House of Commons Hansard #40 of the 35th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was employment.

Topics

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

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Some hon. members

No.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Yea.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

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The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

All those opposed will please say nay.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

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Some hon. members

Nay.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

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The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

In my opinion the nays have it.

And more than five members having risen:

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

The recorded division on the proposed motion stands deferred.

The next question in on Motion No. 201. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

No.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Yea.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

All those opposed will please say nay.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Nay.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

In my opinion the yeas have it.

And more than five members having risen:

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

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The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

The recorded division on the proposed motion stands deferred.

We will now move to debate on Group No. 4.

[English]

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Liberal

Bob Nault Liberal Kenora—Rainy River, ON

Madam Speaker, on a point of order. In group 3 there are three other amendments you did not ask for a recorded vote on, Motions Nos. 5, 6 and 200.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Ringuette-Maltais)

Because of the grouping of the motions we cannot vote on these because we have not voted on Motion No. 4.

We will now proceed to debate on Group No. 4, Motions Nos. 7 and 8.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

NDP

Chris Axworthy NDP Saskatoon—Clark's Crossing, SK

moved:

Motion No. 7

That Bill C-12 be amended by deleting Clause 3.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:20 p.m.

Bloc

Francine Lalonde Bloc Mercier, QC

moved:

Motion No. 8

That Bill C-12, in Clause 1, be amended by replacing lines 9 to 39, on page 4, and lines 1 to 4, on page 5, with the following:

"7. Subsection 26(8) of the Unemployment Insurance Act is repealed."

Mr. Speaker, we have heard many speeches from the members opposite who, after agreeing to limit the debate, have decided to respond to our arguments because they see how this bill is indefensible.

I just heard that this bill will help people help themselves. The things we hear in this House. True, Part II of the bill provides for employment benefits under five programs. However, what members opposite are not saying is that, over five years, there will be only $200 million in new funds and that these provisions are designed mainly to allow money from the unemployment insurance fund to be used to pay for employment programs that are currently funded through the consolidated revenue fund. So such an interpretation is totally unacceptable. It is not true to the facts.

The facts are the unemployment insurance fund will pay for employment programs presently funded through the consolidated revenue fund and the government will be able to use the money saved to reduce the deficit. Yes, money from the unemployment insurance fund will be used for employment benefits, but this is not on top of but in replacement of what exists now. There will be only $200 million in new funds, and they will also come from the unemployment insurance fund.

The government says this bill will help people help themselves, but you cannot tell Canadians this kind of thing. You have to add that, right now, nobody is entitled to the training or so-called employment programs available because there is no possible recourse for people who are refused participation in such a training program. The government can refuse to help you and you do not even have the minimum right of appeal provided for in the legislation.

According to unemployment insurance umpires and the Federal Court of Appeal judges, that right of appeal is highly ineffective. For example, Ms. Reed, an UI umpire, said: "In fact, there is no doubt that umpires see only a tiny proportion of these errors because the majority of claimants will never take their complaint to a board of referees, much less before an umpire". What is difficult to accept, however, is that it is claimants who bear the burden of the board's errors.

In this case, at least, claimants have some recourse, described as ineffective by the umpire, because the umpires and courts cannot overturn a decision; they can only ask the board to review its decision, but at least they can have this decision reviewed, even if it is only minimal recourse. People who want training courses do not have this minimal recourse. This is the nature of the amendment we brought to the bill before us. It is not a question of being told that this modern bill should be amended. It is not a modern bill. It is a bill the purpose of which is to exclude more people from benefits, and an hon. member across the way, the member for Notre-Dame-de Grâce, has admitted it. No, it is not a bill that is trying to give more people access to unemployment insurance.

When we hear that 90,000 more people will be covered, what does that mean? That means that the only thing these people can be certain of is that they will be paying premiums. That is all they can be sure of.

