Mr. Speaker, let me begin by thanking the member for Peace River for sharing his time with me, particularly as we do not agree very much with regard to this question. I will make three points with regard to the changes to the unemployment insurance regulations.
First, in quite an outrageous way the government is taking according to its numbers $1.1 billion out of the fund. It is taking that money from employers and employees. By other calculations there will be as much as $4 billion taken out of the fund. It is not the government's money; that money belongs to employees and employers. They are the ones who contributed. The government has no moral right to take that money from the fund.
Second, I would like to comment on the continued attack by the federal government on the unemployed. One bank president this past week indicated that the country's real rate of unemployment is 13 per cent. Changes to the UI bill continue the attack on the unemployed rather than the attack on unemployment.
Had members on the government side been on the opposition benches when the bill was put forward, as they were prior to 1993, not only would they have spoken against it, they would have voted against it. They would have been outraged at the contents of this legislation.
Third, there are procedures in the bill, so-called active programs, which are designed to provide unemployed Canadians with the needed skills and opportunities to return to the workplace. The way these programs are designed is almost perverse. Quite clearly no attention was paid to the successful active programs which are component parts of the UI programs in Europe, particularly in northern Europe. If attention had been paid to those programs, these active measures would have been designed entirely differently. It is almost as if the intent is to make sure these active programs do not work.
Earlier today I heard some talk about the consultations which took place. It is really a sham to talk in terms of consultations. It is all very well to have large meetings and for them to go on and on. But if the government does not listen to what anybody says and in particular does not listen to what the critics say, those are not true consultations. That is what happened.
There is absolutely no doubt that the proposals put forward by the government were originally proposed by the previous Conservative government. They follow on step for step with those policies. We know that in 1993 the government changed but the bureaucrats and the policies did not change. There is a continuation of the Conservative agenda.
These revisions mark the ninth time since 1975, the fourth time in the 1990s, and the second time since 1993 that unemployment insurance has been systematically attacked.
By the end of 1997-98 there will be a surplus of $9.4 billion in the UI account. This is money which properly belongs to the 13 million workers who contributed to it, not to the government which is taking it away to pay for its own fiscal mismanagement.
In 1971, 96 per cent of those who were unemployed were covered by the unemployment insurance program. In 1990 it was 87 per cent. By 1995 under these rules it was only 52 per cent. By January of this year it was 46 per cent. At the present time only 42 per cent of unemployed Canadians are covered by the unemployment insurance provisions. By the time this process all works through, less than 40 per cent of the unemployed will be covered. We will be down to levels lower than some of the United States. This is a continuation of the attack on the unemployed, not on unemployment.
These changes will have devastating effects particularly in Atlantic Canada, the north and high unemployment regions. It will have devastating effects on low income families. It will push more and more of those individuals and families below the poverty line.
Let me quote the former Minister of Human Resources Development when he talked about UI cuts by the previous Conservative government which were far less severe than these: "I totally disagree with these amendments. The kind of legislation being brought in by this Minister of Employment and Immigration makes Margaret Thatcher look like Mother Teresa by comparison. All it does is simply put the squeeze on the people least able to protect themselves". Those words speak for themselves. It is no wonder that Canadians have trouble recognizing any integrity in government at this time.
The government says that unemployment insurance is a problem for the following reasons. It says that it creates disincentives to work and therefore constitutes a cause of rising unemployment. It argues that unemployment insurance actually discourages the search for work. It argues that the program fosters a dependency in some regions and industries. It argues that the payroll tax that finances UI has its own "perverse effect on job creation which has contributed to Canada's rising core rate of unemployment".
The very studies the government ordered from experts in the field to address unemployment insurance refuted every single one of the criticisms the government had against unemployment insurance. The studies presented by the government to support its own claim made it clear that the great majority of unemployment is involuntary and the result of a shortage of jobs and hours of work relative to the demand of work. In other words, people do not choose to be unemployed. Those who are unemployed should be offended by a government which suggests that they might.
Quite plainly, the focus of the studies is that it is the lack of jobs rather than the lack of incentives to take paid work which constitutes Canada's high rate of unemployment. The studies also point out that premiums are an appropriate way of funding unemployment insurance. All the evidence suggests that the total costs are borne by workers, not by employers and that it is not a significant deterrent to work, as the Minister of Finance likes to say it is.
The reasons for attacking unemployment insurance are refuted by those who conducted the studies on behalf of the government to presumably provide evidence for the need for the attack. It is a continuation of the Mulroney agenda, the Mulroney cuts. I have been here since 1989. This is the fifth time I have seen the same agenda set out.
The main problem we are facing here and why this government likes to attack, as its predecessors did, the unemployed rather than unemployment is that there is no clear vision, no clear industrial strategy, no clear economic strategy, no vision of where this country could and should go. We all know the famous words of Yogi Berra, if we don't know where we are going, we might end up somewhere else. What is happening is Canadians are ending up somewhere else without the job security they need.
In closing, there are two clear failings with regard to the so-called active programs the government has put forward. One of the things it likes to do and one of the things it should do is provide information on available jobs across the country. It should also provide for employers an indication of what skills unemployed Canadians have so that there can be a more appropriate match of skills and jobs.
The government should have looked at the system in Sweden. In Sweden all employers are required to register every job which will last for longer than 10 days with the appropriate government department. Employees are also required to register with that department. Ninety per cent of job vacancies in Sweden are covered by the program. If one wants a job that is where one goes.
To not have any requirement on the part of employers means that any attempt to bring employers and employees together will surely fail. Why would we have a system like that? Why would the government not have learned from a very successful system?
Germany is another example. Potential workers at risk of unemployment are identified ahead of time so that some preventative measures can be taken. Why do we not have that kind of system in Canada?
In closing, we can have all the active programs we like, but if we do not have a strategy and a vision for full employment, Canadians will continue to be unemployed in unacceptably high numbers.