Human Resources Committee on April 15th, 2021

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

I'm on it. Duly noted.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Ms. Dancho, you have two minutes.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you.

Minister, I'm just wanting to follow up again on this EI-CRB issue. I brought this up to you before.

A colleague of mine in the Conservative caucus asked you this question on Tuesday. Just to recap, there seem to be folks who have an open EI file or claim, who are not able to get the CRB but aren't eligible for EI either. They are kind of stuck and they're not able to get any support. I believe I mentioned to you last time that there's that young couple in Winnipeg who are having their first baby and spending hours on the phone with CRA. There was no solution for them at the time. CRA confirmed to me that there are thousands of people across Canada who are experiencing this.

I was happy to hear from Mr. Groen this morning in committee that there seems to be a process in place. On Tuesday you mentioned it was your top priority. I'm not sure if it's ongoing or if there is a solution.

Can you clarify?

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

It is. We put together a tiger team between Service Canada and Canada Revenue Agency. Of course you understand the underlying need to make sure people aren't getting two benefits at once, and this is where this all begins. It is actually twofold, as I understand it. Depending on whether the individuals are applying for the caregiving or sickness benefit, or the recovery benefit, there are different systems that come in.

Cliff, maybe you can do it justice. I could get through it, but could you give us the coles notes?

[Cliff C. Groen]

We have that tiger team in place. There is interplay between the recovery benefit and the EI regular. You're eligible for either one or the other. You cannot be eligible for both at separate times.

With the sickness and caregiving benefit, you have individuals who can be eligible for EI regular and then naturally transition to one of those two other benefits. We have an escalation process in place between CRA and ourselves. It is a high priority for both our departments.

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

Cliff, I understand that in most instances now, we're resolving these within a week.

[Cliff C. Groen]

That's right.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Just to wrap up, Chair, if we have specific cases, is there somewhere I can send these folks specifically?

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

Send them to my office, absolutely.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you, Minister. I appreciate that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Ms. Dancho.

Finally, we'll go to Mr. Vaughan for five minutes, please.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Thank you.

I heard the EI system being described as the Liberal system, in particular on an issue that relates to old technology. We haven't bought older computers since taking office and gone backwards in time to make the required manual overrides even more cumbersome for bureaucrats, have we?

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

No.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

It's not a Liberal system, then. It's the existing system that hadn't been changed by the previous government that we're still working with.

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

We are absolutely working with the antiquated system we inherited six years ago.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

We have actually made several steps to improve maternity benefits on EI, not only for women, but also for both partners in terms of making sure maternity benefits are equal to all parents. Those changes have been done without affecting rates going up or without affecting continuity of service.

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

Absolutely.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

In terms of the gig economy workers, what has CERB taught you about new work patterns in this century that we're trying to administer benefits for, based on an understanding of a work pattern that was really prevalent in the last century?

In other words, we've gone from 9 to 5, Monday to Friday into many places where a contract, freelance and gig economy type of payment process is put in place. What are the big learnings from CERB that you think will help drive EI reform as we go forward?

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

There's a whole bunch of learning, whether it be in terms of really understanding the systemic capacity that you have to work with because there's no option for failure, to a more broad understanding that, as I said in my speech, it really hasn't kept up with the way people work. For example, there are emerging trends in how work is organized, how employment is structured, how the lines between employed and self-employed have been blurred and how the labour market has changed. We have a smaller percentage of working-age Canadians. We have Canadians working older. We have more working Canadians with disability requirements. From CERB, we can learn that you have to really balance the desire to deliver quickly with the need for robust integrity measures.

Maybe I'll just write the report, because there's a lot we've learned from CERB.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

That being said, to fine-tune and make the EI system more granular, to work on a day-to-day basis as opposed to a week-to-week basis, to make it respond to the complexity of the existence that Canadians have in the work environment—whether it's maternity, combined with gig, combined with seasonal employment—all of these things require a very complex computer system.

Is it possible to change EI without also investing in new technology?

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

Quite simply, no, but we are making those investments. As we migrate over to the BDM, we'll be able to make changes within the EI system far more nimbly. We're just not there yet.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

In light of that, is it...? We have a parade of well intentioned and very creative approaches to dealing with some of the employment situations that families and Canadians face moving forward. We keep putting into EI a whole series of income benefits that at some point are going to trigger a rate reset or at least are going to collapse the computer if they're not done carefully. Would it be wise to pause those reforms until a comprehensive new computer system is put into place, or should we be continuing to try to fit new little models into a very complex system that is working with a very old piece of technology?

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

I think we can make reforms to the EI system—the “EI program”, I guess, would be more accurate—but we necessarily have to take into account our system limitations. There's coding that dates back decades, so we're always asking whether, if I make this change, I can make another at the same time, or how long this change will take.

We can move forward, but as much as we consider desired policy outcomes and costs, and the legislative and regulatory considerations, we also have to consider our systemic capacity to implement these changes. It can be done. We just have to be strategic about what we do and in what order, and avoid overburdening the system.

We still have to pay Canadians every two weeks. That is non-negotiable.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Can you confirm that we won't fire all the Service Canada processors while we bring a new system in—that we won't repeat the mistakes of the Phoenix pay system by getting rid of all the employees and then hoping the new system works? Can you confirm that we will make sure we have a backup plan in place so that there is no interruption of benefits and the chaos that the previous government—

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

We absolutely will. We will keep the old system online until we are absolutely confident, 100%, that the new system works, and nobody will be fired.