I also heard that this bill would be good for small and medium size businesses, which, as we know, create more jobs. Here again, they must not have scrutinized the bill very closely. On the contrary, small and medium size business are the ones which will have to open the till wider, while large businesses are being given a gift in the form of an exemption from paying premiums for workers earning between $39,000 and $42,400. There is a gift for workers who are now paying premiums up to $42,400. Henceforth, that will stop at $39,000. It is absurd. It makes no sense.

And who foots the bill for this present? Precisely those who work 0 to 15 hours, not now paying into the fund nor eligible for benefits, it is true. And their employers, who do not make contributions on their behalf, but now they will. These employers and employees will both pay for this, but the problem is that the majority of them will not really have access to unemployment insurance.

If the government had wanted to make the assistance of unemployment insurance benefits available to the people working 0 to 15 hours, if would not have tripled eligibility conditions for those returning to the work force and more than doubled the requirement for those already in the work force. They are taking advantage of the hour-based system, under the pretext that it will cover more people, whereas it will cut back the system's accessibility. Yes, they will be forced to pay. That is the only thing they can be sure of. As for offering them a bridge between two jobs. That is something else again.

There is another worrisome trend in this bill. It encourages people working 0 to 15 hours to hold down two jobs. Everyone, in fact, is encouraged to have two. Generally speaking, then, while there is a universal trend to cut back the length of the work week, to encourage people to job share, this bill is encouraging people to hold down two jobs, rewards people who have two jobs, rewards overtime.

But I must add something, something that many will find a dramatic revelation. People must know that, if someone holding two jobs and with insurable weeks behind him quits one of them, he immediately loses all the weeks of insurable work accumulated until then, even if he was on the verge of having enough weeks to be eligible for unemployment insurance, or on the verge of being eligible.

By quitting one of his own accord, he will lose eligibility on both and will have to start from scratch again. In 1990 and in 1993, the Liberals created an uproar because the Conservatives imposed total loss of eligibility when someone left a job voluntarily.

What are they doing today? Not only do they approve of what they had knocked then, they are taking it even further. Indeed, from now on, according to the double requirements of this bill, someone who has two jobs and quits one because he is no longer able to go on, will lose all his weeks of insurable earnings if he quits for reasons other that those specified in the bill because he will be considered to have left voluntarily. The fault will be theirs. This is a real scandal. I will stop here, but if I listened to my heart I could go on for a long time.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:35 p.m.

Liberal

Raymond Bonin Liberal Nickel Belt, ON

Madam Speaker, the members of this House should take their responsibility to meet Canadians' real needs very seriously.

During the election campaign, people told us of real needs, of the hardship, the suffering people face when there is no more money coming in. Those of us in this House who took part in local debates know what suffering is all about. This is why it is important that all members of this House take the proposed improvement to these people's lives seriously.

I was a member of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development, and we have been debating this subject for a long time. I want to congratulate the members of this committee for the great job they have done, particularly those who made suggestions. The way members of the opposition talk about it, it is as though they are making people's suffering a political matter, which it is not.

It is tragic and most unfortunate to see people so preoccupied with their political future that they put the future of people in serious trouble at risk.

The purpose of sending Bill C-12 to committee after first reading was to create an effective opportunity to look for areas of improvement that would still be consistent with the goals of the bill. The committee has done an excellent job and has focused on one key concern: impact on workers in communities that are dependent on seasonal industries.

The minister and committee members saw the many benefits for seasonal workers in the move to an hours based system instead of a weeks based system, the use of tools such as the family income supplement to better assist low income workers supporting families and a range of innovative employment benefits. These alone will bring 45,000 people benefits they could not get under the old UI. It will extend benefits for another 270,000 workers. Many of these people are in seasonal industries.

They also identified three issues at the heart of the concerns felt by many Canadians about this big step forward: treatment of gaps in earnings; the divisor used to calculate benefits; and the impact of the intensity rule on people with low incomes. They listened, they looked for solutions and they found workable ideas that will increase the fairness of this new program for workers in seasonal industries.

Now people will be allowed to use income within the 26 week period prior to filing a claim when calculating average income for employment insurance benefits. That will increase benefits by about $246 million, much of it to seasonal workers.

