Evidence of meeting #126 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was information.
A video is available from Parliament.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Ramesh Sangha Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Is it possible to have it, or do you suggest that it's not possible, that 12 weeks can't be granted? Do you think it is feasible?
9:25 a.m.
Director, Special Benefits, Employment Insurance Policy, Skills and Employment, Department of Employment and Social Development
I think the testimonies we heard at this committee have been really important to building our knowledge base on these various issues. However, I can't comment about creating a new benefit.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Ramesh Sangha Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Okay.
Administratively, one person has to apply for that benefit. Are there different types of applications? Are there forms that he has to fill out? Is it going to be very cumbersome, or is it going to be very easy for him to make a claim?
9:25 a.m.
Director, Special Benefits, Employment Insurance Policy, Skills and Employment, Department of Employment and Social Development
If you're referring to employment insurance benefits, they all have a common base of applying for employment insurance. Then each benefit type has specific additional requirements.
In our earlier comments, we talked about the sickness benefit. You need a medical certificate to be signed that has certain parameters. This is separate from the medical certificate required, let's say, for the compassionate care benefit. It's a different EI benefit, but even just to apply for EI, there's a common set of requirements.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Ramesh Sangha Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Will this be a separate branch, or will it be among the EI people? Will those who are dealing with EI be dealing with this one?
9:30 a.m.
Director, Special Benefits, Employment Insurance Policy, Skills and Employment, Department of Employment and Social Development
I'm sorry; I don't understand your question.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Ramesh Sangha Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Will there be a separate set of people dealing with the bereavement benefits, or will the same EI benefit people be dealing with this?
9:30 a.m.
Director, Special Benefits, Employment Insurance Policy, Skills and Employment, Department of Employment and Social Development
First of all, I'm not commenting on creating a new benefit altogether, but just saying that all EI benefits have a common website, call centre and processing centres, because they're all part of the EI program.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Ramesh Sangha Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Again, regarding the cost of this, you told us the last time that you cannot comment on that. Does the existing EI contribution system support these benefits?
9:30 a.m.
Director, Special Benefits, Employment Insurance Policy, Skills and Employment, Department of Employment and Social Development
We've explained what benefits currently exist. I'm sorry, but I'm not really sure what you are asking.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Ramesh Sangha Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
This new type of benefit, the bereavement benefit, will be provided to the people who are entitled to it. Do you think this contribution EI is already giving to people...? Is there the same set contribution amount for people who will be claiming, or will extra money be allotted to that?
9:30 a.m.
Director, Special Benefits, Employment Insurance Policy, Skills and Employment, Department of Employment and Social Development
If the recommendation were to create a brand new benefit, it would have to have its own terms and conditions and establish what would be offered. Otherwise, we're looking at—and maybe this is what you're also thinking about—leaves under the Canada Labour Code, which is a separate piece of legislation. We have unpaid leaves. There are many more types of leaves than there are EI benefits. A bereavement leave currently exists under the federal labour code, and bereavement leaves exist under provincial and territorial labour codes as well. That's separate from the EI program.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Rosemarie Falk Conservative Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK
Thank you all for being here today.
I have a couple of questions. I want to go back to my colleague John Barlow and to Stats Canada, because I'm a little confused with the concept of not using the term SIDS anymore, since 2012.
I'm a mother of two. I had my first child in 2013, and SIDS was definitely a term that was used by nurses and doctors. From what I understand, sudden infant death syndrome means you wake up and your child is dead. That's what it is.
I'm confused about why it's going into an unknown category if SIDS is an unknown. We know that we don't know the cause of it. I'm trying to understand why there's that gap.
9:30 a.m.
Acting Director, Health Statistics Division, Statistics Canada
Essentially, the decision is based on what we refer to as the National Association of Medical Examiners. It's strictly an administrative-based definition. The SIDS concept, obviously, still exists.
As we move into the world of administrative data, as I mentioned earlier, we are consuming the information from the registries. It's a recommendation that came from the National Association of Medical Examiners. These changes were made to the coding at the registry level, and we receive this information. It's absolutely not to undermine the reality of SIDS; it's a conceptual definition that was actually made at some point there.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Rosemarie Falk Conservative Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK
It's just confusing to me, I guess, as a mom with young kids. I understand that SIDS can happen from age zero to four. Having a child die in the middle of the night, with no explained reason.... I just don't get it. It just seems like an unknown. SIDS is SIDS. It's unknown, the cause of that.
9:35 a.m.
Acting Director, Health Statistics Division, Statistics Canada
According to our understanding, the fact is that the explanation for SIDS is unknown. That's the reason it was being moved to an already existing category, which is called “unknown”. When they go through the investigation, they're trying to rule out different causes. SIDS is one, essentially, where there's no other explanation. Under those circumstances, because it was considered unknown in the context of the timelines of children's ages and so on, and the circumstances, it was felt that it should be moved to the general category of “unknown”.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Rosemarie Falk Conservative Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK
Okay, thank you.
My next question is for Service Canada.
We had heard lots of testimony about language, about the language on the websites being unacceptable. It's very cold, harsh, not compassionate, not empathetic. I'm wondering if there is any openness to addressing that gap in the language on the website.
9:35 a.m.
Director General, Employment Insurance Program and Services Oversight, Transformation and Integrated Service Management Branch, Department of Employment and Social Development
Certainly there is. As a matter of fact, it's one project that we have just recently undertaken, in terms of doing a comprehensive review of all of our public-facing content. We want to ensure that it's more client-centric in nature and that it really is framed with an appreciation for the circumstances someone may be in. Therefore, it needs to be more intuitive, more focused on a client's needs, and more readable and understandable. We are actually undertaking work on that now and doing consultations to ensure it's properly framed.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Rosemarie Falk Conservative Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK
Okay, thank you.
I also want to follow up on a question that my colleague Mr. Long had asked.
Regarding the sensitivity training, is that mandatory training for every single employee who works at Service Canada?
9:35 a.m.
Director General, Employment Insurance Program and Services Oversight, Transformation and Integrated Service Management Branch, Department of Employment and Social Development
It's a portion of the initial onboarding training that does take place, yes.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
9:35 a.m.
Director General, Employment Insurance Program and Services Oversight, Transformation and Integrated Service Management Branch, Department of Employment and Social Development
Every public-facing employee would receive this training.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Rosemarie Falk Conservative Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK
Okay.
I don't know if I interjected this into my own thoughts when I was listening, but had you mentioned that sometimes calls are recorded for service quality?
