Human Resources committee  Members of the committee, do you realize that the employment insurance fund is currently in deficit? Do you understand that we do not have the billion dollars needed to fund Bill C-50? The money will have to come from the Consolidated Revenue Fund. Do you understand that the bill

Human Resources committee  The estimate for 2010 is a deficit of between $7 billion and $8 billion. How can that be covered? Contributions will have to be raised. Contributions under the employment insurance system must be in keeping with expenses. That is how it used to be done. However, the government fr

Human Resources committee  They do not have the right to an extension.

Human Resources committee  The honourable member is quite right to make a distinction between the waiting period and administrative delays. In fact, the infamous waiting period, a sort of void, will never be paid for, even if a claim was processed, settled and paid out retroactively. When it was designed

Human Resources committee  Yes, of course, especially since we have many reservations about the numbers put forward by the government with respect to Bill C-50. The figure quoted was $935 million, and the number that came out in the media is $1 billion. It has been demonstrated that these figures do not m

Human Resources committee  Good afternoon, Mr. Chair. Thank you for inviting our organization, the Conseil national des chômeurs et chômeuses, to take part in this discussion on Bill C-241, a bill that aims to remove the waiting period for EI. We've prepared a short three-page document, of approximately

Human Resources committee  I wasn't invited here, Mr. Godin, to discuss the NDP's position. I'm here to explain our organization's stand on Bill C-50. You can vote whichever way you choose. I'm not here to talk about that. I'm here to tell members of Parliament that, clearly, the government isn't listenin

Human Resources committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. I thought I had 10 minutes. That is what they told us in the documents, but fine. First of all, on behalf of our organization, the Conseil national des chômeurs et chômeuses, I would like to thank you and the members of the Standing Committee on Human Reso

Finance committee  We were not consulted by Minister Flaherty, but the FTQ was and it passed along information to us. Some pre-budget consultations were held. Minister Flaherty came to Montreal in early January and with him were some of Quebec's most important business leaders. An advisor to a unio

Finance committee  May I be clear about something and voice my opinion on how the Liberal Party of Canada should address this budget?

Finance committee  All I know that is that the Liberal Party of Canada must participate clearly and directly in the process of repairing the damage to the employment insurance program and to worker protection schemes. Since 1996, this program has been greatly compromised. The closest we got to res

Finance committee  I'm not sure how to answer that question, Mr. Mulcair. You're asking me if the Liberal Party should vote against the budget.

Finance committee  All I can say is that we do not intend to give up the fight. Our sole objective is the restoration of an employment insurance scheme that protects workers, and we are prepared...

Finance committee  It is indeed an important consideration. It creates a hole in people's budgets. When the program was developed in 1940, one of the underlying principles was that no benefits would be paid out to unemployed workers for the first two weeks. In other words, it was the equivalent of

Finance committee  There is no question that the situation is quite dire. Economists, editorialist and commentators everywhere are becoming more vocal. Across all orders of government in Canada, from the provincial level down to the municipal level, people are publicly speaking out and saying that