The divisor that is used to calculate benefits will be two weeks above the regional minimum entrance requirement. That will increase benefits by about $95 million for workers in seasonal industries in high unemployment regions.

The intensity rule will not apply to people who are receiving the family income supplement. Other workers who can pick up some work while on claim will be able to earn credits that will reduce the impact of the intensity rule on them too. Those steps will increase benefits by about $24 million for low income workers.

Government members have listened to seasonal workers and they have responded with fair and balanced changes that will make this new legislation work even better.

Employment insurance reform is not a once and for all step. It is an ongoing process of feedback and adjustments. We will assess the impact on people, not just measure whether or not they are adjusting to the system.

The government will use a series of objective tools to monitor the impact of measures in the new act on individuals, employers and communities. It will monitor the performance of the economy and the job markets. It will monitor the ways in which workers, employers, industries and communities adjust.

About a dozen communities across Canada will be selected for an in depth study. They will be chosen to represent different types of labour markets. Some will be urban, others will be smaller cities and towns. Some will be rural and some will be seasonal economies.

The employment insurance commission will monitor and assess how individuals, communities and the economy are being impacted by the changes and what type of adjustments they are making. The commission will report annually to Parliament. The monitoring process will assess the degree to which individuals are finding additional work in the new system and how much employers are providing more work. The Minister of Human Resources Development told the committee and Canadians that if the bill is not performing up to expectations we will see it clearly and take the necessary actions.

These monitoring steps will allow an assessment of how this new employment insurance system has resulted in changed behaviour by individuals, employers and communities. For example, we know the old system sometimes led people to refuse work that was available because the old UI rules could mean people could actually lose money from a claim they were going to file by working at less than their previous average weekly wage. We believe the new system will correct these problems. It will make work pay.

The department has provided us with a great deal of research that suggests this bill will achieve its goals. However the monitoring will ensure that what we sincerely believe will happen after Bill C-12 becomes law actually does. It will allow us to check our predictions against results.

In closing I commend and thank the members of the committee who contributed positively to the bill being presented today. This bill could have been presented to the House sooner had the government received co-operation from the opposition.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:40 p.m.

Bloc

Paul Crête Bloc Kamouraska—Rivière-Du-Loup, QC

Madam Speaker, the amendments discussed today are on the mandate that will be given to the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission.

We find in this mandate the whole spirit of the act. This is why we wish that it be modified. I will read you briefly a few lines that express very clearly how the government wants things to be done. It says:

3 (1) The Commission shall monitor and assess how individuals, communities and the economy are adjusting to the changes made by this Act-

They take people for some kind of guinea pigs. "We will see how you will live with that, but, as a government, we will not take on any obligation. We do not assume any responsability". It is the whole spirit of the act that it expressed in the mandate given to the commission. "Give us your money, we will take care of it. The system is financed only by you, the employers and the employees, but it does not matter, we will put all the obligations on your side, and we, as a government, will make no commitment". It would have been a nice place to find a commitment by the government to say if the measures really have an effect on employment.

Will the unemployment insurance reform, in one, two, three years, have the impact expected by the government and help people find a job more easily? There is no obligation of this type in this clause. All that will be done will be to check how people have adjusted. It is truly the bureaucratic approach. Punitive action will be taken, the commission will see how people react to this action and, one year from now, the government will be in a position to say that there are more abusers than before because the act will have been made more complicated so as to produce more abusers.

This is an absurd way of thinking, because the unemployment insurance fund is fully financed by employers and employees. They are the ones who should have their say in the reform. There should be something about employment in the bill. Since the commission is asked to report to the minister, to produce an annual report of its assessment and the additional reports that the minister may request, do you not think that it would have been normal to say somewhere in the bill that the government will adopt unemployment reduction objectives, labour utilization objectives, that it will try to give people more jobs and that the commission will have to report on the effectiveness of the measures taken to meet those objectives?

