Prior to being elected in 1993, I ran my own company as an independent entrepreneur for almost 20 years. I went to work to build my company, employ people, pay their EI premiums, their OHIP premiums, and their Canada pension premiums. I felt it was my obligation as an employer to provide a platform whereby they had something to fall back on in case there were some difficult times such as layoffs, job losses, et cetera. Having been an employer, I do know first-hand.

Let me clarify this. As an officer of the company, I was not eligible to pay into EI. Quite frankly, I did not want to pay into EI, because that was a demotivating factor for me. It was as though I would have been paying into EI because I planned to be unemployed. It was a different story for my employees.

We are trying to change that today. What is strange here is that there has been no analysis done. Nobody knows. We do know that once the legislation would receive royal assent, people could apply. They would have to pay for one year prior to being eligible to receive benefits.

Unless this bill is really fine-tuned and all the bugs are clearly addressed, I am concerned that this legislation will be abused.

I am not picking on the member for Edmonton—Sherwood Park, but he said that the Conservative government made a promise, and now it is doomed; it is keeping it.

I do not want to say it is too little too late, although it is too little too late.

Three and half to four years ago, when the Conservatives took over with their first minority government, we and all the economists said that we were headed for trouble and difficult times. The economists said to that administration and to this administration the second time around that it has to do certain things. But no, the Conservatives said, “Don't worry, be happy. Everything is fine. There is no recession. We are not going to go into deficit. Everything is hunky-dory. Everything is okay”.

Sure it was okay because when the Conservatives assumed government after the first election, the Liberals had left a surplus of $13.2 billion.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Now what do we have?

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

That is a good question. Mr. Speaker, I will tell the House what we have now. The government is now projecting a $56 billion deficit.

The Conservatives had a $13.2 billion surplus, money left over after we had paid our bills, after we had paid our expenses, after Canada had met its obligations. Now we are into a $56 billion deficit. If we add those two figures, we have a $70 billion turnaround in three years. No wonder Canadians are asking where the $70 billion went.

A friend of mine said to me a couple of weeks ago that Brian Mulroney in nine years added about $20 billion to $21 billion to the deficit. That is over nine years. If the Conservatives have left us with a $70 billion deficit in three years, times three, nine years down the road, God forbid if they are in government, we are going to have a $210 billion deficit.

[An hon. member]

Unbelievable.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is unbelievable indeed. It is not our generation that is going to pay. It is our kids, our grandkids and our great-grandkids who will pay.

We laboured and sacrificed in 1993, not on the backs of Canadians, but we put our house in order. Then what did we do? We returned it back to the system by providing EI premium relief, over $14 billion year after year after year. Those are the facts.

We have shown co-operation on other pieces of legislation. If the Conservatives want us to co-operate, we must deal with facts, not innuendoes. When they are asked a question, let them respond with the facts.

When the parliamentary secretary was asked a question, as the member for Cape Breton—Canso said, why did he not respond with the facts? He misled the House by saying that the employment insurance premiums supposedly went up. That was not accurate. That was not correct. That was false information. I think I can use that word. We are always trying to be very polite and professional in this environment.

I wanted to speak to the bill for various reasons. One was to set the record straight. I also wanted to speak as a former independent entrepreneur. My company was not a big company. I employed 23 or 24 people. We were there for 20-some years. We provided an environment where people could earn a living and provide for their families. We were more than happy to contribute to the system that provided the foundation for a strong safety net.

I am trying in my own way to understand this safety net. If there was going to be an undertaking to help the unemployed, and we were beginning to see what was happening in the United States of America several years ago, and the government literally did nothing, today we are bringing forth a system, for what? These people who are unemployed have already taken the hit.

It is shameful because once this individual who is unemployed, this woman, man or young person, gets a job as an independent entrepreneur, what is the individual going to do? First, the individual has to find a job as whatever, an accountant, a computer programmer, a painter, a plumber or whatever, and then the individual will pay EI premiums. Why? With the intent that he or she might be unemployed a year and a half down the road? I do not think that is the individual's intent.

Right now, I am of the opinion that it is too little too late. If this legislation is to work, and judgment is still out there for this piece of legislation, it should have been done three and a half years ago when the member for Edmonton—Sherwood Park said the Conservatives promised it. I do not dispute that they promised it. I do not remember, but I will take his word for it that they did promise it. But if they did promise it, why did they wait for three years to bring forth this legislation?

Preventive maintenance are words used in the computer industry, or let us take care of ourselves so that we do not get sick and need medication or surgery. We knew the tide was coming. We could see it. All the economists were telling us. The big question I have is, why did the government not undertake to bring in this legislation three years ago so that the people who are unemployed today, the people in small business, the entrepreneurs they are trying to protect would have some protection today? Today they have zero protection, nothing. Even on regular EI, we had to fight like crazy to get them to help these people now.

