Maurizio Bevilacqua

[Unemployment Insurance Act, April 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak on this bill introduced by my hon. colleague.

The proposal invites us to consider a topic most important to this House and indeed to the whole country: the financial integrity of the unemployment insurance program.

Every member of this House knows the vital importance of small business. Every member personally knows of families in their ridings who work long hours to be independent, to achieve family goals, to contribute to their community. Every one of us is very much aware how difficult, demanding and rewarding a family business can be.

The unemployment insurance program has been extremely important to thousands of family businesses across this country. In thousands of offices, stores and plants when the business has run into a temporary slow period, revenue cannot support the employment of a family member and the person has been laid off, unemployment insurance has been there.

The family employee who has contributed along with the other employees of the company to the unemployment insurance account and qualifies for a claim has received temporary income from the unemployment insurance program. Many family business members have been able to receive help for training, help in searching for a job with another firm, help in seeking work elsewhere.

Along with millions of other Canadians, people who have been employed in a family firm have obtained their rightful benefits. Thousands of Canadians have also worked for small business corporations with which they have had close relationships. These men and women have also benefited from the unemployment insurance program.

Throughout Canada these two groups have received regularly their rightful benefits which they have earned as legitimate employees of legitimate enterprises. They confirm that they are genuine participants in our unemployment insurance program and they obtain the temporary income while they seek new employment.

For hundreds of thousands of these Canadians the present Unemployment Insurance Act has been there in their time of need. That is the intent of the act.

My hon. friend who has introduced Bill C-218 is rightly concerned about the unemployment needs of family small businesses. Every member in this House I am sure shares her concern.

Every one of us knows family enterprises in our ridings which have experienced difficulties in recent years. A father, mother, sister, brother has faced unemployment when business has turned down. Regrettably there are too many families who have served the community for 10, 25 and even 50 years and suddenly are no longer in business.

The record shows that these families have been well served by the unemployment insurance program. For example, in the fiscal year 1992-93 family businesses filed tens of thousands of claims for unemployment insurance benefits. Of those, 15,000 cases were reviewed and 75 per cent were confirmed as qualifying for benefits.

This position of the vast majority of claims by employees of family businesses has been most satisfactory, from the viewpoint of the employer and employee who finance the program, and from the viewpoint of the administrators who have the fiduciary responsibility to collect and to disperse the funds.

All members of the House who are familiar with the purpose of the unemployment insurance fund understand that a balanced and fair approach must be maintained. They know that funds are to be dispersed to respond to lack of income because of temporary and involuntary unemployment and to expedite return to employment by claimants. This is the mandate of Human Resources Development Canada.

These are funds collected from employers and employees to alleviate temporary lack of employment by those who have contributed. Any other treatment of these premiums collected for specific purposes does not come within the scope of the Unemployment Insurance Act.

The government has a responsibility to manage these funds with prudence and fairness, ensuring that to the greatest possible extent for those who have contributed, the misfortune of unemployment is alleviated. To act otherwise is to risk the integrity of the entire unemployment insurance program, to go beyond the bounds of responsibility, competence and the financial stability of the fund.

This is not to say the Unemployment Insurance Act does not require examination, review and revision by the House. As the Minister of Human Resources Development has clearly pointed out, all our social programs do indeed require reform. This view has the support of Canadians. They require a comprehensive, forward looking, perhaps sweeping reform to ensure they all meet the needs of Canadians as they enter the 21st century.

Therefore, I feel it would be premature to look into the application of unemployment insurance to the isolated situations where the employer and the employee are not dealing with each other at arm's length.

We all share the concern of the member who has introduced this bill. Each one of us has in our own riding family businesses that have been in difficulty. We know employees of family businesses who have needed and obtained the benefits for which they have paid.

I suggest that this bill for all its intent of responding to the difficulties of family businesses is not quite what this House would consider an appropriate contribution to our legislation at this time.

I suggest that this question would be better considered as part of our general review and reform of our social programs which is now under way. I can assure the hon. member it will be.

[Labour Relations, April 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, I will take the question under advisement and report to the hon. member as soon as possible.

[Labour Relations, April 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question. I will take it under advisement and report to him as soon as possible.

[Canada Pension Plan, April 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, perhaps I should present some facts to the hon. member.

In the long term the fund intended to operate as "a pay as you go" with contributions and benefits more or less in balance. It was intended to hold two years of benefits as a buffer against fluctuations in the economy. The fund now has about three years worth of benefits.

As legislated contribution rates increase and come into force, the plan's income and expenditures are projected to be more closely in balance. Reserves will grow from $41 billion to nearly $55 billion over the next 10 years.

I hope this answers the hon. member's question.

[Canada Pension Plan, April 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is worrying unnecessarily. The plan is operating very much as expected. The CPP fund was established to meet the contingencies as outlined by the hon. member.

[Controlled Drugs And Substances Act, April 19th, 1994]

Madam Speaker, clearly the federal government has exclusive jurisdiction over unemployment insurance. Much of what we do in the labour market area is based on that responsibility: for example, employment services, counselling, training and labour mobility programs.

Specifically our employment services and the programs and services flowing from these are adjuncts to the UI program. They go hand in hand with UI to reduce costs primarily by getting claimants off UI as quickly as possible and keeping them off UI as long as possible.

