Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'm pleased to appear before you today to address issues related to the pandemic and the various measures that the Canadian government has taken to support workers.
We'd like to begin by commending the Canadian government for its efforts so far to support people hard hit by the health and economic crisis.
At the Confédération des syndicats nationaux, or CSN, we represent people from the cultural and hospitality sectors. Ms. Baker talked about the importance of supporting the hotel industry. It's clear to a labour organization like the CSN that the Canadian government must continue to take advantage of low interest rates and borrow to support the working class. It must maintain wage subsidy programs so that the cultural, tourism and hospitality industries can weather this extremely difficult crisis for everyone.
The CSN, like the Government of Quebec and the other provinces and territories recently did, is asking the federal government to increase the Canada health transfer from 22% to 35% of provincial and territorial health expenditures. We believe that the current crisis, particularly in the health and social services network, requires major new investments, especially since we are going to see an aging population in the coming years, in Quebec and elsewhere in Canada.
We believe that the provinces must be given the financial means to create more housing, whether in the form of residential and long-term care centres, or in the form of housing co-operatives. We could even innovate. In Quebec, new ideas have been proposed to address the issue of housing for seniors.
So, at the CSN, we stand behind the Canadian provinces in calling for a substantial increase in the Canada health transfer.
Also, as I mentioned, assistance programs for workers must continue. I think the federal government needs to take this opportunity to reform the employment insurance program in Canada. The crisis has shown that all workers, whether self-employed, non-standard workers or seasonal workers, are not currently covered by the EI program. The crisis must be used to modernize it and improve coverage for non-standard workers. We think that the federal government should reform employment insurance.
As far as economic recovery is concerned, as a central labour body, we are choosing a recovery that will also be green, in other words a recovery that will take into account the importance of sustainable development. We have labour-sponsored funds in Quebec. At the CSN, we have Fondaction, which invests in companies that are going green. We must take advantage of the current crisis to reorient the national economy and make a transition to much greener production methods that will allow us to reduce our greenhouse gas footprint.
On the manufacturing and industrial side, in a more targeted way in Quebec, we represent the Davie shipyard workers. For several years now, the federal government has been telling us that the National Shipbuilding Strategy must take the Davie shipyard into consideration. There's also the whole issue of the contract for Diefenbaker, the famous polar icebreaker, which was to be awarded to the Davie shipyard. For the greater Quebec City region, and even for Quebec in general, a shipyard integrated with the National Shipbuilding Strategy represents thousands of direct and indirect jobs.
Those are essentially the comments I wanted to make in the five minutes allotted to us. Again, we thank you for listening. We assure you that we are available to you should you wish to discuss further issues relating to public finance or social and economic development.