Human Resources Committee on May 30th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

The Standing Committee on Human Resources, Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities is meeting this morning in room 209, the West Block, pursuant to Standing Order 108, to commence its studies on employment insurance funds and the summer career placement program.

I just want to thank the witnesses for coming out today. I know we still have a few more witnesses and members to show up, but I thought we'd get started.

Just before we get started, though, just for the members of our committee, you'll see in front of you a proposed schedule for the HUMA committee. I just want to let you know that we'll be addressing that. As we talked about previously, we will address motions in the last 15 minutes of each meeting. My suggestion is that because we have a number of motions before us, we should start looking at how we can deal with those motions over the next couple of weeks.

In terms of the motions that we have here, I just wanted to let you know that they're here and that we can discuss them after we've heard the witnesses today. So if there are some concerns about what motions we should hear today versus others, we can discuss those afterwards, but I just wanted to let everyone know that we are aware that there are a number of motions before this committee and that we would like to address them. This is just a proposed schedule set up by the clerk.

Mr. Regan.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Mr. Chairman, can you just tell me if their order here is related to the order they've been received?

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

That's correct, yes. Thanks.

Mr. Lessard.

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

Mr. Chair, we could deal with the motion on pilot project number 6 today since it comes to an end on Sunday, June 4. If we deal with it on June 6, the pilot project will already have come to an end.

Mr. Chair, I'm therefore going to move that this motion be debated and voted on today.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Okay, thank you, Mr. Lessard. We'll discuss that when we deal with the motions afterwards; that will be one of your recommendations.

Now we're going to hear from our witnesses. We're going to have up to 10 minutes each for opening statements, and then we can start with some questions. We're hoping we can have 10 minutes on each issue, which would be great. We have the issue of the rate setting and employment insurance funds, as well as the summer career placement program.

[Diane Carroll, Assistant Deputy Minister, Employment Programs Policy and Design Branch, Department of Human Resources and Social Development]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My name is Diane Carroll, and I'm the assistant deputy minister for employment programs with the Department of Human Resources and Social Development Canada. I'm joined by my colleague, Réal Bouchard, from the Department of Finance, and by Bill James, also from Human Resources and Social Development Canada.

The individuals at the table are here to talk about the first item on the EI account and the premium rate-setting mechanism. We have handed out a short presentation deck that I will walk you through in no more than 10 minutes, as a way of doing the presentation. There are some colleagues in the back who will deal with the summer career placement issue.

In terms of purpose, the deck sets out to give you a sense of how the EI account works in the context of the EI program and to give a bit of information about the new premium rate-setting mechanism that was put in place for the first time this current year. There's a new mechanism that sets the premium rate for 2006.

First, I'll give you some background on the account. As I'm sure most members of the committee recognize, the EI account is an integral part of the fiscal framework of the Government of Canada. Since 1986, it has been integrated with the books of Canada, which means it is not an account that holds cash but one that tracks how much is collected in premiums for EI and how much is paid out in benefits.

The account's resources are integrated with CRF, which means that if you spend more on EI, you impact the overall fiscal situation of the Government of Canada. It is integrated, which was a recommendation of the Auditor General back in 1986. Given that the EI program is an integral policy for the Government of Canada, it should be integrated with its overall spending plan.

Page 4 gives you a bit of background on the new rate-setting mechanism that was launched by Budget 2005. What it did was address five key principles that had been set out by the government at the time in Budget 2003, stating that the premium rate-setting process needed to be more transparent, that the premium rates needed to be based on independent expert advice, and that the expected premium revenue should correspond to expected program costs. We should try to set the premium rate so that the expenditures on the program are equal to the premiums collected.

The premium rate setting should allow for mitigating the impacts of the business cycle, and we should create some kind of stability in the premium rate over time. This is a particularly important issue for employers, because you don't want to be in the situation where you're constantly changing employer cost from one year to the next, and particularly you don't want to be doing that when you're moving into a downturn in the economy.

The rate-setting mechanism, which was set out in Budget 2005, also took into account many of the views of the standing committee that had looked at the entire EI account and premium rate setting.

Slide 5 sets out what the legislation actually provided for that set the new premium rate. What it basically requires is for the Department of Finance to provide the chief actuary with all the relevant forecasts: the economic variables for the upcoming year. That has to be provided by the Ministry of Finance by September 30 of the preceding year. The chief actuary then prepares a report that is forward-looking and designed to be break-even, meaning that the premiums to be collected in the upcoming year will come as close as possible to equalling the benefits to be paid out that year.

