Bill C-50 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Employment Insurance Act and to increase benefits

This enactment amends the Employment Insurance Act until September 11, 2010 to increase the maximum number of weeks for which benefits may be paid to certain claimants. It also increases the maximum number of weeks for which benefits may be paid to certain claimants not in Canada.

Employment Insurance Act

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West—Glanbrook, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to stand in favour of Bill C-50, our government's most recent measure to improve the EI system, this time to increase the duration of benefits to long-tenured workers. This afternoon I will use my time to cover the recent economic history that has led us to these measures.

As we all know, about one year ago there was a swift, largely unexpected and severe economic meltdown throughout the world. This was precipitated not by any actions of our government or conditions in our country, but largely by the subprime mortgage and debt crisis that occurred south of the border. Many countries around the world reeled from the effects of that crisis. Some smaller economies almost collapsed. Across the developed world many banks did collapse.

Due to the good sense of Canadians, Canadian banks and their governments, Canada is one of the few western economies that did not have to bail out any of its banks. We have the strongest banking system in the world. I think we all know that, and we should be proud of it. The strength of our banking system and the prudence with which our banks acted over recent years was a major contributor to our economy's relatively late fall into recession and our relatively early recovery out of the recession.

The recession affected every single country that we do business with. All of our trading partners were affected and consumer demand plummeted. It was natural for many of our large exporting industries to be hit especially hard and for workers in those industries to be hit with layoffs.

One of the many things this government did once the severe and widespread effects of the economic downturn were realized was to start making plans to improve the EI program.

Many hard-working Canadians lost their jobs through no fault of their own. Demand for wood and wood products, cars and all sorts of consumer goods fell in the U.S. and around the world. Workers in our manufacturing industries were laid off. Many workers in the auto sector saw their companies collapse around them and saw their jobs disappear. Workers in the forestry sector were losing their jobs because companies were going bankrupt. We acted to help those workers as they tried to recover and transition from the effects of this economic downturn.

What did our government do? We consulted with Canadians and we were told, most important, to extend the length of EI benefits. Many Canadians who had worked full time for many years had suddenly lost their jobs. They were left wondering how long it would take for them to get back into the workforce. So, as part of Canada's economic action plan, we extended the EI benefit period by five weeks.

We also took other actions to help Canadians. We significantly increased the government's investment in skills, training and upgrading so that workers who were laid off could get the necessary training to transition to find work in different industries. We put more money into training programs so that people who did and did not qualify for EI could access them. But that is not all. We expanded the work-sharing program. We raised the number of weeks that employers could access the work-sharing program by 14 weeks to a full 52 weeks. Those actions by our government are protecting almost 165,000 jobs of Canadian workers through over 5,800 agreements. Again, that is something Canadians told us they wanted, and we delivered.

We did even more. We froze EI premiums for 2009 and for next year, 2010, because we understood that employers and employees needed to keep more of their money in their pockets to help them through these troubled times.

We were also clear that more may be needed and that we would monitor the economy and the EI system to ensure needs were being met with appropriate actions. While we heard these good, affordable and responsible ideas for EI improvements from Canadians, we heard different things from the veritable coalition of opposition parties and from the usual suspects.

What we heard consistently, first from the NDP and then the Liberals and the Bloc, was that they felt the solution, the silver bullet, was a number, and they kept repeating that same number.

That special number was 360. They suggested we lower the threshold to access EI benefits to a flat 360 hours across the country. What that is, quite plainly, is a proposal for a 45 day work year. They want folks to be able to work for 45 days and then collect months of benefits for those 45 days of work.

What good does that proposal, the one we have heard the most noise about from the opposition, for a 45 day work year do for the hard-working Canadians who have worked for many years in the automotive industry who have found themselves out of a job? The answer is nothing.

Would it help Canadian forestry workers in B.C., Quebec and elsewhere who have worked for 10, 15, 20 years in the forestry industry, who put in literally thousands of hours in full-time employment year after year? No, not really.

It certainly would do nothing to help Canadians who have been in the workforce for their entire adult life, working 35, 40, 50 hour weeks, month after month, year after year. It would do nothing for them.

That has been the opposition's big plan for Canadians who have worked hard and paid their dues for years, even decades. Nothing.

This government, on the other hand, saw what was needed and took responsible action to increase the help we were providing to hard-working, long-tenured workers.

We saw that many tens of thousands of Canadians, in fact close to 200,000 Canadians, could make use of additional weeks of benefits to bridge them further and to give them more time for the economy to recover and for them to get back into the workforce.

That is why we took the actions that we did and why we have introduced Bill C-50.

The measures in Bill C-50 would help ensure that long-tenured workers who have paid into the EI system for years are provided with the help they need while they search for new employment and while the economy begins to recover.

This legislation is an important step for Canadian workers who have worked hard and paid their taxes their whole lives and have found themselves in economic hardship, and it is the right thing to do. We are not the only ones to say so either.

Two weeks ago when we announced the bill, the premier of Ontario said that it was a step in the right direction. The president of the Canadian Labour Congress said that he was pleased about it.

The president of the Canadian Auto Workers said:

In the months ahead tens of thousands of unemployed workers are going to join the growing ranks of Canadians who have exhausted their EI benefits. They need action, not political posturing.

Unfortunately, all Canadians have received from the Liberals on this legislation is exactly what Canadian auto workers do not need and that is political posturing. From this government they are getting action.

My colleague from Acadie—Bathurst made some prudent remarks on September 16 in the Telegraph-Journal . He said:

But if we say no to this [help for long-tenured workers], we're saying no to thousands and thousands of people who would then go on welfare.

He is right. His comments illustrate the reckless and selfish political posturing being exhibited right now by the other two opposition parties, the Liberals and the Bloc.

The Liberals especially only seem interested in forcing an unnecessary election. Here on the government benches, the economy is still our number one priority. We need to continue to implement our economic action plan in order to create and maintain jobs.

