Mr. Speaker, 40 per cent of new welfare recipients in Quebec are unemployed workers who have exhausted their unemployment insurance benefits. Who is to blame? Blame the man who launched those tirades on the weekend.
How can the federal government accuse the Government of Quebec of ignoring poverty, when the federal government, through cuts in unemployment insurance under Bill C-17 and reductions in federal transfer payments for social assistance, has aggravated the circumstances of thousands of people who, in Quebec, are already living below the poverty line?