He has to submit a report to the commission by October 14 of each year. The commission must make that report public and consult with the constituencies. They can hold very broad public consultations with the public, but the key constituencies are obviously the representatives of the premium payers, which are the workers, unions, and employers organizations.

The rate is then actually set by the commission itself, and it must set the rate by November 14. The government does have the ability to change the rate. The legislation basically says it can be done if it is felt it is in the interest of the public to do so. The government would have to have a rationale that the premium rate the commission set is either too high or too low due to situations that are projected for the future year.

In terms of the principle of transparency, the legislation sets the timelines. They are defined fairly clearly and give a lot more certainty to employers and employees. It ensures that the rate is set much earlier than it has been in the past. There have been years where the premium rate has actually been set as late as mid and late December. This gives very little time for employers to prepare for the collection of different premiums that have to start on January 1. The lead time for employers is extremely important.

The chief actuary's report is actually made public; one was released last year. It sets out how he set the rate. There is broad consultation authority that the commission must lead. The Governor in Council can substitute a rate, if it so decides, but again, they have to demonstrate that it's in the public interest to do so.

In terms of the principle of independence, this new rate-setting mechanism ensures that the commission has the full legislative authority to set the premium rate. In setting the rate, the commission is required to take into account three basic things: the principle that revenues will equal program costs in the upcoming year; the actuarial perspective; and what it has heard from the public, from the representatives of the two key constituency groups.

In matters related to setting the rate, the chief actuary has a functional reporting relationship directly to the commission. The chief actuary is actually an employee of Human Resources and Social Development Canada, but in his role in terms of setting the premium rate, he has a direct reporting relationship to the commission. The commission itself, for those who don't know, is made up of a representative of employers--somebody who represents the employers in the business community--and a representative of the workers and unions. The chief commissioner is also the Deputy Minister of Human Resources and Social Development. It's a tripartite commission, and it makes decisions by a majority vote.

On slide 8, in terms of premium rate stability, there were a number of things put into the legislation to ensure that the premium rate did not dramatically fluctuate from one year to another. There is a maximum change that the commission can actually make in setting the rate. It cannot increase or decrease the rate by more than 15¢ from one year to the other. There was also a ceiling put on the premium rate for both 2006 and 2007, that the rate could not be higher than $1.95. If the government were to decide to substitute its own rate for the commission's rate, it is restricted by those two rules as well.

In terms of next steps, 2006 was the first year for the new rate-setting legislation. Last year, the commission set the premium rate for 2006 at $1.87. This followed a consultation process with representatives of the payers. It was consistent with the break-even rate that was calculated by the chief actuary and actually decreased the rate from $1.95 to $1.87. In 2005, the rate was $1.95 for employees. It dropped to $1.87; the employer's rate dropped from $2.73 to $2.62. This was the 12th year that the premium rate has actually declined. If you look back to 1994, the premium rate was $3.07 for employees. It has now gone from $3.07 to $1.87 over that 12-year period.

Although the commission continues to consult its constituencies throughout the year, the substantive work by the chief actuary and the commission for the 2007 rate will start this September. The first step is the receipt by the chief actuary of the economic forecast for 2007 from the Department of Finance. That's when the chief actuary can actually start the process of analyzing what his recommended rate would be for 2007.

That is just to give you a sense of how the process works.

We can turn back in terms of any questions, but I'm not sure if you are moving on to the second presentation first.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Ms. Carroll.

I think we'd like to hear a 10-minute overview from the summer career placement program, and then we'll get everyone to answer questions on both.

[Donna Achimov, Assistant Deputy Minister, Citizen and Community Services, Service Canada]

Good morning, Mr. Chair, and thank you.

Good morning to the committee members.

My name is Donna Achimov. I'm the assistant deputy minister with the citizen and community service branch of Service Canada.

Joining me today are Robert Smith, director responsible for the youth initiatives programs directorate; Julie Lefebvre, also from the youth programs directorate; and Renata Borysewicz, director of target strategies with Human Resources and Skills Development.

Thank you for inviting us here today. I have provided each of you with a copy of my presentation, en anglais et en français, and I am pleased to start with a short overview of the presentation.