We are concerned about fighting the recession. The Liberals just want to fight the recovery. Our government will remain focused on the economy and helping those hardest hit by the economic downturn.

I encourage my colleagues to help us do that by supporting this legislation.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his excellent question.

Of course, we will vote against Bill C-50 on employment insurance. Why? In my riding, for example, the tourism industry is very important. As we know, there are a number of seasonal jobs in this industry. People who have these jobs have no stability and are unemployed for a period each year. Therefore, they are not able to benefit from the employment insurance program and the benefits provided for in Bill C-50.

Jobs in the manufacturing sector are also very important in my riding. We know that the manufacturing industry has been experiencing difficulties for several years. Since 2001, workers from this sector have regularly been laid off. These people have had to claim employment insurance several times and would not benefit from the measures of Bill C-50. And how about the forestry industry? In my riding, there are many forestry workers. We know that this industry is in crisis, and we know that the Liberals at the time refused to provide loan guarantees to businesses in this industry. Now, the Conservatives have decided to invest in Ontario to support the automotive industry.

These forestry workers have lost their jobs many times, and have been experiencing periods of unemployment for years. So they would not be able to benefit from Bill C-50.

This is why my colleague and I, along with the other Bloc Québécois members, will vote against Bill C-50.

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to first congratulate the hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé on his speech and for making it clear that we will be voting against this bill.

This bill is full of measures to prevent even more people from getting employment insurance. I would like my colleague to describe once more the situations in his riding where people who lose their job would no longer be eligible for benefits under Bill C-50, despite what the government claims. I would like to hear what he has to say about that.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-50, An Act to amend the Employment Insurance Act and to increase benefits, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with interest but also with concern that I am taking part in today's debate on Bill C-50 to provide additional weeks of benefits to certain categories of unemployed people.

The Bloc Québécois—and we have seen this many times here in the House—has always acted and will continue to act as a reasonable and responsible party. It will study every bill introduced, issue by issue. As always, we will act in the interests of Quebeckers.

As we said a number of times this morning, we cannot support this bill because it does not address the root of the problem, which is that the employment insurance system is unfair and not suited to the needs of Quebec's workers. The Bloc Québécois and the NDP and some other hon. members know that accessibility is the problem and we have been saying that in this House for a long time.

When it comes to qualifying for employment insurance, far too many workers, who have paid their premiums, are told they are not eligible because they do not have enough hours of work. According to Human Resources and Skills Development Canada's own numbers released in this House, more than half of unemployed workers—which is not insignificant—do not have access to a system to which they have contributed. This is truly disgraceful.

It will take more than piecemeal measures like Bill C-50 to fix a system that has been full of holes since the many Liberal cuts in the 1990s. It is all well and good to design the best programs around, but if people are not eligible for employment insurance benefits, then all is for naught. That is why we cannot support this bill.

The Bloc Québécois and committees of the unemployed, the Coalition des Sans-Chemise, who have been calling for change for years, and Quebec's unions, have been unanimously demanding a universal 360-hour eligibility threshold. That is what Quebeckers need to be eligible for employment insurance. Lowering the eligibility threshold to 360 hours for everyone would immediately help the most vulnerable in our society.

The bill not only does nothing to address the problem of access to the system, but it contains measures that will essentially benefit a certain category of workers in western Canada and in the auto sector in Ontario. In fact, according to Mr. Chevrette, the head of the Quebec Forestry Industry Council, as well as the Conseil national des chômeurs et chômeuses and unions in Quebec, the measures announced will have little impact in Quebec, because they are not accessible to seasonal workers, forestry workers, young people or vulnerable workers.

In Berthier—Maskinongé, the riding I represent, there is one category of workers this bill does not cover. The government could give 100 weeks of benefits and these workers would not be affected. I am talking about seasonal workers, especially those who work in tourism in my riding. I also want to talk about the many forestry workers in my riding who have unfortunately lost their jobs. They will not be eligible for benefits under Bill C-50. Unemployed forestry workers will not have access to the additional measures being introduced in this bill, unlike auto workers in Ontario.

The president of the Quebec Forest Industry Council points out that nearly all forestry workers are unemployed at least 10 weeks a year. Did the government think about these workers when it drafted Bill C-50? No, even though the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities came up with a number of proposals and recommendations. The Conservatives turned a deaf ear.

Instead of proposing comprehensive, consistent reform, Bill C-50 proposes piecemeal reform of employment insurance that will create a new category of benefit recipients. The criteria in the Conservatives' bill mean that there are good and bad recipients. There are good and bad unemployed. People who have been unlucky enough to lose their jobs or to hold seasonal jobs for many years will not be any more eligible for EI and will not benefit from any other measure in this bill. The government is making the poor poorer.

We in the Bloc Québécois refuse to support these mean-spirited, demagogic measures that the Conservatives, with the NDP's support, are trying to impose.

Opportunistic political manoeuvring is not what we need. As we all very well know, a bill was unnecessary. These measures could have been introduced simply through special projects. Instead, we are seeing mass political manipulation. A thorough overhaul is needed so that this program can really meet the needs of all workers.

A few extra weeks of discriminatory benefits are not what we need. Instead, we need a real adjustment program for older workers, which is what we have been asking for for some years, as have workers in Quebec and across Canada—a program that the Liberals cancelled and the Conservatives refuse to bring back, in spite of an electoral promise to that effect.

What we need is a system that can fulfill its main mission, that is, to provide benefits to everyone in a fair manner, long enough to allow people to live with dignity.

The Bloc Québécois understood this, which is why we proposed a series of measures to restore the employment insurance system's main mission. In addition to improved access to the system, the Bloc Québécois is also calling for the elimination of the waiting period.

With that in mind, I presented to the House a petition signed by nearly 4,000 people from my riding, people who are losing their jobs and are asking this House to assist them in their time of need.

I would like to close by saying that if a government is not capable of adequately supporting its citizens when they find themselves out of work, those people inevitably wind up living in poverty.

