Human Resources Committee on Oct. 8th, 2009

[Paul Thompson, Associate Assistant Deputy Minister, Skills and Employment Branch, Department of Human Resources and Skills Development]

Perhaps I could clarify this. The bill does not contain any measures of that kind because the Employment Insurance Regulations already provide for a benefit period of 104 weeks. This means that people have two full years in which to use their benefits. So the two-year period...

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

If I understand correctly, they will be covered.

[Paul Thompson]

It is the waiting period.

The allocation of the severance remains, for the period of time that they're in receipt of separation, but the benefit period is two periods, which is in excess of the normal entitlement for EI.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Mr. Thompson and Mr. Godin.

Minister, we're going to move to our last questioner of the first round.

Mr. Komarnicki.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll be sharing my time as well.

Welcome, Minister, to the committee. Certainly the amendment ensuring the effective date of legislation as January 4 will be well received by those who are unemployed and affected, and certainly each of the opposition parties has been trying to outdo every other to say that they also agree with it. It's good to see.

You've indicated that you've taken a number of measures in addition to this one with respect to helping the unemployed. But this particular piece of legislation is very specific. How do you see this bill as being consistent or inconsistent with the original mandate or purpose of the employment insurance legislation?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

The original employment insurance legislation was designed to help those who were unfortunate enough to have lost their jobs through no fault of their own. In times like these, in a significant and very serious economic recession, different people are affected differently. This time, we've lost a tremendous number of manufacturing jobs particularly. These are jobs that may not be coming back.

A lot of these individuals have limited portable skills, even though they may have been working in high-paying jobs. Many of those with whom I have spoken may be in skilled trades, but they never bothered to get their final papers for their apprenticeship, for example. So they have difficulty transferring their skills to another job, if indeed one exists. Some of the jobs are going away permanently, unfortunately, and many of these individuals are looking for another job in another field. It's time to change careers.

Finally, many of these people by definition—long-tenured workers—haven't had to look for a job in a very long time. They're not used to what's required or how to do it. They're having to learn these new skills, and Service Canada and many other service delivery groups are helping them learn how to look for a job, how to write a résumé, and how to do an interview. It's taking these individuals much longer for any number of reasons to find a new job. We want to help these people, who have worked hard all their lives, paid into the system, and paid into the EI system. They have families to support. We believe this bill will recognize the contributions they've made and also the difficulties they're facing as a group, difficulties that, shall we say, make it more difficult for them. As I mentioned, in a study that was done under my predecessor, the committee then acknowledged that it can take up to 35% longer for these individuals to find work than people who are not long-tenured workers, people who have been in the marketplace more frequently.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I see a quote by Don Drummond, chief economist of the TD Bank. With respect to this particular bill, it said this legislation is “quite powerful, particularly in the current context”, and “appropriately targeted”, and

Without the extension, their benefits would soon expire. Plus, the measure will alleviate some of the pain in the hard-hit auto, forestry and manufacturing sectors....

This was said in the Winnipeg Free Press on September 14, 2009.

There is no doubt that in the career transition assistance program, which we have talked about and which also was an initiative taken by this government, there was a bridge to those as well.

What are your thoughts on his comments, and is there a bridging between the career transition assistance initiative and the long-tenured legislation that you're proposing under Bill C-50?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I was very pleased with Mr. Drummond's comments. He has identified exactly what it is we're doing and why we are trying to do it. He said it's targeted. Yes, it is, because there is a large portion of the unemployed who fall into this class, in quantities—sheer numbers and percentages—that haven't existed prior to this recession. These are unusual circumstances; they call for unusual measures, targeted measures, that will help people, particularly in those sectors that have been hard-hit. Forestry and manufacturing, including the auto sector, are examples. And let's not forget that a large chunk of the forestry sector is actually manufacturing.