No, according to the bill, the reports will deal with the success of the follow-up on people. It says, for example: "How the benefits and other assistance are utilized by employees and employers, their effect on the obligations of claimants to be available for and to seek employment".

The whole bill is based on the principle that people are abusers. In our society, it has been proved by statistics that only 4 per cent of the three million people having claimed UI benefits were abusers. Let us look at any other legislation, the Income Tax Act, for instance, to see if there is no more than 4 per cent of dodging. Is it normal to pass a bill imposing on all workers, in a deliberate and exaggerated way, rules that are specifically intended to deal with 4 per cent of Canadians? The government could have drafted a bill which looked at things differently.

The first thing it could have done is state that the commission is allowed to let employers, employees and all those concerned have their say. When the bill states that "The commission shall monitor and assess how individuals, communities and the economy are adjusting to the changes made", why is the burden of proof not reversed to let people come to testify and share their experience?

Nowadays, when we hear accounts like the one we heard at the demonstration in Rivière-du-Loup, where a young woman told us that her brother and her spouse committed suicide because of a lack of jobs and of the insecurity created by the UI reform, I think there are questions we must ask ourselves. We are not here simply to manage millions and billions of dollars. We are also here to create systems which will make people as happy as they can be and give them the opportunity to earn a decent salary to support their families. This should be part of the objectives of any government. We are not only accountants. We are people who have to make sure that laws promote development for everyone.

I would like to draw the attention of the House to a new element the government is trying to slip through with this bill. It has decided that those who would refuse training programs would no longer have the right to appeal. Let us take the example of young people who have studied and graduated, then landed a first job, but now find themselves in an impossible situation. There are no jobs in their field. They must decide if they will accept another training program and find out if there will be programs offered in their region, if they will have to move and what exactly they will be offered. If they refuse, they are automatically penalized and cannot appeal against that decision.

We know that, in legislation as complex as this bill, many decisions are interpreted differently depending on the official, not because government officials are not skilled, not because they do not know their subject well enough, but simply because provisions can be interpreted in different ways. The 45 or 50-year old employee who just lost his job because of technological changes and who is offered training in an area he knows nothing about is told by the official that the training will help him find a new job.

A worker aged 45, 50 or 55 who has just lost his job and needs unemployment insurance, may not need specialized training but rather some training to face the labour market, to find out what is coming and what kind of choices he will have to make. If we tell him: "Well, you always worked in construction, but the area where we expect employment in the future is tourism, you must go and take a 52-week course in tourism", this person, who never worked in that sector and thinks he might not have what it takes and would rather think about it a little longer and find out whether there are other programs or other things which would interest him more, is going to face a situation where he will not be at liberty to refuse.

It is more and more the state that is going to move people about, like pawns on a chess board, to get them to take a training course. If we, in our riding offices, are not aware that a fifteenth person is needed to complete a group so the course can be given, could the counsellor, at that time, be faced with a situation where he must steer someone in that direction, to fill the fifteenth slot, even though that training course might not really meet his needs according to his abilities, simply to be able to go ahead with the course, so that the 14 others to can receive their training?

According to the legislation, that person will have no other choice because if he refuses, he will be penalized and will not have the right to appeal. Others will come knocking on our doors because of a legislation that will not have corrected this kind of situation.

In clause 3, when it says that

The Commission shall monitor and assess how individuals, communities and the economy are adjusting to the changes made by this Act to the insurance and employment assistance programs-

it means the commission will have many things to monitor. There are many human factors, many variables in this bill. There will be significant secondary effects and numerous unforeseeable consequences.

Let us take just one example: the change from a system based on the number of weeks to one based on the number of hours. Will this change be good? Will it really make it possible for more people to qualify, as the government claims? Are there not secondary effects-for instance, the 910-hour requirement for new entrants, the increased number of hours compared to the old system-that will systematically force people onto welfare?

Will there not be increased pressure on transfer payments? Will this not gradually lead to an absurd situation, in which the UI fund runs a surplus while reducing training for claimants and providing fewer services to those who need them?