I would like the members of the Liberal Party to pay close attention to what I am about to say. Speaking of poverty, I would point out that 19% of Canadians are currently living in poverty, while in Sweden for instance, only 11.4% are in the same situation. In France, that number is 14.1%, in Belgium 6.2%, in the United Kingdom 17% and in the United States 23.9%, dead last.

A policy like Bill C-50 will only make all our citizens poorer. We do not support this policy, and we will be voting against this bill.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am really glad to speak to that issue. As the hon. member should know, during a time of global recession, it is very complicated. We need to tackle this recession from many different angles. In actual fact, people want to work. Things like the job opportunities program are incredibly well received in British Columbia.

We have taken a multi-faceted approach. Bill C-50 is an absolutely critical piece of that support for the long-tenured workers. However, it is part of a fabric, and our economic action plan is the complete fabric.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully and I noted that the member opposite was really talking about a plan that has nothing to do with Bill C-50. She talked about issues that were resident in the Canadian action plan, the same plan that has produced 500,000 unemployed and a deficit that is now at $56 billion. However, that was only last week. It is probably higher today.

She talked about it serving employees and workers. Some of these projects were ongoing projects and they have their own merit. She did not talk about what this bill does in terms of the jobs it is going to create, where it is going to create them and in which industries they are going to be created.

I noted as well that she very deliberately left out the references in the bill to all the exemptions that displaced workers are going to face if they want to access EI. Those exemptions are all included under this rubric: Anyone who has used the EI system any time in the last five years will be out of luck. Anybody who has already been unemployed as a result of the government's mismanagement—

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to have this opportunity to express my support for Bill C-50, which would amend the Employment Insurance Act to provide additional EI regular benefits to long tenured workers.

As the House is well aware, our government is hard at work to help Canadians in every part of our society deal with the current economic downturn and the challenges that bear on individuals, their families and communities.

We are acutely aware, for example, of the dramatic impact of the global economic downturn on forestry workers in British Columbia. In my riding, across the interior of British Columbia and on Vancouver Island thousands of workers and their families have been affected by forestry plant closures and layoffs. These are men and women who have contributed many years of their lives to building a thriving forestry industry in the province, producing high-quality products in demand throughout Canada and around the world.

I am sure I do not need to say how hard these people work or about the intense pride they take in their jobs. I am equally sure I do not need to explain why they are deserving of our support in this tough economic climate. They have paid their taxes, their dues and their EI premiums. Is it therefore only fair and responsible that we support them and their families in this time of need.

This is why our government is taking unprecedented action to respond to the needs of long-tenured workers who find themselves laid off through no fault of their own. Bill C-50 would enable long-tenured workers in all industries and sectors throughout the country to access additional EI support while our economy recovers. Many of the affected workers have been paying EI premiums for years. In fact, many of these men and women have worked for decades in their particular sectors. They are highly-skilled individuals committed to doing the very best jobs they can. They have paid into the EI program, strengthening it year after year through their contributions, but have never collected EI benefits until now.

Under the legislation, we are proposing the regular EI benefits for these long-tenured workers would be extended by between five and twenty weeks. The amount of the extension would depend on the number of years workers had contributed to the program.

For example, under the legislation, workers who contributed to the program in seven of the past ten years would get an additional five weeks of regular EI benefits. For every additional year of contribution, the number of weeks of benefits would increase by three weeks, up to the twenty week maximum. This additional support would give them more time to look for jobs and, if necessary, get the training they needed to help them participate in the recovering economy.

As I am sure my hon. colleagues will appreciate, our goal is to enable long-tenured workers to access the extended weeks of benefits as soon as possible. We are proposing that these new measures be retroactive so as to cover many workers who are caught up in the peak of layoffs during the recession. We would extend this coverage to claims up to almost a year from now, September 11, 2010. Payments of extended benefits would continue until the fall of 2011 for those who needed them. By that point, we are very hopeful that the most difficult challenges of the economic downturn will be a thing of the past. Workers will be finding and keeping new jobs, sometimes in their former industry and sometimes in a new sector of the economy.

Allow me to be clear that the measures in the bill would not make any permanent changes to the EI eligibility rules. We see the legislation as a temporary, albeit very much needed, response to a temporary situation where Canada's long-tenured workers and their families require our immediate support.

I also want to draw to the attention of the House another measure we have introduced to help long-tenured workers who want to make the transition to a job in a new industry. The career transition assistance initiative extends EI benefits of long-tenured workers to a maximum of two years, while they participate in long-term training. Many of my colleagues have mentioned this valuable flexible program and I would like to mention it as well because it dovetails nicely with the measures in Bill C-50.

Under this initiative, our government is providing an estimated $500 million to help laid-off long-tenured workers upgrade their skills. We are implementing this initiative in partnership with the provinces and territories. The workers in training receive income support through the federal government's EI program, while the provinces and territories provide training support, including additional money to cover the learner's expenses.

This is an important initiative, and the EI changes proposed by Bill C-50 will build on measures our government has introduced through Canada's economic action plan to assist Canadians who find themselves unemployed during these difficult times. These measures include five extra weeks of EI benefits nationally, increasing the maximum duration of benefits from 45 to 50 weeks in regions of high unemployment.

Under Canada's economic action plan, we have also made changes to the work-sharing program to help workers in the labour force and to protect their jobs. This program offers EI income support to workers who are willing to work a reduced work week while their employer pursues the company's economic recovery plan. In my riding, we are using it in many locations, and it is fabulous.

The changes we have made extend the work-sharing agreements by an additional 14 weeks to maximize the benefits for workers and employees during this recovery period. As of today, there are close to 5,800 active work-sharing agreements across the country, protecting the jobs and skills of over 165,000 Canadians. Forestry workers figure largely in the work-sharing program.

I also want to mention the additional $60 million over three years that Canada's economic action plan has invested in targeted initiatives for older workers. This initiative enables people 55 to 64 years of age to get the skills upgrading and work experience they need to make the transition to new jobs. Let me add that we are expanding this initiative's reach so that communities with populations lower than 250,000 are now eligible for funding.

