Mr. Speaker, a study done by Statistics Canada which was released yesterday revealed that the after-tax income of families dropped 2.1 per cent in 1993. Compared to 1989, Quebec and Canadian families have on the average $3,025 less money to spend per year. All levels of society have been hit by this drop which started in 1989 and which has carried us back to income levels we have not been seeing since the early 1970s. Even the poorest families have seen their after-tax income drop since 1989.
Economists predict that this decline could very well continue over the next few years, all the more so because the federal government's unemployment insurance reforms are having a negative impact on workers at the lower end of the pay scale. The dignity of working is above all the dignity of being able to earn a living at it. That is what the government should have realized before it started blindly cutting its support to those in need.