Mr. Speaker, I called last week the week of the gag. We have just be notified that there will be a time limiting motion once again, to be announced Monday. So, here we are headed for a second week of the gag.
This current week, however, has been the week of problems relating to keeping or not keeping one's word. Without going into great length, I would like to take a few seconds to read certain paragraphs of a letter by the present Prime Minister. As I have already read it out in the House, I will not read it all, but some parts of this letter, written to the Mouvement Action-Chômage when he was Leader of the Opposition, merit rereading.
On March 26, 1993, he wrote as follows:
Thank you for your fax indicating your opposition to the legislative measures taken by the government to change unemployment insurance.
You have my assurance that the Liberal Party shares your concerns about this attack on the unemployed, and we also do not believe that the recent superficial amendments change the fundamentally unfair nature of these measures in any way.
Skipping several paragraphs, he goes on to say in the second-last paragraph:
Liberals are appalled by these measures. By reducing benefits and penalising even more workers who voluntarily quit their jobs, the government shows it cares very little about the victims of the current economic crisis. Instead of addressing the problem at its core, the government picks on the unemployed. Besides, these measures will have disturbing consequences because they will discourage workers from reporting harassment cases and unacceptable labour conditions.
Finally, rest assured that Liberals will continue to demand that the government withdraw this unfair bill. As Leader of the Opposition, I appreciate your taking the time to let me know your position on this issue.
Since then, he has heard plenty of "positions on this issue".
It started in the human resources development committee. During six weeks of conducting hearings across the country, we heard a good many positions. We also witnessed a good many demonstrations. Let me only recall what happened in Montreal. I do not say that I approve, but at some point, people get fed up. We have said this repeatedly. Last week, they wanted to gag us, now they want to do it again. It will not work. We will be heard.
In summary, after the hearings held by the committee, the Liberals decided to wait until after the referendum in Quebec. They waited all that time. Then in December, after the referendum, they came out with a special step called a pre-study, they eliminated second reading, supposedly to give the committee more time. What was done in committee? It was just before the holidays, not a proper time to look at a bill. Not only that, people did not have much time to present submissions. There were many submissions. Therefore, the committee started examining them.
However, the government came up with the most brilliant idea. It decided to have a speech from the throne. It wanted to make something new out of old stuff. It wanted to reintroduce, and in fact did reintroduce some ten bills, under new numbers. Bill C-12 is the same as Bill C-111, as it was called before. So, during that time, we waited again, because the throne speech put an end to the session and the committee's proceedings. We resumed work hurriedly after the throne speech.
Last week, the committee began clause by clause study. We got as far as clause 2. The government wanted to limit study of each clause to five minutes. In the group of motions dealing with clause 2, we ask that the whole clause be deleted. What is in that clause? All the definitions. Take the first one for example: "affidavit". It is an addition, it did not exist before and people did not know exactly what it meant.
But there is worse than that; because I have very little time, I will read a clause we wanted to examine more thoroughly. At the bottom of page 3, it says:
(3) A document or other communication under this Act or the regulations may be in electronic form.
We are talking about electronics. But what did we hear this morning? For the second year in a row, people are waiting for old age security payments. Last year, about 50,000 people have seen their payments delayed. The minister admitted it this morning. This year, the same thing happened again. Now they would like the unemployment insurance reform to bring a similar system.
Frankly, I think we were right to voice our concerns in committee. For the second time, the government gagged the committee. Its imposed time allocation on a very important bill to bring it back to the House as quickly as possible. Now, we were just told that after a day and half of debate, there will be time allocation, the same system used in the case of the rail strike. This government is going to be known as the gag government, because there are no precedents, except once under the Conservatives. Before them, this had never happened in the history of Parliament.
There is another clause I would like to talk about and on which we had proposed an amendment, which is to strike the two clauses denying people the opportunity to appeal decisions relating to the unemployment insurance bill. We find that is very important.
As an example, so that our listeners can understand, we wanted to correct the bill so that anyone could challenge a government decision under any program. Why did we want to do that? It is because the Mouvement action-chômage, in Quebec city, among others, told me that, when a decision of the unemployment insurance commission was challenged, the claimant was found to be right in 75 per cent of cases, and the government itself admits that.
I will show the House a report we asked for in which the minister makes alarmist comments about the increase in fraud cases. So what does the report say? In 1991-92, 130,081 people were charged with and convicted of unemployment insurance fraud. By 1995-96, that figure had fallen to 116,603.
Some may say: "Wow, that is a lot of people". True, that is a lot of people, but the figure applies to all of Canada. The total is not so high considering that some 3 million benefit claims are submitted in a year-which does not mean 3 million unemployed. Some claims may be for a short period only. Out of a total of 3 million, the number of fraudulent claims amounts to less than 6 per cent. The auditor general has already determined that there are always cases of fraud in any government program, regardless of what segment of the population it is intended for.
What is happening? We could have recovered $272 million last year. In cases of fraud, however, only $93.4 million were recovered. The remaining $179 million was due to honest mistakes, occasionally by recipients but, three times out of four, by the unemployment insurance commission.
This explodes the myth of fraud, which is, in fact, the basis for this reform. They want stricter controls and increased mechanisms.
They want better control of measures. Why? To catch more people because unemployed Canadians are seen as potential cheats.
We object to this kind of approach, because we know that, in many cases, UI benefits keep people from starving after they lose their jobs.
There is something else we find quite extraordinary and revolting. I often tell this story to help people understand. Everyone knows the story of Robin Hood. I am not saying he was right, but he used to take from the rich to give to the poor. But what is the Liberal government doing by lowering the contributory earnings ceiling from $43,380 to $39,000? It is saving $900 million. It is giving a present to the better off in our society. I am not saying that people making $40,000 are rich. The government is giving a present to business, to large corporations. But what is it doing to compensate for this $900 million? It is collecting this $900 million from those working less than 15 hours a week, who had not been paying UI premiums. And 70 per cent of those working less than 15 hours a week are women and young people. This is unacceptable.
By calculating benefits based on the number of hours rather than the number of weeks, the government is heating up the competition for McJobs. People who want to qualify for benefits will apply left and right to take someone else's job.
This bill is unfair. It is not an employment insurance bill, as it ensures that fewer people will qualify for benefits, thus hurting the most disadvantaged in our society. That is why the Bloc Quebecois is spending all its energy fighting this bill to have it withdrawn by the government.