I think he got quite a bit more than that, but thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I'm delighted to make my maiden intervention here at this committee. It's interesting, with this bill here and what Mr. Godin's presenting to us. I happen to be part owner of a business in the lodging, food service, and attractions business in a seasonal area, so I understand this concept very well. But I was a little concerned about two comments from Mr. Godin.
Number one is when he talked about tax cuts being only for large corporations. I can tell you from my experience in our business--it's a family business as well, and it's been around for a long time--that when money becomes available, it gets reinvested into the company. I can tell you that in our case we continue to invest in our company, and it creates jobs every time we invest more money. So those tax cuts are not just for large corporations; they're for small companies that take people off the EI rolls.
Also, I was a little concerned about his comment about small business owners not being out in the street protesting the EI premiums they have to pay. I can tell you once again that money.... And I'll give some credit to the former government and our government, which has continued to cut those premiums so that there are more dollars left in a company. It's not just fat cats making big profits who are putting it in their pockets. Many of these companies are reinvesting.
Maybe you could address those two comments that I made, but I'm also interested...and this will be to my question. The fact is that in our area we do have to lay some people off because of the seasonality of our operation--much of it still operates on a year-round basis--but I know for a fact that some of those people who work for us actually do wish to not work in the winter. What many of them, if we have to lay them off, would be more interested in doing is getting training to be able to do a better job and be more employable.
There are also things going on in the economic development side, so those are government dollars going in that are helping to make the season a little longer.
So here is my question. Does the member think that pushing this forward might be a disincentive to work and that maybe more money should go into economic development and training, rather than into keeping people on the EI rolls?