Mr. Speaker, once again today I appreciate the opportunity of commenting, this time on unemployment insurance in support of Bill C-218, introduced by the hon. member for Saint-Hubert.
The purpose of this bill is to exclude from the definition of excepted employment, employment where the employer and employee are not dealing with each other at arm's length. That this bill was tabled shows that we on this side of the House are very much aware of what is happening in our ridings.
Every day, unemployment insurance claimants knock on the doors of our riding offices and ask for our help because they feel they are not being treated fairly by federal unemployment insurance authorities. In fact, these people are fed up with the way they are being treated.
They often feel powerless before the legislation and the almighty bureaucracy. The problems with unemployment insurance are many and complex. Unreasonable delays, erroneous decisions and unwarranted investigations often haunt the lives of claimants and make a mockery of their rights.
I am sure members opposite also see many people in their offices with problems concerning unemployment insurance. If they really want to stand up for the interests of these people, they certainly should support this bill.
Since this government came to power, however, the Liberals have chosen to forget the people at the bottom of the ladder. The break with the grass roots has been very quick and very obvious. The government's decisions and actions are a clear indication of this development.
We should realize that the purpose of the unemployment insurance system is to provide support, during a specific period, for claimants who are out of work. The objective is quite clear but unfortunately, the legislation, the way it is administered and the whole bureaucracy around it often obscure the actual purpose of this program. It is the applicants who suffer the consequences.
Of course, the main problem of all these people is the lack of work. If our economy produced enough long-term jobs, all these problems with unemployment insurance would be less or go away, but such is not the case. In my riding, Laurentides, the unemployment rate is 18 per cent. If we add to this large percentage all those who are no longer looking because they are discouraged by the non-existent job market and all those who must rely on welfare, we come up with a frightful jobless rate of 30 per cent. I am very worried about this.
All these people are also very worried. The unemployed face great tension and uncertainty. Imagine that you are the head of a household with children and suddenly you lose your job. You now receive only 57 per cent of your former income, soon a mere 55 per cent, as the callous Liberals decided, to support your family. It is a great worry and concern for people who unwillingly become unemployed.
Unfortunately, some say that one gets used to unemployment and others will even say that for some it is a way of life. Far be it from me to make such tendentious allegations. No one in our society wants to collect unemployment insurance. No one gets up some fine morning and says, "Well, this morning I want to lose my job and become a paid unemployed person." No one sincerely or voluntarily desires such a situation. On the contrary, people do want to work. They want lasting, well-paid jobs. I do not think that receiving a reduced cheque every week, looking for work day after day and finding none is paradise for the unemployed people in my riding.
The people opposite do not understand what is going on out there and they stupidly bury their heads in the sand, unable to deliver the goods they promised so much during the election campaign. Their promises are turning into crumbs. Crumbs from the infrastructure program that will only create or maintain some 45,000 jobs to meet the needs of 1.5 million unemployed. A real joke, a real farce from the clowns opposite who increasingly arouse laughter and scepticism from everyone.
In my riding, this miraculous Liberal program will solve nothing. It is a drop in the bucket, providing only insecure short-term jobs. That is what we get from the conjurers opposite.
What are you waiting for to come up with a real employment policy? What are you waiting for to create and establish new, intelligent, promising programs? What are you waiting for to give technical and financial aid and support to companies and to individuals who want to create new businesses? What are you waiting for to invest massively in research and development? Nothing, you are waiting, you are in neutral and, I even believe, in reverse in many respects.
But what is even more disappointing and heartbreaking from the Liberals is that not only have they forgotten about jobs, they are cutting unemployment insurance. They are taking from people whom they offer nothing, whom they are not giving a chance. The conjurers opposite reason backwards.
This whole everyday reality of the unemployed creates definite problems for them. One of these problems is related to the Unemployment Insurance Act and Bill C-218 would eliminate it by recognizing a 1989 Supreme Court decision that excluding spouses from unemployment insurance is discriminatory. Unfortunately, the insensitive Conservative government in 1990 made life more difficult for spouses. I can tell you that in my riding, where many people hire their spouses to meet the needs of the tourist season, we have hundreds of these problem cases due to paragraph 3(2)(c) of the Act. These spouses, mostly women, go through a real nightmare when they apply for benefits. To collect benefits, employees related by blood, marriage or adoption must convince the officer that their job is justified and that they are not cheating.
So this employee carries the burden of proof, with all the inquiries that this provision implies. These inquiries have become almost systematic and impose unacceptable delays for people who often badly need these unemployment benefits.
Furthermore, since the burden of proof is theirs, we generally consider these people abusers of the system. Such an attitude is unacceptable in a democracy, a free world where everyone is presumed innocent until proven otherwise. Once again the main victims of that provision are women. We women can take a lot. Approximately 650,000 women would be in that category.
I therefore ask the members from the other side to approve this bill, I ask the women of this House to bring these facts to the attention of their male colleagues in order that we may redress this injustice done against women by repealing this provision of the legislation.
We must trust in ourselves, trust in others if we want them to trust us and the system.