There are other people who are entitled to it: if you're hospitalized.... There are other circumstances in which you're entitled to it. I think the bigger question is that this seems to be a punitive move, and certainly the presumption that it doesn't impact or victimize anyone else is certainly not correct. It will victimize the families of those individuals who are trying to get back to work to support themselves.
It does victimize the families, and to take it away is to presume then that the person can manage. I think one of the things that need to be looked at by this committee is who will pay for the absence of the insurance policy this person has paid into. Who will then be left with it? It will be the provinces and territories left to ante up social assistance resources if a person can't get employment when they get out.
I suggest to you that you also take that into account when you're looking at this bill and look at the notion that we're going to continually develop more and more penalties. There are places in the United States where they have gone down that path. They're now retreating from it, because they have masses of people, huge unemployment, and huge problems with the type of poverty and degradation that it has created in their cities, and that kind of philosophy is absolutely wiping out the ability of people to be civically involved in their communities.
I suggest that's not the Canada we want.