Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It seems to me that this issue is important enough to give a member of Parliament the right to a modicum of attention, in the same way that unemployed jurors merit to qualify for benefits.
The current provisions of the Unemployment Insurance Act prevent UI claimants from accepting jury duty. I believe that one factor should weigh heavy in the decision that this House and eventually the government must take, and that is that, day in, day out, including any allowances to be made for Quebec, on the average 30 per cent of all those who are able to work or have worked are on unemployment insurance. Not everyone milks the
system until their benefits run dry. What is more, with the new cuts we are seeing, it is not everybody who qualifies for unemployment insurance for several months.
There is therefore a significant number of citizens who, each year, rely on unemployment insurance. Something does not make sense when the judicial system must pass over these citizens, who are available anyway, only to call on others.
Furthermore, it hardly makes any sense either that those who must serve as jurors are only paid the meagre allowance of $25 per day.
It is not merely a question of amending the Unemployment Insurance Act to ensure that people chosen for jury duty may exercise their right to do so-recognizing that they are not handsomely paid since, as people say, no one gets rich on unemployment insurance in any case-and continue to receive at least the minimum to which they were already entitled under the Unemployment Insurance Act, thereby allowing them to perform this function which is eminently necessary to a democratic system, namely being chosen at random from the population for jury duty.
I say to the minister that this is not only a reform worth carrying out, but rather one that should have been carried out a long time ago because of the many negative consequences for ordinary people. In that way, we would be sure at least that persons receiving unemployment insurance benefits would not try to avoid this important role which is also very demanding physically and morally.
Since certain responsibilities are already being imposed on them, we would like to allow them to keep at least some peace of mind, which is in any case greatly diminished since unemployment insurance is hardly a king's ransom.
So I would ask the House to vote for the amendment proposed by my colleague from Restigouche-Chaleur and I say to him that Bloc Quebecois members will vote for this amendment.