We are making huge investments in training and retraining workers of all ages. We cannot spare any of them. We need the skills, experience, energy and creativity of Canadians to meet the challenges to come. Our government is focused on what matters to Canadians, on finding solutions to help long-term workers who have worked hard and paid into the system for years but who are having trouble finding employment through no fault of their own, on extending benefits to self-employed Canadians, and on getting Canadians back to work through historic investments in infrastructure and skills training.

It is clear that Bill C-50, the measures the minister has spoken of and those introduced in Canada's economic action plan are working for Canadians to get Canadians back to work. That is why I would like the members of the House to support the bill and support Canadians who want to get back to work.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will leave the partisan politics for the Liberals and the Conservatives to sort out.

I want to talk about the fact that I certainly did not turn myself into a pretzel. I was very straightforward in talking about what I saw as being an important aspect of the bill and what I saw as being its deficiencies.

Were we to put the interests of all Canadians front and centre, instead of the partisan politics that play out as being some form of debate in the House, we would talk about what we could do to make a difference in their lives, right here, right now.

Bill C-50, despite the fact it does not cover many of the aspects that are important to members in my community and other communities across the country, will deliver some tangible results for some workers in our country. Again, I still have not heard a concrete, justifiable reason to turn down the benefits for those workers.

If we want to talk about making Parliament work, if we want to talk about what is in the best interests of Canadians, it does not seem to me that a party that got nothing for supporting the government 79 times can claim it is putting the interests of Canadians front and centre.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I actually hope to speak specifically to Bill C-50 and give a brief summary on what we are talking about in the House. A lot of what we are hearing today is what is not in the bill.

The bill specifically addresses the needs of people whose benefits began after January 4, 2009 and who have claimed less than 35 weeks over the last five years. They would get from five to twenty extra weeks of benefits depending on how long they have been paying into the EI system. The maximum additional weeks for those who have been paying at least 30% of their maximum annual premium in seven of the last ten years is five weeks. To get more they need to have been paying that 30% for a longer period and, to get the full 20 weeks, they need to have paid in for 12 to 15 years. Of course, there is a time limit on this. This measures expires in September 2010. Therefore, what we are talking about is a temporary measure.

In all of the back and forth debate that has happened in the House today, what I have been hearing is the reason not to support the bill because of what it does not contain. What I have not heard is a valid reason for voting against those workers and their families who would benefit from the bill. I have not heard a viable argument that says that those workers who have worked a long time in an industry do not deserve to have this additional benefit.

Much has been said in the House about what is not contained in the bill. I want to touch on that. The bill does not address some of the pressing needs of employment insurance. What many of us in the House know is that in the mid-1990s the Liberal government of the day started to take apart the employment insurance system. As a result of the measures the Liberal government passed in the 1990s, today thousands and thousands of workers simply do not qualify for employment insurance or, if they do qualify, the number of weeks they can claim are insufficient to meet the needs in these economic times.

We have heard people talk about forestry workers and fishers. In my riding, there is no question that many forestry workers would not benefit from Bill C-50. However, I have not heard one forestry worker say that since he or she does not benefit that we should ensure that those people who have worked a long time in a particular industry should not benefit.

The forestry workers in my riding are telling me that we should get on with it, that we should pass the bill and then they will take their issues to Parliament so they can have another piece of legislation that will meet their needs.

Canada has a system that designates labour market areas where unemployment rates are determined. Nanaimo--Cowichan is attached to the Vancouver labour market. Conditions in the Vancouver labour market are better than they are on Vancouver Island so the unemployment rate is lower than it is on Vancouver Island. However, because the unemployment rate is attached to Vancouver, that means that the forestry workers in my riding get less weeks of benefits.

I have been calling on the government to fix that anomaly in the system and to recognize that economic regions that are set, perhaps in Ottawa, do not necessarily recognize the differences in the labour market. This legislation obviously does not deal with this and actually we do not need legislation to fix it. It can be done through a directive.

I know members of the House have spoken about the importance of forestry in their own communities and yet I challenge some of those members because those are the very members who supported the softwood lumber deal.

I want to acknowledge the members of my party, for example, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster who, when the bill came before the House, consistently, with my other colleagues, raised the problems with the softwood lumber agreement. Here we are, some years later, seeing the impact that agreement has had on many of our communities, especially our forestry sector in British Columbia which is in a huge crisis.

I want to remind people that over 90% of the land in British Columbia is crown land, which has some forestry tenure attached to it. This means we are not in a sunset industry in forestry there. We need meaningful reform that will ensure forestry remains viable to the workers, to the families and to their communities. Many communities are suffering because of the softwood lumber agreement.

In addition, as I said, the employment insurance system does not meet the needs of the forestry workers. Many of them have been off and on work for the last five, seven, ten years. Despite all the talk and the rhetoric in the House, we are simply not meeting the needs of the forestry workers.

As well, we have seen the collapse of the sockeye salmon fisheries in British Columbia. I know the minister was out on the west coast, but did not respond to the concerns raised around an overall comprehensive plan to deal with west coast fisheries. This needs to include the fact that many of the commercial fishermen and women will not qualify for employment insurance benefits this year because they simply have not been able to get out on the waters.

Bill C-50 does not deal with the fishermen and women. It may deal, sometimes, with some of the fisheries workers.

In addition, we also have seen that many of our communities, because of those transitions from forestry and from fishing, are now reliant on seasonal and part-time work. In fact, when we look at the numbers that have come out about where jobs have been created, we consistently see that the overwhelming amount of those jobs are in the part-time sector. Bill C-50 does not address the fact that many workers are in part-time seasonal contracts, self-employment.

Again, New Democrats have put forward a comprehensive plan to deal with the deficiencies in the employment insurance system right now.

Back in June, we put a motion before the House of Commons that talked about the kinds of changes we saw as important for the employment insurance system. Those changes included reducing the number of hours that were required to qualify, eliminating the two-week waiting period and increasing the benefit rate.

