Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has raised an important question. He has basically made the allegation that the Department of Human Resources Development Canada is discriminating against women, specifically in the choices it makes during the evaluation of eligibility for employment insurance benefits.
The people involved in the member's concerns are a group of women who participated in the fishing industry in various forms. They basically came to the hon. member with what I would call a serious complaint. They felt that they were not receiving due process.
It may be worth pointing out that the people in question received what appears to be due process in that the Department of Human Resources Development Canada received complaints from members of the community in which the hon. member is actually a resident himself. When there is an allegation that a person may not be fulfilling the requirements under the arm's length provisions of the employment insurance eligibility criteria, the department has a responsibility to review it. It is quite often referred to Revenue Canada for investigation.
Departmental notes show that under these circumstances the evidence did not indicate that there was full compliance with the requirements for insurable earnings. Again, these allegations of abuse came from the community members themselves. They were not generated by departmental officials per se, but in many instances came from the community.