I'm turning to slide 1. The purpose of the presentation is to provide an update on the summer career placements initiative in 2006. What I'll touch on today is an overview of the summer career placement initiative, for those members who are new to the table; a little bit of context in terms of what we did last year; updates for this year; and an update on the Service Canada centres for youth, which are interrelated.

Now for a brief overview of the SCP initiative.

Part of the YES, the Summer Work Experience program is designed to help create summer employment opportunities for secondary and post-secondary students. The program supports the delivery of the Summer Career Placement and the operations of more than 320 Service Canada Centres for Youth across the country.

As part of the Summer Work Experience program, SCP is a major component of the Youth Employment Strategy.

Slide 3 has an overview of eligibility. The summer career placement objectives are to help secondary and post-secondary students acquire the employment-related and career-related skills they need throughout the summer during summer jobs to support their return to school and to help finance their education.

To be eligible, very simply, students have to be between the ages of 15 and 30 inclusively. They have to be registered full-time students in the previous year, with the intention of returning full-time in the next academic year. They have to be without another full-time job, they have to be legally entitled to work in Canada, and they have to be a Canadian citizen, a permanent resident, or a refugee.

Slide 4 shows that annually the program helps over 50,000 students gain valuable summer work experience. Funding provides wage subsidies to help employers provide career-related summer jobs. The wage subsidies can be 50% of the prevailing provincial-territorial minimum wage for private and public sector employers and 100% for prevailing provincial-territorial minimum wage for not-for-profit employers.

The career placement work experience ranges from six weeks to a maximum of 16 consecutive weeks each summer. In the 2005-06 fiscal year, over 31,000 contribution agreements were signed with employers. The majority of those were with the not-for-profit sector.

Slide 5 indicates that the program is traditionally launched in January every year, allowing sufficient time for employers to submit their applications. The application deadline date for summer career placement is normally at the end of March, and applications are processed throughout the months of April and May. The program is delivered locally; applications are submitted to the local Service Canada centres for review, assessment, and approval, and all summer career placement agreements are supported and managed at the local level.

Slide 6 talks about the role of members of Parliament. MPs are invited to provide concurrence on the summer career placement recommended projects. They can choose to participate, delegate to an assistant, or decline entirely their participation. MPs provide concurrence on the list of Service Canada recommended projects, and Service Canada officials approve the summer career placement projects for funding on behalf of the minister.

Slide 7 is the budget process. The budget is allocated using a two-step budget allocation model. A national allocation model distributes funds to the regions, and the constituency allocation model further allocates the regional amount at the constituency level. The model is based on two variables from census data, as I mentioned earlier: full-time student population between the ages of 15 and 24, and full-time student unemployment rates for those between the ages of 15 and 24 years.

Slide 8. In 2005 the allocation model was revised to allocate funds from 301 to 308 constituencies. We were using the 2001 census data, and the use of variables was consistent with that of previous years. The 2001 census showed marked changes in youth demographics in some parts of Canada more than in others. Notably, there was a decrease in the youth population in five of the eastern provinces and increases in some of the western provinces. I have a little bit of an overview and a breakdown of that in annex A in the attachment at the very end of the deck. Applying the revised model resulted in changes to funding allocation at the regional and constituency levels.

Slide 9. To reduce these impacts, Service Canada and Human Resources and Skills Development Canada introduced two specific measures. The first was that regional allocations were maintained at the 2004 level. The second was that no constituency budget decreased by more than 30% from 2004. The $4.2 million in additional funding for the summer career placement program that was required to support these measures was drawn from within the department. The 2004-05 budget was a total of $93.3 million, and the 2005-06 summer career placement budget was increased to $97.5 million.

Slide 10 gives a brief update. Summer career placement was successfully launched again in January 2006 and was announced by Minister Finley in March 2006 in Quebec City and Kitchener, Ontario. The application deadline was March 31 across Canada, except in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, where it was extended to April 7 of this year.

Minister Finley approved the summer career placement budget allocation of $97.5 million for this year. Again, this is the same as the budget we had for last year. We have received over 38,000 applications this year. Project approvals are currently under way, and 320 of our Service Canada centres for youth, formerly known as HRCC-S, are in the process of opening across the country in support of students.

Slide 11. On May 16, the Office of the Auditor General's report on grants and contributions was tabled in Parliament. Chapter 6, on the management of voted grants and contributions, referred to the summer placement program, which was one of five contribution programs assessed as part of this review.