The mandate given the commission in clause 3 will not help us reach our goal. To do so, we must find a way for the commission to report directly to Parliament so we can get to the bottom of this.

One only has to remember the myriad studies-there is talk of 26 studies-that were done on the employability of seasonal workers. It was like pulling teeth. The government put on the table the studies it was interested in, but several of them were never released.

In conclusion, it will be very important to make sure the commission has a clear mandate that does not simply reflect the financial consequences of the reform, but really assesses its impact on employment. That is why we are urging the government to approve our amendment.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

5:50 p.m.

Liberal

Wayne Easter Liberal Malpeque, PE

Madam Speaker, on this grouping of motions I listened again very intently, as I did the other day, to the human resources development critic for the Bloc party. I hoped to hear members opposite give some good, reasoned arguments for the amendments they are proposing in this section. Sadly their arguments were wanting.

We are reasonable people on this side of the House. We listen to reasonable arguments. As I said the other day, we listened to the reasonable arguments put forward at committee and as a result substantive changes were made to the bill. Several problem areas have been fixed. This bill is substantially improved and will meet much better the needs of seasonal workers and the needs of the regions of the country.

The member for Mercier in her remarks talked about cutting off entitlement. I want to refer to some of the numbers that were used by myself and others the other day. The fact is that more part time workers will be in the system: 500,000 more individuals will have their work insured. The 45,000 seasonal workers who, despite paying premiums, were not eligible for UI, will be eligible for EI. The hours based system is beneficial. In high unemployment areas somebody working a 45-hour week will now qualify with just over nine weeks of work.

This bill is actually improving the entitlement of people who are getting into the system. I want the member for Mercier to understand that.

The argument that puzzled me most was the member saying the bill supposedly gave a gift to corporations. Any of us who sat at committee, as did some of the members opposite, can recall what the representative groups from the big corporations, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, and so on, were saying. They certainly did not see it as a gift. They were concerned that perhaps too many benefits in the system were going to the less well to do and to seasonal industries.

Let us look for a moment at the maximum insurable earnings that the member talked about. They are being reduced to bring the MIE into line with the average industrial wage. That makes sense. When the UI system first came in, the maximum insurable earnings were at the industrial wage level but they have gone out of line over the years. They have to be brought back into line. That is what this bill does.

The maximum insurable earnings have to be brought into line gradually with balance so that people are not unduly affected. Dropping them to $39,000 means that they will fall to about 17 per cent above the average wage in the year 2000 versus growing to about 47 per cent above.

When I talk to the people in my area, they cannot understand why some people cannot live on over $40,000 a year or slightly higher and why they need to draw unemployment insurance at that level.

This bill is trying to come to grips with that and better balance the system. We will admit that while this results in some high income earners and their employers paying less in premiums it also means that there are substantive savings on the expenditure side as such workers will receive substantially less in benefits.

Keep in mind that the benefits are less at the high income level, bringing better balance to the system. The people who need the system in the regional industries can continue to take advantage of it. I see that as a major improvement to the system, one about which people have come to me and asked be changed.

I hate to accuse members of the Bloc Quebecois of throwing a red herring into this debate but I have to. They say there is no appeal for training programs. They are trying to negate the bill on the basis of that point. Let me ask, is there an appeal process under the current system that they seem to accept without criticism? There is not.

Let us take a closer look at it. The appeal mechanism in place for EI claimants and part I benefits is a formal process to ensure that regulations spelled out in legislation governing the EI fund are being adhered to, and that individuals are not being denied the benefits to which they are entitled. That is under Part I.

There is an appeal process at that level. I do not like to see this kind of fearmongering going on, and people saying there is no appeal process. There is one under part I.

Part II is substantially different. Part II is based not on an individual entitlement but on a framework of benefits and measures that can be implemented with discretion and judgment according to local and regional needs and priorities. Decisions are made, not on objective criteria bound by strict rules and regula-

tions, but within guidelines and strategies developed to respond to labour market conditions and the needs of the local work force.