We have also talked in the House many times about the $57 billion theft from the employment insurance fund. It cannot be described in any other way. Workers and employers contributed premiums to the tune of $57 billion. That was taken away from workers and their employers and put into the general revenue fund to offset a deficit. In any other place where we have funds that are designated for a particular purpose and they go missing sounds like theft to me. When I talk to workers in my communities, they say they want that money back. They do not want it in their own pockets. They want that money to come back into the employment insurance fund so there is money for training for workers who need to make a transition out of the industry in which they are. They want more money for the kinds of innovations and upgrades that are needed in some of the workplaces. They want a higher benefit rate for workers so they can have money to spend in their communities.

While I talk about benefit rates, we also know that the single biggest economic stimulus that we can provide to families, to their communities, is ensure they have an adequate income. One of the ways we can ensure adequate income is to ensure they qualify for the employment insurance benefits, which they have contributed to for many years.

The NDP support for Bill C-50 should in no way construed as overall support for the Conservative government. In this case we are saying that there are workers out there who can benefit from the increased duration of benefits and there simply is no good reason to tell them they do not deserve to have that money.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Essex for his enthusiasm. He always jumps to his feet in my support. I take it as a great compliment.

Bill C-50 puts us in a situation where, once again, we bring up employment insurance. I have been here for five and a half years. Time and time again we have talked about employment insurance. We have several amendments on the table. Most of them have to do with the fact that members want to lower the qualification period, or at least the barriers to qualifications in that first period. With Bill C-50, we find ourselves talking about the back end of the system, meaning one gets additional weeks. Usually we do not get that. In private members' legislation we usually get a qualifying period that allows people who are unable to find work to benefit when under normal circumstances they would not.

I welcome this debate. However, I believe the bill completely lacks a focus on those people who are unable to qualify.

Over the past few years we have seen several resolutions passed in the House; some have been voted down and some have been voted for. They have included things like lowering the hours to qualify, such as 360 hours for re-entrance. We also talked about 55% to 60% of the benefits to be paid out when one is receiving EI benefits.

Some of the other issues, including the two-week waiting period, also come up, but time and time again they come up as private members' bills. Now we have government legislation in this direction.

Let me start with my own riding of Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor. I want to talk about two types of industry and juxtapose their situation with the intent of this legislation. Let me start with seasonal work and the shrimp plant workers. Work in the plant is a seasonal occupation, as anyone in this country can understand. I am hearing a lot from people who work in particular shrimp plants. Prices have been low. There has been labour unrest in certain cases. They cannot seem to settle on a price. People are unable to qualify for EI in the off season because they lack the hours to qualify.

Bill C-50 does absolutely nothing to address that. At some point I hope the government will give credence to that issue. I would like to see it go to 360 hours, for the reasons I just stated. The majority of my constituents would feel the same way, and I get a lot of feedback from them.

Let me look at another aspect, and this is where we get to the crux of the matter on Bill C-50. Time and again members of the government will stand in the House and say the bill does wonderful things for the long-tenured worker. I would like to give an illustration of a long-tenured worker who has many questions. I live in the town of Bishop's Falls near Grand Falls-Windsor. It recently suffered a major setback when the AbitibiBowater mill closed in the spring of this year. There were upward of 700 people who lost their jobs. Many of these people have called me. They were loggers. We go back to the idea of seasonal work. They were loggers who worked so many weeks of the year and the other weeks could only receive 55% of their income through EI.

Many people will say they do not want to feed into that. They do not want to have someone claiming EI time and time again when they can do other work. One has to understand that this is an aspect of rural Canada. All parties in the House agree it is difficult for seasonal workers in rural areas to get work in the off season and therefore this system was required. We still need someone to log our forests. We still need someone to farm. We still need people to pave our roads. Rural Canada, especially rural Newfoundland, is now so popular because of its rural aspect. Who will be waiting to show people around? It will be tourism workers. They will be in the same situation. People ask why they cannot do something else. In a town of 100 people or less, there is not a lot of industry to go around. This type of policy helps sustain communities such as this.

I have 172 communities in my riding and only one town, Grand Falls-Windsor, has 13,000 people. I have a collection of communities that is vast but the people are proud and this is the type of legislation they need to sustain themselves within their community.

I want to go back to the logger situation. Bill C-50 is what I have a problem with and the loggers want me to ask the government about a situation. If a claimant is paid less than 36 weeks of regular benefits in the 260 weeks before the beginning of the benefit period, they can qualify. What does that mean? Of the 260 weeks, which is approximately five years, if people have received benefits for over 36 weeks, they are out and receive nothing more. Loggers are included in that but my definition of a logger is a long-tenured worker. What do the Conservatives say to them? What do they say to the shrimp plant workers in this situation?

There is a lot of talk in my province from many corners and not just us. I will quote an individual who has done extensive work on the EI system. I respect her opinion because she probably knows more about the EI system than any person I know. Her name is Lana Payne and she is the president of the Newfoundland and Labrador Labour Federation. She has a few things to say about this. She said that Bill C-50 divides the unemployed into two groups: those deemed deserving by the Conservatives of extra benefits and those who are not.

She went on to say that the proposed changes by leaving so many unemployed out essentially blames people for their job losses by penalizing workers who may have had to avail of EI benefits in the past five years.

That brings me to my next point. Many Conservatives have said that they have had people working in the auto industry and had auto plants in their riding and have people who work in newsprint mills and other types of mills. I have a question for them. It is not seasonal work, but in the past five years those mills have suffered shutdowns. The mill was shut down for whatever reason: too much inventory or market conditions persist such that they had to close the mill down for a period of time.What did these people do? They went on EI. For a mill worker, a long-tenured worker, if he or she has received more than 36 weeks, which is about seven weeks a year, which is highly possible, they are out.

The Conservatives tell us that they had to cut it off somewhere. Well, this is not the place to be doing that. I do not think it was well thought out in this situation. We could have done something for these individuals. They are long-tenured workers who, through no fault of their own, were in a situation where they were laid off for a period of time which put them in a very rough situation.

