Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I'm becoming very concerned as to how this is all playing out on the street, particularly in my own community.
We just had a call to our office on February 11 from a woman who had applied for EI on January 12. She was told she would have her cheque within 28 days. She called back yesterday and was told that the assessment would take another 10 days because of the backlog of applications.
We were told by the minister on Tuesday that the ministry is hiring more people to deal with that. We've been hearing since before Christmas that there's a backlog, that people are waiting 40 or 45 days. Whenever you talk to the minister she says that's not true. Well, we have an actual case in fact here, and there are more cases of people who are now in serious need of money to pay the rent and put food on the table for their children. This is a sole-income earner, so it's tough. We're now looking at at least 38 days, but there's no guarantee that the cheque will be in her hand in 38 days.
Could you maybe talk to us about how this mass hiring is going? Yesterday the minister suggested that there's overtime being worked. How is that actually playing out in terms of the commitment that was made that in fact these cheques would be out within two weeks?