In our discussions and round tables that we have had across the country, we heard that most of the workers who are in these sectors will qualify—normally they would qualify, with the grace period that we've allowed of 35 weeks of EI benefits within the last five years. We're confident that this is going to provide the extra help that these particularly challenged individuals—because of the industries from which they come—are going to need. We need to give them a hand up now to help them take the extra time they need to look for a job.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I'll pass my time over to my colleague.

[Ron Cannan, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Madam Minister, and thanks to your staff. All of us in this room are going through unprecedented economic times, the worst situation in our lives for any one of us. I thank you and your team for the work you have done to date. We had some of your staff at the meeting on Tuesday and they provided a lot of additional answers. I thank them for the time and energy they have put into this bill.

I have the honour of representing constituents in the Okanagan, a beautiful part of British Columbia. We have agriculture and manufacturing, and our science and technology strategies are helping other parts of the country to diversify. And of course we have some of the best wines, in competition with the chair, but we're looking at other ways to diversify.

In British Columbia, wood is good, and it's still one of the biggest economic generators in our province. As Mr. Lessard from Quebec and others around the table have said, the forest sector is a big economic engine for our country. This bill is one piece of assistance to help our forest sectors.

Madam Minister, could you explain or outline some of the other support programs that we've initiated as a government to help the forest workers?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

We've introduced a number of initiatives in the last year in recognition of these tough economic times.

One that's been very well received by the forestry sector has been the expansion of our work-sharing program. It's not to be confused with job-sharing. In work-sharing, a company and its employees work with Service Canada to develop a program to avoid layoffs. People in the operation work maybe three or four days a week, but for the day or two a week that they aren't working, they're allowed to collect EI benefits.

This has several advantages. Number one is that the employees get to keep the jobs. They take a slight cut in pay, but it's very little compared to the alternative of being laid off. It also works for the employers from a number of points of view. It keeps them going. Also, to qualify, they must have a recovery plan, so they're obviously thinking about their future. But importantly for them, they don't lose people in whom they've invested significant amounts of time and money in training them so they can perform well on their jobs.

Right now we have some 8,500 work-sharing agreements across the country. Those are protecting the jobs of some 165,000 people, which is a large multiple of the number of jobs we usually have with that.

Also with this program, not only have we made it easier for companies and employees to access the program, but we've extended the benefit period from 38 weeks to 52 weeks. We've made it easier to protect the jobs.

These are people who aren't being laid off. I've had tremendous positive feedback from the forestry sector on that particular initiative. That's just one of many.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Cannan.

We're now going to move to the second round, which will be five minutes. We're going to start with the Liberals and Ms. Minna.

You have five minutes.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, Minister.

First, do you have in the department the segregated data showing how women were affected in this economy versus the general population?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

What we do have are the very, very high-level numbers that I mentioned earlier. While women comprise 48% of the workforce, they comprise 20% of those who have lost their jobs in the last year.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

But do you have the segregated data that shows the analysis? It would be interesting to get that information.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I don't believe we have--

[Paul Thompson]

There would be information from the labour force survey of Statistics Canada.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

Go ahead.

[Paul Thompson]

Yes. The Statistics Canada labour force survey would be one of the sources of information. The data we have would be drawn largely from Statistics Canada.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Minister, was there a gender-based analysis done on this particular bill?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

No, there was not. We'd normally do that, but this was recognition that the benefits are available by attachment to the workforce, by length of employment, and by amount of EI claims. There was recognition in designing it when we said that they must have participated in seven out of the last 10 years. There may have been women who took time off to have children, for example.

That's why we made two conditions. First, it allowed that time, that extra three-year period, to be out of the workforce for any reason. Secondly, we made sure that when we say they claim benefits for no more than 35 weeks, that's only regular benefits, not special benefits, and 90% of special benefits are used by women.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

In my same question to the officials the other day, they said yes, there had been one. I asked for a copy. Are you telling me now that there was no actual official gender-based analysis done on this bill?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

Paul?

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

I have another question.

[Paul Thompson]

If I could clarify, an analysis was done of the bill with gender issues embedded in the analysis, including arriving at the parameters that were....