Slide 12. HRSDC and Service Canada received a positive report for all elements of the summer career placement that were assessed in the February 2006 Auditor General's report. The summer career placement system for ranking applicants was considered to be the most transparent and objective of all of the programs that the Auditor General examined. The summer career placement risk assessment process to determine the level of monitoring and reporting requirements of the recipients was considered to be rigorous.

Finally, the summer career placement system has built-in features and controls ensuring rigorous accountability and management procedures.

Moving to slide 13, Service Canada continues to look for ways to further enhance delivery of the summer career placement program. An implementation plan is in place for automating the summer career placement application process for the next fiscal year. An earlier application deadline date is also planned for the summer career placement program, starting in 2007.

We're reviewing input from various sources to identify the most effective and efficient ways to improve client service and to have continuous improvement. We currently have a field survey of participants, employers, and Service Canada officials on the go. A recently completed examination outlining ways to reduce administrative burden and to improve the delivery of the initiative is part of that process.

Let us turn to page 14. There are over 320 Service Canada Centres for Youth serving students and youth across the country. A plan is underway to further enhance the services offered by the centres to better meet the needs of students and youth. It is expected that enhancement will be made in the near future to include a more extensive Youth Outreach Strategy designed to more actively reach out to youth within communities.

In conclusion, the summer career placement program is an extremely important initiative designed specifically to help secondary and post-secondary students acquire relevant, career-related employability skills and to help them finance their education. Providing more than 50,000 students with valuable summer jobs each year speaks directly to the success of the initiative and its positive impact on strengthening the Canadian economy.

We'd be pleased to answer any questions the committee has.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

We'll start our first round of questioning.

Mr. D'Amours, seven minutes.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

The first question I'm going to ask concerns employment insurance. I'll then talk about Summer Career Placements.

If you know what is happening with employment insurance currently, you'll be aware that in the next few days—and there will be other changes over the upcoming months—one of the pilot projects may not be renewed. I'm referring to the pilot project that provides for five extra weeks which is intended to fix the black hole problem, if I can call it that. We're currently getting an indication that this pilot project won't be renewed.

In October, there will be a similar situation with another pilot project. I don't know in which direction that pilot project is headed, but I'm afraid that it may also be left by the wayside. I'm referring to the pilot project on changes to some regions' economic areas, including Madawaska and the Lower St. Lawrence in Quebec.

Do you intend to or do you want to find solutions? On June 4, one of the pilot projects will come to an end. We've heard there will be only an assessment and that these people will be in a very tight spot as of June 5. Those who don't manage to tally up enough weeks over a 52-week period will find themselves in a black hole for some time.

Do you intend to continue with the pilot projects until the evaluations are conducted so that these people and the families that rely on them will not suffer? As we say, bills have to be paid. You've got to keep paying the rent, the mortgage, the groceries and electricity. It is no longer like it was in the 30s where you could buy on credit at your general store. That's no longer the way things are done. This is 2006.

What's your stance on that issue?

[Diane Carroll]

Thank you for the question.

As an official, I cannot state what the government intends to do in terms of the decision. All I can say is that Minister Finley is certainly looking at the issue, and has consulted certainly with you and with other MPs. I think a decision, obviously, will be made this week in terms of what will happen.

The minister is certainly very aware of the issue. She understands the dynamics, knows the issues facing gappers, and understands what the pilot is trying to achieve. She is doing that assessment, along with her cabinet colleagues, in terms of the next steps.

As an official, that's all I can say at this point in time.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

As an official, you can certainly tell me if the minister has asked you to not extend the pilot projects. You probably started to check certain things and to make recommendations to the minister. If there were to be an announcement this week, somebody somewhere would have to have been consulted. I'd like to know if you've made any such recommendations to the minister.

[Diane Carroll]

The minister has certainly not recommended to us that we end the pilot. As I said, she is still considering all of the options in terms of whether the pilot should continue, whether it should be adjusted, or whether it should simply end.

She has not made a decision, so she has not directed the department one way or the other in terms of the next steps.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

I agree with you on that point, but can you tell me whether you think these pilot projects are worthwhile maintaining, so that workers who will have bills to pay and will be facing serious difficulties in a few months will not be penalized? Shouldn't the pilot projects be kept until another assessment is made?