Individuals, groups, employers and others may all be recipients of program resources. It would not be appropriate or practical to introduce a formal appeal process to such a framework. It is not in the current system. This is what I find absolutely amazing. I have never heard that complaint about the current system.

Given the fiscal framework, it is not possible to meet the expectations of every group and individual. While exercising flexibility and discretion, local offices must at the same time ensure that decisions are made fairly, equitably and transparently within an overall strategic planning process. Officers are held accountable for results, including participation by priority groups.

I wanted to raise those points because there is some strange information and a little bit of fear mongering which is being put on the record by members opposite.

I will raise one last point. I believe the last speaker mentioned the zero to 15 hours as if moving to the hours based system was a problem. We had this debate previously. I must remind the member again that by moving to the hours based system we improve the system substantially.

We will be getting out of the 15 hour trap which mainly affects women and to a great extent people who work in fast food outlets. The new system allows multiple job holders to get into the system and to draw benefits if needed, which we hope they are not because we are working very strenuously on the side of employment. However, the hours based system will help people get into the system if they need to. The benefits to a great extent will help women who are presently not entitled to get into the system. That is an improvement.

At least once during the debate members opposite should recognize some of the improvements in the system.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

6 p.m.

Bloc

Antoine Dubé Bloc Lévis, QC

Madam Speaker, I liked the speech made by my colleague from Malpeque, because it really spurs me on. Being gagged can lead to yawning and dozing off, but the previous speaker really gets us cracking, because for someone who was disappointed by the arguments heard so far he really used some very poor counterarguments. Let us dwell a little on what he said.

First of all, I have been a member of the human resources development committee ever since the Liberal Party was elected, along with the hon. member for Mercier and also my colleague from Kamouraska-Rivière-du-Loup, the last three speakers. Two years and a half ago, we travelled throughout the country and the hon. member for Malpeque says that he listened carefully to the views expressed during the last phase, that is consideration of the bill since it was introduced in the House. Let us see what he has to say. We ask for clause 3 to be deleted, because we think that it does not provide for a better role for the commission to play than it has now. So, we want clause 3 to be deleted.

Why? Here is the first argument about clause 3. What does the clause say?

(1)The Commission shall monitor and assess how individuals, communities and the economy are adjusting-

We wanted to know the real impact of the legislation, not the way people are adjusting to it, because that is the whole issue here. The main hypothesis behind the reform proposed by the Minister of Human Resources Development is that individuals should adjust to the cuts and the commission will assess how they are adjusting. But what we wanted to find out is the real impact these cuts have on the regional and local economy. This is outside the mandate of the commission.

The hon. member says he is disappointed by our amendments. For the member's information and others' as well, let me point out that, at report stage, the opposition cannot move amendments that can incur expenditures. This means that, under the parliamentary rules presently in force, this type of amendment must be proposed by the government in order to be admissible.

The best evidence of this is the fact that, in committee, three members proposed amendments; I do not remember the name of their ridings, but they proposed three amendments. Because they implied financial changes, these amendments could not be proposed during clause by clause consideration of the bill; they had to be submitted in this House, by the government.

One must be careful before criticizing the opposition's behaviour. One must understand the rules. The opposition respects the rules. This is why we did not propose amendments that would have had financial implications. If it had been possible for us to do so, we would have proposed several amendments of this type. For example, there is the $2 billion cut resulting from the reform. We would have seen to it that the reform had no impact at all, in other words that there would have been no $2 billion cut. Unfortunately, the Liberal Party did not understand that.

There is also the consequence of reducing maximum insurable earnings. There are people, employees as well as businesses, who will benefit from this $900 million gift, since there is, by lowering

insurable earnings from $42,430 to $39,000, a loss of $900 million to the government. It must be said, though, that the target group used to benefit in the past from $200 million in unemployment insurance benefits.