Continued federal intervention in this area is a legitimate exercise of jurisdiction. Virtually every jurisdiction in the world which has an unemployment insurance program has associated with it an unemployment service as well as other active programming to help the unemployed return to gainful employment quickly. Federal interventions in the labour market help people avoid claiming UI either in the short term or the long term and reduce the costs of UI by shortening the duration of claims either in the short term or the long term. This applies regardless of

whether funding is channelled through the UI account directly or whether these programs are funded by tax dollars.

Nevertheless all government have agreed that we need to find ways to co-operate more in order to provide better service to clients, to increase efficiency and to eliminate any duplication that may exist.

The federal government is actively pursuing agreements to achieve this end even while the reform of social security is under way. Any major changes in labour market roles and responsibilities of governments will be based on the outcome of the comprehensive social security review.

[Product Packaging, April 12th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member is referring to a comprehensive strategy on job creation, I would like for him to be mindful of the fact that the government has really begun a process of modernizing and restructuring Canada's social security system, creating job opportunities through the infrastructure program, the Canada youth corps and the national apprenticeship training system.

I am sure the hon. member would have to agree that since we have taken office in October over 100,000 jobs have been created.

We want to not only create jobs but they should be long term, high paying jobs. What is important to note about the jobs that we have created thus far, particularly the latest statistic released recently, is the fact that these are full time jobs. They are not the part time jobs that we saw during the Conservative years. These are full time jobs that will once again provide to Canadians, particularly young Canadians, the type of confidence that is required to bring about economic renewal in our country.

There is no question about the fact, and I remember his question clearly about the Group of Seven and the industrialized countries, that to them unemployment is an important challenge to face. That is why we are looking at ways to upgrade our training programs. We are looking at the entire social security system and ways to modernize and make it relevant to the lives of Canadians in the 1990s and beyond.

[Product Packaging, April 12th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Human Resources Development stated clearly in this House that it is not the government's intention to touch old age security benefits and I would refer members to page 56 of the budget papers which sets out increases in OAS which will take place over the next few years.

The government is not looking at reducing the pensions of Canada's seniors. There is a responsibility by the government to ensure that the next generation of Canadians can have the same security as this generation.

Our society is aging and we need to prepare for a doubling of the senior population over the next several decades. We must begin now to be ready for these changes. The aging of society brings with it opportunities as well as challenges and the issue is one of readiness, not cost cutting.

The government's paper will not focus only on pensions but will look at aging more broadly. While we must of course be fiscally responsible and ensure sustainable programs we know that planning for an aging society cannot be done overnight.

Governments, employers, individuals and families cannot engage in short term thinking. Canadians know that the sooner you begin planning for retirement the more likely you will be to have the kind of retirement you want. That is as true for this nation as it is for individuals. Now is the time to start looking at the kind of programs today's working age Canadians will need and want for their retirements in the next century.

The paper we are preparing will be about people, their values, needs and responsibility. We will look at trends in our society, the fact that people are living longer and healthier lives, the fact they are retiring younger and living longer, the fact that family structures have changed, especially with regard to the role of women and that of a number of older seniors, those over age 85-

[Budget Implementation Act, 1994, April 11th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I will be extremely brief in giving my assurances to the hon. member that I will bring his concerns to the attention of the President of the Treasury Board.

[Budget Implementation Act, 1994, April 11th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his question.

As a government we are concerned about agriculture and the benefits which we draw as a nation from the production and sale of agricultural products. There is a great willingness in the government to bring about positive change to the lives of Canadians, whether they are affected by agriculture or the deindustrialization of the manufacturing base in Ontario.

On October 25 we received a mandate for change. People were tired of working harder and earning less money. Our young people were tired and feeling really hopeless about their prospects. That is true whether they lived on a farm or in a city. People felt that the rules for membership in our society had changed. Basically they were asking for vehicles of opportunity, a way once again to participate fully in the life of the nation.

In the last budget and in the throne speech we began a process as a government in co-operation with the people of Canada to redesign a new vision for the nation. That is why we entered into the very extensive process of reforming Canada's social programs.

Many governments in the past shied away from that. They were afraid, perhaps of the misunderstandings, of the code words. They were afraid to face the challenge of saying to people that the systems were no longer working and new ways of giving Canada a better social security system should be looked at.

We have accepted the challenge. We have said that unemployment insurance as it exists today simply does not reflect contemporary reality. Young people have asked for a vehicle of opportunity, something to have during the transition period between school and work. Therefore we are looking at internship and apprenticeship training programs, the Canadian youth corps.

We have told small business we understand when they say too much stress is placed on them. We therefore have decreased payroll taxes, the UI premiums.

We are doing many things to make people come together rather than split apart. That was the legacy of 10 years under the Conservatives where we saw polarization of classes and people really losing hope in our country. It is our number one challenge.

A very important part of this new vision we speak and act upon every day since the October 25 election is the people who are involved in the agricultural sector of Canada. We value the commitment and dedication they have made to developing a better society for all Canadians. The challenges are great. There is no question about that.

The measures we have taken in the budget set a direction but they are interim measures. There is much work to do. We have seen that we need to modernize and restructure our economy. We have to give Canadians tools to become productive, to share in the national vision that speaks to regaining the values that made this country a great nation.

I am, as you are, extremely tired of going into cities and towns where people are lining up at food banks, where we have the problems of latchkey kids, where our young students are not looking to the future in a positive way.

Our mission is to take back our communities. Our mission is to take back our nation, to give it back to the people. Together there is great potential to increase the quality of life for everyone who resides here.