Had that $13.5 billion been there and had it been invested properly, as opposed to spending $100 million in advertising that we are seeing every day on billboards, et cetera, money that is being literally wasted--

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Trains.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, you name it, buses, trains, the whole gamut.

In conclusion, all I can say is that I will support anything that will help improve the life of any Canadian. I just do not have a good feeling that this legislation, as it is written, will solve this problem. I have not been convinced. Maybe when it goes to committee, amendments could be brought forward and it could be worthwhile for the future. The concern we have is what we can do for the unemployed today.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I do not say this often, but I would like to congratulate the government for bringing in a bill that is timely and important for Canadians.

On March 10 in the House, we adopted a motion on employment insurance that was proposed by the New Democrat member for Hamilton Mountain. Among other things, that motion called on the government to allow self-employed workers to participate in the EI plan. It does no violence to our cause here to say that we have long championed the extension of benefits to the self-employed, and I congratulate the government on recognizing that.

In this country there are 2.6 million Canadians who report some income from self-employment. For a large majority, it is the sole source of their income. The share of self-employed in the labour force has been stable over the past decade at 15%, and over 75% earn less than the maximum insurable income. This bill will help our country's artists, taxi drivers and truck drivers, tradespeople, small retailers and farmers, and it will disproportionately help women in this country. That is very important in these economic times and the New Democrats are very strongly in support of helping these people.

My question for the hon. member is, after being in power for 13 years with three successive majority governments, why did his government not extend benefits to self-employed workers?

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, unlike the new NDP government, after 60 years we refuse to tell people what they want to hear. We tell people what they should hear.

The NDP could promise pie in the sky knowing they could never deliver. They had their chance in the 2005 budget when there was money for the environment, money for housing, money for students, et cetera, and the NDP blew that chance by betraying Canadians and joining forces with the current Prime Minister. All that money went down the drain.

Let me give the hon. member the answer, because he talked about supporting truck drivers and taxi drivers. A truck driver and a taxi driver do not go to work with the intent of being unemployed. Those people go to work every day diligently to earn a living and support their families. He asked why we did not do it. During our tenure we created over 3.5 million jobs. Canadians were not in need of these programs because Canadians were working. The nation was confident. Money was being generated. The books were balanced. That is why Canada was the number one country in the world then, unlike today, where I think it has dropped to second or third.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things the Conservatives keep talking about is the idea that we did not support Bill C-50 for the extension of weeks. I would like to point out to them that in 2004 with respect to a similar matter, a five-week extension, they voted against that, so therein lies yet another backflip. It is unbelievable in this situation because now all of a sudden there seems to be this self-effacing realization that EI is the way that they are going to endear the people of Canada when in fact they have denied all these benefits for so many years. We have bills such as Bill C-50 which could have been done a long time ago. This particular bill, as my hon. colleague from Scarborough Centre pointed out, they could have done a while ago. Now all of a sudden they keep forcing these people into doing what they promised they would do.

My colleague is an independent businessman and I respect him for it. He is a great man. He is a great speaker, hours of entertainment if nothing less than that. I mean, the man is just so diligent it is unbelievable. I am not even being paid to say these things. If I lived in his riding, I would campaign beyond belief.

I want the member to tell the House about his experience as an independent businessman and just how the Conservative government is trying to pull the wool over our eyes by pretending to be a compassionate voice of EI.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is very simple. If the government were a compassionate government, it would have kept the promise that we were told about by the member for Edmonton—Sherwood Park three years ago. If the government really felt for Canadians, it would not be increasing the EI premiums, which is in its books, to the tune of $15.5 billion. It is on record. If the government were compassionate, it would work with the rest of us, but every time we go into committee, for example, there is always an obstacle here and an obstacle there, some kind of stumbling block.

When it comes to the well-being of Canadians and the nation, earlier today we spoke about our veterans, past and present. There was one united voice and all parties spoke from the heart. That is how we have to approach this type of legislation, for the good of the country. Bill C-52 and the Conservatives' initiative on these areas is pure politicking right now.

[Phil McColeman, Conservative, Brant, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my question relates to a specific situation. An independent business person, a small renovation contractor who employs six people finds out that one of his four children has a severe illness and has to be hospitalized for two years for treatment, and of course, the impact that would have on the business person's ability to be with the son, to be compassionate. The husband and wife work in the business and did not have the opportunity to contribute into a plan that could cover off some of the lost income for one of the spouses.

How would the member respond to that situation for an individual in those circumstances, where a business person is not able to have the type of insurance needed in those kinds of situations?