[Diane Carroll]

The full evaluation of the pilot has obviously not been completed. The pilot is still running. We obviously have not had time to fully evaluate what the impact has been. You need the time to actually track these individuals to see how much time they worked, how much time they actually collected EI benefits for, and what the gap was between the end of their EI benefits and the start of their work. The full evaluation has not been done. I think that is certainly one of the things the minister is taking into account in making her determination, whether we actually have enough information to understand what the impact has been.

With two years of the pilot's running, we have a certain amount of information on the first cohort, if you want to describe it that way, who used the pilots. We certainly don't know the full information on the individuals who just came in during the last number of months who are now collecting EI and are about to run out. We obviously don't know enough about them. That is one of the things she is taking into account.

It is not my role, as an official, to speculate on future policy. I think the things you take into account are whether or not our recommendations to the minister ensure that the broader integrity of the EI program is maintained, that there is a relationship between the amount of time people work and the amount of time they collect benefits and so on. Those are the kinds of things that we put forward to the minister.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Given what you've just said, are you going to recommend that the minister, when referring to employment insurance, no longer refer to seasonal workers but rather to seasonal work?

The briefing session we attended focused on the evaluation of seasonal workers who repeatedly find themselves in the same situation when it comes to employment insurance. And yet, it's the work which is seasonal. Despite this, there seems to be a push for definitions or formulas which would hurt those people who do this seasonal work. Do you intend to recommend to the minister that we talk about seasonal work and not seasonal workers?

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Ms. Carroll, just give a very short answer, as Mr. D'Amours' time is up.

[Diane Carroll]

One thing I would say is that in the operation of the EI program we do not insure individuals. It actually insures the work. So the EI program actually insures the job. In the design of the EI program, you are actually looking at the nature of work; you're not looking at the actual individuals in those jobs. The fact that you do have variable entrance requirements across the country, where people with as few as 420 hours in high unemployment areas can collect EI for up to 32 weeks and you have to work longer in lower unemployment regions to collect even close to the same amount is very sensitive to the seasonal nature of a lot of the economies of different parts of Canada. By its very nature of having a variable entrance requirement and allowing people with less work to actually collect for longer periods of time in high unemployment regions, it is extremely sensitive to the seasonal nature of a lot of work. That's always been an integral part of the program, and has been for a very substantial period of time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

Monsieur Lessard, for seven minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First, I'd like to thank you for your presentation, which served as a reminder to us of the way these two programs work.

I was hoping that we would be able to have an exchange on perceptions, opportunities, projects and a concrete contribution from the Employment Insurance Fund designed to help people who lose their job. I understand your answer, and you're right in saying that this is a political issue involving political decisions. I'm sure you'd agree, however, that this is all totally surreal.

Whilst we look for ways of improving employment insurance, this morning, we've heard an essay on the history of the Employment Insurance Fund which reminds us, at the end of the day, that over the past 12 years, every year, the premium rate has dropped. In no way has it been demonstrated to us that every year, the income support eligibility conditions for people who have lost their jobs have become more and more difficult to meet.

In my opinion, the government's main role is to assist these citizens, to regulate the way revenue is distributed and the means at each person's disposal. The Employment Insurance Fund formerly called the Unemployment Insurance Fund—the terminology is important—is insurance for those who lose their jobs.

I'm not blaming you, I understand you must honour the mandate which has been given to you, but in 1994, 88 per cent of people paid into the Employment Insurance Fund and 88% of people were assured they would receive an income should they lose their job. Today, this percentage has fallen to only 39%. How did this occur? Is it solely due to the way the actuary manages the Employment Insurance Fund? I believe that the fund is there for the people.

This is not only a perception, it is a reality borne out by the facts. The UN strongly criticized the way Canada manages its Employment Insurance Fund and notes that only 39% of the unemployed actually get employment insurance. This is not something to be proud of! This morning, we should have got an accurate description of the unemployment situation and increasingly impoverished families.

Mr. Chair, I would have liked to have asked concrete questions on what was said this morning. These are facts that we are quite well aware of. They serve as a good reminder. I appreciate this and I thank you for it, but when we're told that the Employment Insurance Commission is representative of the people who contribute to the fund, it's enough to make you laugh.

Whom do the employers' and employees' representatives and other government representatives appointed by the minister consult, exactly? The real consultation has gone on here over the past two years.

We produced a report containing 28 recommendations which were all brushed aside without any response worthy of the work and thinking behind the testimony of groups which appeared before us here. They took the trouble of coming all this way and they've asked if they'd be doing it all again for nothing. Regrettably, I'm compelled to tell them that that is indeed the case.