Lana Payne said it quite well. As a matter of fact, it is not just Newfoundland and Labrador but it is also the Canadian federation, the CAW. It is of the same ilk where it claims that the government will qualify 190,000 people. People with the CAW are experts. They are not paid to confront the government. They are not just the opposition. These are people who actually stick up for the people who have jobs or used to. I do admit that some people in the mill at Grand Falls-Windsor where I am from will receive extra benefits, if need be, but a lot of them have gone away to work which disqualifies them yet once again.

Finally, just before last January, if workers were laid off before 2009, they are out. So much for Lewisporte Wholesalers in my riding. I do agree that we need more benefits but this particular bill leaves out so many to the point that it becomes an injustice to actually spend so much time to help so few people.

[Maurice Vellacott, Conservative, Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to contribute to the debate on Bill C-50. I have the privilege of sitting on the particular committee that looks at these kinds of issues.

I will be speaking to the details of the legislation in just a few moments, but first I want to step back and initially give something of a more general perspective as we get started here.

In the short-term, the Canadian economy is going to recover. Our economy has held up relatively well throughout this recession, though of course that does not mean that it hurts any less when Canadians lose their jobs, particularly for those Canadians who have lost jobs in this period of time. It does not hurt less for those Canadians who have not been able to get back into the workforce as yet.

In the long-term, however, our economy is going to change, and through Canada's economic action plan we are dealing effectively with our current difficulties but we also have a vision for the future. It is crucial that that be said and crucial to have at this point in time.

I do not claim to have the gift of prophecy. I am not a prophet, or the son of a prophet as the Good Book says, but I think it is safe to say that the economy of the future will rely upon some different things. It will rely upon high technology, including forms of technology that we cannot even imagine today. Our traditional industries, especially our resource-based industries, are also seeing some major transformations in this light. We want Canadians to be working in that new economy.

I believe that the world is on the cusp of an economic transition, a crucial change coming that will be just as important in its own way as other major transitions of the 18th and the 19th centuries.

The industrial revolution, to take one example, was a tremendous shock to the traditional economies of Europe and America. Millions of hard workers were put out of business by the coming of steam power and mass production. Millions were forced to learn a new way of working. There was a human cost to industrialization but it was temporary, and in the end industrialization created many more jobs than it destroyed. It also brought about a much higher standard of living, and that is important and obvious as well to note.

From the vantage point of two centuries, it is easy to see that industrialization was a good thing. Although there are people who lament its coming and hark back to an earlier era, we do believe that on the whole it was a good thing. In the middle of an economic transition it is not so easy, however, to be philosophical, as we are in these few moments here.

I want to put it rather bluntly. When people are out of work, they cannot pay their mortgages. They stand to lose their cars and their houses. When they do not know whether they will ever have jobs again, because the industry appears to be dying and the skills that they have honed for decades look like they are obsolete, it is not so easy to take that long view, because they are right in the middle of it.

When people lose jobs through not fault of their own, it is a tremendous blow to their identities, self-confidence and sense of security. When we see our families and friends losing their jobs and businesses shut down in our communities, it is hard not to feel real fear about the future; apprehension, anxiety and real fear.

Believe me, our government would like nothing better than to be able to assure Canadians that the downturn will become an upturn and give a specific date, a certain, definite point, but this is a global recession and we are, to a significant degree, affected by what happens in other countries around us and across the globe. Nevertheless, the economic news is encouraging. We can now see the beginning of the end of the recession and the start of our recovery. Canada has weathered that downturn better than most other countries, and I believe we can attribute that to actions by this Conservative government, actions to stimulate the economy, actions to protect jobs and support the unemployed.

We, as the Conservative government, took concrete action to help Canadians through the employment insurance program. We made timely improvements to help Canadians by providing five extra weeks of EI benefits, by making the EI application process easier, faster and better for workers and businesses, as well as increasing opportunities for unemployed Canadians to upgrade their skills and get back into the new and emerging economy.

Canadians are benefiting from those improvements to the EI program. More than 240,000 Canadians have received additional weeks of benefits thanks to the extra five weeks of benefits included in Canada's economic action plan. Canadians are also benefiting from improvements to service delivery. Between April and July, over 750 additional claims-processing staff and over 250 more agents answering calls were hired and trained to help even more Canadians receive their EI benefits as quickly and as efficiently as possible.

Canada's economic action plan also announced the freezing of the employment insurance premium rate for 2010 at $1.73 per $100 of insurable earnings, the same levels as in 2008 and 2009, and actually its lowest level since 1982. I would point out to the Liberal members opposite that while the previous Liberal government may have reduced EI premiums, it is our Conservative government that has them at their lowest level in a quarter of a century.

This government has also created the employment insurance financing board to ensure that the EI premiums paid by hard-working Canadians do not go into general revenues and that they are not available for future governments to use on their pet political projects or to fudge deficit numbers, like the previous Liberal governments did.

I am hearing about the kind of recommendation we are putting into place from chambers of commerce, including the Saskatchewan Chamber of Commerce, that EI premiums should not go into general revenues to be used in a slush fund, pet political project kind of way. Our government's action on that issue is another good thing for Canadians.

I will go back to the freezing of EI premiums for this year, 2009, and next year, 2010. Keeping the EI premium at the same level in 2009 and 2010 rather than allowing it to rise to the break-even level will achieve a projected combined economic stimulus of $10.5 billion. That measure keeps premium rates lower than they would otherwise be. From an employer perspective, the measure provides an incentive to create and retain jobs, and at the same time it leaves more earnings in the hands of employers, which impacts on consumer spending.

We are assisting businesses and their workers experiencing temporary slowdowns through improved and more accessible work sharing agreements. More than 165,000 Canadians are benefiting from work sharing agreements that are in place with over 5,800 employers across Canada.

