I see the officials shaking their heads “yes”, but I stood in those classrooms; I stood in those training areas. I've got a story here of a young lady, a single mother with three children, who was making $9 an hour. She started her program in September; they told her there was no money left for her to qualify. She's now without a job, and because she left her job voluntarily, she's not eligible for EI.
They're going to tell you there's money in the program, and there isn't for those people. They're saying call centre employees who are making $9 an hour are job-ready and they're not supporting them, so they're twisting the criteria to pencil these people out. We've got people hurting in the community, and I don't think my community is unique. It's not as severe in Halifax or in Dartmouth, but in rural communities it's severe. I really ask you, Minister, to scratch through the....
You know, sometimes when you're asking the guy who's designed the program to provide his comments on it, we call it leaving the dog in charge of the meat. We've got to scratch down past that and get down to the people this is impacting.