Some of those members who were here over the past two years agreed on these 28 recommendations and would have liked further light to be shed on what's at stake for the edification of our new committee members. And that is why you are here this morning.

Does the government and do your superiors intend to implement the 28 recommendations? If they don't intend to implement them all, which do they intend to implement? That is my question to you this morning. If I don't get an answer, I'll take it for granted that we need to vote on the 28 recommendations again, without waiting for the department's opinion.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Mr. Lessard.

You've got about 30 seconds.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Diane Carroll]

As perhaps Mr. Lessard knows, I cannot answer that last question. Obviously, whether all or any of those recommendations get accepted is in the hands of the government to decide.

I guess I would just make two really quick comments, one on the number of unemployed covered by the unemployment insurance system. The main reason for the drop was not the changes to the employment insurance program; the employment insurance program actually allowed more people in than before. What has actually happened is that the nature of unemployment.... When you think about who the unemployed are, there's a group of unemployed who are working, paying EI premiums, and losing their jobs, with the vast majority of them qualifying.

The other big portion of the unemployed is people who are looking for a job but who have never worked before; they could be young people, they could be new immigrants into Canada, they could be people who have a very marginal attachment. There are also people who are self-employed—and there's a question, obviously, of whether they should be paying premiums, but they do not pay premiums. Increasingly there are people who are now unemployed for two weeks or less, because unemployment in large parts of this country is very marginal. So if you're unemployed for two weeks or less, you are not eligible for EI, because everybody has a two-week waiting period.

So the question is not so much, is the EI program providing benefits to the people who are paying premiums and lose their jobs. The argument in that case is, yes, they very well are doing that.

There is another question that needs to be asked about the other group of unemployed who have no work attachment, or who have never worked before. The EI program is not designed for them; obviously, if you're not working and haven't worked in the last year, or are a new immigrant, you have not paid EI premiums, so you cannot be eligible for a program that is there for people who pay EI premiums. The question then is, do we have other programs to help those people get into the labour market? Do we have programs that enable new immigrants to actually find that first job and get them into a job where they are paying premiums? Do we have programs to help the long-term unemployed?

It's not a question of the EI program no longer being there for people who pay EI premiums.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Ms. Carroll.

Mr. Godin, for seven minutes.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have to tell you that I honestly didn't intend to ask you any questions because you are not teaching us anything new.

The last answer you gave us, Ms. Carroll, is an insult to Canadians, and to this country's workers! We know that only 32% of women and 38% of men qualify for employment insurance and that the Liberal Party stole $49 billion from the employment insurance fund to balance its budget and to get rid of the deficit, and that the Conservatives have always made do by saying that the premium rate needed to be reduced. It's gone from $3 to $1.92. In the past, a person working 15 hours per week and 150 hours per year could qualify for employment insurance, whereas today, the same person has to work 910 hours before being entitled to employment insurance for the first time.

Ms. Carroll, I have to tell you that the statement you just made is completely false. Don't come and talk to us about immigrants and those two weeks. I'd like to hear what you have to say about what I've just said.

Just think about this. Previously, workers would be eligible for employment insurance by working 15 hours per week, that's 150 hours per year. A worker applying for employment insurance for the first time had to have worked 20 weeks over the year to be eligible, whereas today, it's 26 weeks or 840 hours; it went from 910 hours to 840 hours.

Can you believe how the statistics have changed! How can you make a comment like you just made? How can senior officials briefing the government have such an attitude? As you so clearly stated at the start of your presentation, this money went into the government's consolidated revenue fund. Every time you touch the employment insurance fund, you affect government revenue and that has an impact on the amount of money the government gets. The basic problem is this: it's the little guys that bear the brunt, it's the workers who are being hit upon and it's hurting them.

Ms. Carroll, you're not the one who is going to solve the problem; we need a government that really wants to reform employment insurance and believes that important insurance isn't a tax imposed on its citizens, but rather a payment for which companies are responsible. If they aren't able to have their employees working 12 months out of every year, then the companies should pay for insurance so that employees can support their families. That's what the unemployment insurance program was like when it was set up 50 years ago. The Auditor General made a big mistake in 1986 when he transferred the money into the government's consolidated revenue fund. He gave the government a cash cow for it to use as it saw fit. And now look at the program.