It is important to ensure Canada's workforce is in position to get good jobs and bounce back from the recession. To help, we have the career transition assistance program, the CTA, a new initiative launched by our government that will help an estimated 40,000 long-term workers who need additional support for retraining to find new jobs.

Through that initiative, we have extended the duration of EI regular income benefits for eligible workers for up to two years for those who choose to participate in longer term training. As well, we are allowing earlier access to EI for eligible workers investing in their own training by using all or part of their severance packages.

This initiative is being implemented in partnership with provinces and territories. The federal government provides income support through the EI program, and the provinces and territories are responsible for providing training support. By working with the provinces and the territories through this and other programs, we are providing Canadians easier access to training that is tailored to the needs of workers in our country's different regions.

As I read the reports from the different chambers across the country, again including my own Saskatchewan Chamber of Commerce, they are certainly supportive of that training component and EI funds being used to that very good end.

The new legislation we are introducing is part of those efforts. Bill C-50 is about extending regular EI benefits to workers who have lost their jobs after working a long time and who have never, or rarely, collected employment insurance or EI regular benefits; in other words, those who have a long-term attachment to the workforce. That is what this bill is about.

These Canadians have paid taxes and EI premiums for many years. It is only fair and right that we support them and their families in this special time of need.

I appreciate the reasoned support of the NDP, and I wish that other members of the House would support something like this on behalf of their constituents. I encourage all members of the House to support these measures.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-50, An Act to amend the Employment Insurance Act and to increase benefits, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in this debate on Bill C-50, concerning the Employment Insurance Act and potential amendments.

My first reaction was to wonder why, if this was really important, it did not happen last May when numerous employment insurance bills were coming before the House on a regular basis. Why did it not happen during the meetings that were negotiated with the Liberal Party to sit down and work out important changes that could help the unemployed? Five hundred thousand families are living on EI right now. Jobs have been lost.

We have debates going on about a stimulus program, and we are going to get this infrastructure money out, and it is going to be shovel ready. How many people can remember when the government kept talking about shovel ready? In most people's minds all it takes is approving the money and giving the money to the approved project, and it is ready to go.

However, that is not the way it works. In fact, at the end of the last fiscal year, which ended March 31, 2009, there was about $3.5 billion of infrastructure funding that lapsed. It was for approved projects that were ready to go. We knew that the economy was under duress. Unemployment was rising and that is when we needed the investment.

Why did it not happen? Why did that $3.5 billion not get out before the end of the fiscal year? It was because the government wanted to manage the bottom line. It did not want to show a bigger deficit than what it was already going to have, because it had promised to balance the books.

I have raised these points to raise the issues of credibility and accountability. Accountability to me is when one can say “I can explain my actions and my decisions or my words truthfully and honestly and in plain and simple language. I can explain and justify them, and everybody will understand”.

However, what we have had is a lot of fuzz. We have had a lot of code words. The minister responsible for infrastructure will not talk about how many projects money has gone out for. He talks about what the government has announced.

There is a project that got money this past week which was announced six years ago. Therefore when the minister responsible for infrastructure talks about something being announced, it means nothing. It is simply trying to evade the reality that in fact monies have not gone out.

We are faced with an employment insurance problem, and we have a bill that has come forward. I think there has been a fair bit of debate and I do not want to repeat it. However, it is clear that there are many good arguments that this bill for long-tenured workers who have not claimed EI but have paid into the system means they are going to be able to draw benefits for longer periods. However, the benefit period will depend on the industry that the worker comes from, whether it be auto, forestry or the resources. Under the bill, that makes a difference.

I looked at the minister's speech, and I did not see that. The minister boasted that she had called for a briefing. In her speech and in question period that same day, Thursday, September 17, the minister went out of her way to make the point that we had a briefing and not one Liberal member came, and that therefore they do not support these important changes for workers.

I found that really hard to believe, because I did not see anything. It took me a couple of hours to track it all down, and what I found is that the e-mail from the minister's office went to only one Liberal member of Parliament. Then the minister had the gall to get up in the House and say, “not one Liberal member attended the briefing meeting”.

That is not my opinion, that is a fact. Government members can ask for a copy of the emails to prove it.

Other members have said that. The parliamentary secretary said the same thing in a speech. They have said that not one Liberal member showed up. When a notice is sent out to only one member, and if that member's staff happens to miss it or the member cannot make it, what do we do? It is not being accountable. It is not being truthful and plain. It is playing games. It is casting aspersions. If the truth were known, if it was in plain and simple language, it would not be an issue, and it should not be brought up.

If the minister's only argument is that the Liberals do not care, that argument just fell apart. On top of that, her colleagues are parroting the same erroneous facts. That is the reality that we have to live with here.

I raise this accountability issue because the member for Selkirk—Interlake on the Friday we were last here went through a little scenario about employment insurance premiums. He said that when the Liberals were in government, they kept raising employment insurance premiums.

After that but before question period, and the record can be checked, I rose on a point of order with the Speaker because this was clearly not a matter of fact. It was, in fact, the reverse. For 12 years in a row the Liberals reduced employment insurance premiums from the position they were at when we took over from Brian Mulroney. I did not know how to deal with this matter other than to raise it with the Speaker and the Speaker had to rule it as a matter of debate.

We have to think about this. If someone says something that is factually incorrect, not a matter of opinion but just factually incorrect, and another member rises to challenge it, there is no recourse in this place. A member has no recourse when another member gives misinformation that he or she knew or ought to have known was false.

The people of Canada continue to get the same rhetoric, the same misinformation. Suddenly, that misinformation shows up in all the Conservative literature that those members send out to everybody else's ridings. Everybody knows about the $30 million worth of ten percenters sent out to ridings of other members of Parliament--

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois today on Bill C-50 to reform employment insurance.

I deliberately did not intervene in the previous debate between the Conservative and the NDP members. I allowed the NDP member to ask his questions because I am trying to figure it out. This bill, supported by the New Democratic Party, will help the auto sector. The Conservative member's speech was eloquent and 65% of his presentation addressed that aspect.

