Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
Colleagues, thank you very much for being here today to discuss this bill.
If I understand you correctly, you are proposing that, when there is a work stoppage caused by a labour dispute, workers who find themselves with no income benefit from an exception, such as the ones that exist for inmates and individuals who can no longer work or have no income because of illness. You would like to see another exception under the Act for these workers with no income.
Mr. Lévesque, you made an interesting comment earlier when you were talking about what happened in Lebel-sur-Quévillon, and I would like to come back to that. You said it is a single-industry town and people are anxious to hang on to their jobs because opportunities to work in other companies are extremely rare.
At the same time, you talked about the economic situation. You are right that this could prompt an employer, after a three-year lockout, for example, to lay off employees, which is what happened in your area.
I would like to know whether you think this bill would give some power back to employees, or at the very least, reassure them, and perhaps limit a tendency to go to extremes by engaging in mass layoffs when a strike or lockout lasts a certain number of years.