Mr. Speaker, in terms of actual money transferred, Quebec and Atlantic Canada will still be better off than the rest of Canada. Taking into account the changes introduced on February 21, the Atlantic provinces as a whole will receive $970 in unemployment insurance per capita and Quebec $730 per capita compared with $575 per capita for all of Canada.
Historically Quebec and Atlantic Canada have each received more in benefits than they paid in premiums. On average each receives about $1 billion annually in transfers from Ontario and the western provinces.
The changes that we proposed to the unemployment insurance plan aim at putting people back to work. Small businesses asked us to give them a break and reduce unemployment insurance premiums so as to be able to create jobs for Canadians. This is what we did.
The unemployment insurance changes cannot be seen in isolation. They represent a first but interim step in giving Canadians a sense of new direction.
If in the redesigning of the social security system we find that different changes are needed, we will make them. There is no doubt that the proposed measures will impact on some unemployment insurance claimants. That is unavoidable. We have tried to make the changes in a manner that is fair and protects those with the greatest needs.
Unlike the previous government, we made sure that the changes took into account the needs of the poorest of the poor.
As we begin the shift from our current set of programs to something more comprehensive, we have decided to reintroduce a principle into unemployment insurance that was part of it for 30 years. That is we have decided to look at the needs of individuals with low incomes and with dependants and to provide more adequate coverage for these Canadians. These individuals will receive a 60 per cent benefit rate. Others will receive 55 per cent.
With the provinces and the territories we will initiate new programs targeted at the most chronically unemployed Canadians. We have dedicated $800 million over the next two years for these strategic initiatives to test out new approaches to social security.