It is true that the automobile sector is in crisis. In 2008, the Conference Board already forecast the loss of 15,000 jobs in that sector. Workers in the auto sector are considered long-tenured workers.

To date, 15,836 jobs have been lost in the Quebec forestry sector, more than will be lost in the auto sector. No bill or assistance has been introduced to help the forestry sector. When we talk about this to the Conservatives, they tell us that those workers must switch careers. Forestry workers will probably be transformed into oil sands workers in the riding of our Conservative colleague from Fort McMurray—Athabasca.

This is ridiculous because the forest is like a garden with trees that grow back, whereas the oil sands provide non-renewable energy. One day, there will be no more. To hear the Conservatives talk, they are going to increase oil sands production fivefold. Thus, we will exhaust these resources more quickly. This Parliament, with the support of the NDP, is attempting to transform forestry workers into oil sands or oil production workers. that is just ludicrous, especially from the New Democratic Party.

I find it particularly ridiculous that we are creating new classes of workers. There are long-tenured workers, who are the auto workers. The remaining workers—in the forestry, tourism, agriculture and fisheries sectors—are not long-tenured workers. Even though these people have devoted their lives to maintaining industries that are found in all regions of Quebec and the rest of Canada, they are not treated in the same way by the NDP because they do not consider them to be long-tenured workers.

This is an aberration, and it is frustrating, because a great deal of money is being spent. The Bloc Québécois has introduced bills in this House, and the other parties have defeated them. The Bloc Québécois has tabled plans for employment insurance. Before the latest budget came down, the Bloc Québécois was the only opposition party that proposed a recovery plan. The Minister of Finance even congratulated us. But the Liberals supported the Conservatives on that budget, all because some members of this House are trying to save their own jobs instead of defending their constituents' jobs. I find that scary.

The Liberals wanted to save their jobs when the latest budget was tabled, because their polling numbers were not very good. Now, the New Democrats want to save their jobs, because their polling numbers are not very good. No one is thinking about the workers, and that is scary.

Once again, it is a good thing the Bloc Québécois members are standing up in this Parliament on behalf of workers in Quebec, especially forestry workers. I repeat that 15,836 forestry jobs have been lost in Quebec to date. We do not care much about polls, and it will not bother us to go to an election if we no longer have confidence in this government, which is ignoring a whole slew of workers who have lost their jobs. We will not hesitate to put our seats on the line on that issue. That is the strength of the Bloc Québécois. All the analysts and reporters are wondering what is happening in Quebec and why Quebeckers do not like Canada.

It is simple. Quebeckers just want members who defend their interests. That is what we do every day, and we take pride in doing it. What is happening right now in this House is out of control. It is an aberration, especially when it comes to this bill, which is designed as an assistance program for the automotive industry.

I believe that our Conservative colleague was honest: for 60% of his presentation, he talked about the auto sector, saying that it represented 14% of GDP.

What he forgot to mention is that, according to the Conference Board, some 15,000 jobs were lost in that sector and that over 15,000 jobs were lost in the forestry sector in Quebec alone. He forgot to mention that. He also forgot to mention the fact that his party has decided to ignore forestry workers.

He forgot to mention that his party is not planning to do anything to help agricultural, tourism and fisheries workers. He forgot to mention that. What I have the hardest time understanding is why the NDP is supporting this. I know that people in ridings in the Gaspé peninsula are starting to get angry. When people—workers who have dedicated their lives to fisheries, forestry, tourism and agriculture—see a party like the New Democratic Party, which claims to be the great defender of all workers, support a bill that will help only one industry, the auto industry, I can see why people in NDP ridings might start wondering what is going on. Those people are looking at Quebec and I am sure they are very glad to see that Quebec, at least, has MPs who are defending workers' interests. The only party doing that is the Bloc Québécois.

The government has created a new category of workers, so-called “long-tenured workers”. Simply put, these are workers who, over the past five years, have collected no more than 35 weeks of employment insurance benefits. So, the government created this new class of workers, and all other workers are not long-tenured. I find this term appalling. Conservative and NDP MPs use the term “long-tenured workers” as though workers in forestry, fisheries, tourism and agriculture were not long-tenured workers, even though these people have dedicated their lives to sustaining industries that, in some cases, are seasonal and, in others, like forestry, have been going through a huge crisis for the past five years.

If the Conservative Party—and the Liberal Party in its day—had made a similar effort to get the forestry industry out of the crisis, the industry would now be leading the Canadian economy and we would be out of the recession by now. That is the truth. But once again, forestry does not get the same treatment. It never does. People forget that in the forest, the trees keep growing. There will always be trees. We are sitting on one of the best assets in Quebec's economy, and one of the best in Canada's economy.

Once again, some members in this House—the Conservatives, the Liberals last spring at budget time, and the NDP today—are ignoring the forestry industry. These people are being cast aside. They hear promises. Maybe we will see what happens during an election campaign debate. For five years now, the Bloc Québécois has been rising in this House to say that there is a crisis in the forestry industry. We need to help this industry. It will take loan guarantees. We must be able to modernize our companies. We want to be able to do so because in Quebec, the forestry industry represents 108,000 jobs. That is the reality.

There are forestry workers in the other provinces, too. If we had addressed the forestry crisis five years ago, we could have already come out of the current economic crisis. But once again, the other parties, for purely partisan reasons, have decided to save their own skins. Today, it is the NDP, who, over the next four, five or six weeks will try to make us understand that this measure is truly good for the economy. These members need only return to their ridings and talk to their constituents to understand that these outrageous measures are not good for the economy.

What we needed was a real overhaul of the employment insurance system, especially because, as of 1996, the federal government no longer contributes to the employment insurance fund. It is funded entirely by workers and employers. That is the reality. The Conservatives even have the gall to say that they will use this money to pay down the debt they have racked up.

So, once again, I am proud to stand here on behalf of forestry, agricultural, tourism and fisheries workers. We are obviously against this bill because it is unfair for all the long-tenured workers in these industries.