For the time I have left, I will dwell on a significant point raised by the hon. member. Speaking of rights of appeal, it is said that Part II on employment services has a collective rather than an individual scope. I believe this is misunderstanding the problem. It must be remembered that the unemployment insurance claimants who will be affected are individuals.

I will give you an example of what exists presently in employment services. We, in the opposition, have deplored it. We spoke at length about it in committee, and I believe the member was there. We said that in the program SEA, which helps people set up their own businesses, there is presently no right of appeal. I will give you a concrete example in my riding.

We have two employment centres in my riding, two centres which presently administer this program, which, by the way, was put in the new bill, under the same form. They changed its name, but it is essentially the same program. In the past, two people who knew each other decided to set up a business together. One went to one employment centre and the other went to the other for himself because the service is provided on an individual basis, even though they wanted to start a new company together. The first one's application was accepted while the other's was rejected. When the latter learned it, he mentioned to the employment service officer that his friend's application had been accepted, but the answer he got was that the decisions concerning that part of the program cannot be appealed.

The hon. member for Malpeque argues that it is collective and so on. Those are workers who, after losing their job, go to an employment centre to receive their benefits. After unsuccessfully looking for a job, they come to the conclusion that it is difficult for them because of their age or for other reasons. They then think of starting a company, so they devise a business plan that allows them to get benefits for a longer period.

After that, there is an assessment by a public servant or a committee but the decision cannot be appealed. In this specific case that occurred in my riding, the individuals could not even be heard. The decision was made by a committee without the individuals being able to argue before the committee.

If there is one thing I want as a Quebecer and I wish for all Canadians, it is that in all government programs, a person never be subjected to a decision made by one person or even by a committee without having the right to appeal. I think that by denying that right of appeal in Part II of the bill, the government is not showing the will to improve the system for the people.

Why are the appeal procedures important? According to the unemployment action groups, when a case goes to arbitration,

three out of four decisions are in favour of the recipient. Let me repeat something that can never be said often enough: this bill is intended to seek out UI cheaters. As the Minister of Human Resources Development told the committee the other day, "It is dreadful".

The figures the opposition has asked for and obtained tell us that, in 1991-92, 130,000 people were found guilty of defrauding the system in Canada, while the figure for 1995-96 was 116,000. That means there was a decrease of 14,000. This is not a growing problem, but a lessening one. What premise is the new unemployment insurance reform based on? Certqinly not on this.

Let us look at recovery. Of the $272 million recovered in 1995-1996, that is last year, only $93 million were recovered from individual cheaters. The remaining $179 million were due to honest mistakes on the part of claimants or of the Human Resources Development Department. Mistakes.

While it is still possible, we should change the spirit of the reform to make it not a hunt for so-called cheaters or potential cheaters, but a hunt for mistakes and delays.

This brings to mind the guaranteed income dupplement paid to some seniors. We know that there have been delays again this year. Last Friday, the minister apologized for the problems caused by this situation. Meanwhile, the government reduces the number of employment centres and increases the number of computer terminals.

Our goal should be to eliminate errors, to improve the system so that people do not get penalized. I also believe that we should go back five or six years and remedy to errors done by the Department of Human Resources Development in three cases out of four by giving refunds.

Employment Insurance ActGovernment Orders

6:10 p.m.

Liberal

Roger Simmons Liberal Burin—St. George's, NL

Madam Speaker, I too want to say a few words on Bill C-12.

I want to support the legislation as I did earlier in this House because I believe the time has come for a change in the legislation. The past system was not working, not doing the job it was intended to do and just was not good enough. The system had served its purpose fairly well over the years but the time had come where it had outgrown itself and it was time for a basic structural change. I am not the only one who believes that of course. We are told that fully four out of five Canadians believe that the existing system is not working and needs to be fixed.

The legislation, initially introduced last December by the now Minister of Foreign Affairs, is meant to address the calls of four out of five Canadians for a structural change in the system. The

legislation is also meant to make the system more workable, affordable, modern and more functional.

I want to talk particularly about the impact of the changes on seasonal workers because I proudly represent the constituency of Burin-St. George's. This riding has a number of industries which by their very nature are seasonal, for example, logging, fishing, mineral extraction, construction. The overwhelming majority of my constituents earn their living from seasonal work activity.

The downturn in the fishery of course has not helped the situation. When I first came to Parliament I would stand in the House and brag that my riding had the same unemployment rate as Alberta at the time, which was about 4 per cent. The disaster in the groundfishery has changed all of that, of course. The unemployment rate in Burin-St. George's is the highest anywhere in Canada. It is 35 per cent, to the degree that it can be measured at all. Therefore, members will understand my particular emphasis today on how the bill will impact seasonal workers.

I believe that many seasonal workers will find the new employment insurance program to be a big improvement over the old UI program. One of the most important changes is the shift to calculating eligibility through hours of work, not weeks, which was the old, arbitrary method. Many people in seasonal industries work long hours when the work is there, far beyond the normal work week of 35 or 40 hours. People in those industries tend to work much more than 40 hours when work is available.

More workers in seasonal industries will qualify. Some will qualify sooner because of the extra hours I have just mentioned. Many will get benefits for a longer period. These are some of the good features of the legislation.

This change alone will bring benefits to 45,000 workers in seasonal industries who are now shut out of the system. It will add about three weeks more benefits for an additional 270,000 workers. I are talking about people like construction workers, fishery and forestry workers. They can all put in more than 50 hours a week. Under UI they never received credit for those additional hours of work. Now they will because the eligibility is based on the number of hours worked.

The new system will benefit workers in a a number of other ways. However, the benefits of the program are fairly well known and I believe I have an obligation to focus on some of the concerns which my constituents and I have had with the legislation.

As good a piece of legislation as it is, it was never carved in stone, as the former minister said. I want to give credit to the new minister for the efforts which he has made and for the success he has had in bringing improvements to what was a fairly good piece of legislation in the first place, but needed some wrinkles taken out. Through the amendments, of which the minister is supportive, which we will be dealing with in the next day or so in the House, it is a much better piece of legislation now than when it was introduced in December.

For example, I had real concerns about the intensity rule. That rule would penalize people who, through no fault of their own, could not find enough work on a continuing basis and, therefore, would have more recourse to drawing benefits than would other people in other parts of the country. I felt from the beginning that was wrong. I still believe it is wrong.

The amendments which are being proposed will largely address that rule, particularly for the person who draws less than $26,000. However, I still say that the principle is wrong. It is a principle that I cannot support, when two people who engage in the same work activity at the same rate are paid different rates of benefits. I have had difficulty with it from the beginning. I could not support it then and I cannot support it now.

What I can support is the marvellous progress that has been made to address the needs of the low income worker, the worker who earns less than $26,000. Without taking the House through the details, members will be aware that marvellous strides have been made to address the situation of the low income earner.

I had concerns about the so-called divisor method. I am delighted that the amendments address that issue. My people and I have felt from the beginning that their benefits ought to be based on weeks worked, not on some arbitrary divisor which factored in weeks that they did not work, for example.

I had some concerns about the eligibility rules as they affect new entrants. I had some concerns about the clawback of benefits. I believe these matters are being addressed, explained and understood better by people who will be directly affected.

The impact on seasonal workers in my riding and in Newfoundland will be good. It will be a positive impact. They will be better off in a number of ways than they were before. There are particular pockets of people it would have impacted adversely but I believe the amendments that will be put before the House will deal largely with those issues. For that reason I am very pleased to give my support to the principle of the bill and to the various provisions in it.

However, as I said and will continue to say and act accordingly, I cannot support the principle that says we pay people who earn at the same rate different benefits on the basis that they accessed the employment system more frequently over the previous five years. I will not dwell on that at length. I believe everyone in the House and outside the House knows my feelings on that issue.

The Minister of Human Resources Development and the standing committee deserve a lot of credit for the improvements they have made to the initial legislation. As a result it is a much better bill, one which will benefit my constituents and others throughout the country.