Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure today to say a few words on the debate amending the Employment Insurance Act. I have listened intently to colleagues from both sides of the House and their serious discussion and comments pertaining to what is a very important issue for most members of the House of Commons.
I represent a very rural riding on the south coast of Newfoundland and Labrador where people through no fault of their own find themselves working seasonally. As someone said to me not too long ago, it is not the workers that are seasonal. It is the nature of the business they work in that is seasonal, whether it is forestry, logging or the construction industry, which is dictated by the abilities of government to fund road construction or climatic conditions such as winter conditions that prevent construction from taking place.
In my area of the country it has been dictated by the mismanagement of fish stocks around our coast. People who once worked for 12 months a year now find themselves working for much reduced periods of time. The length of employment the people I represent now enjoy has been decided in large measure by actions of successive federal governments.
We brought our resources into Confederation. The Government of Canada was supposed to be the custodian of our resources for our people. We have found that the situation has not quite worked out, for we find ourselves in some very difficult circumstances.
The people who I represent along the south coast of Newfoundland and Labrador always worked for 12 months a year. They did not know what vacations were. Our fish resources were so abundant that our people harvested and brought the fish to shore where our plant workers processed the fish in the processing plants. Then there was a collapse in our groundfish industry and as a consequence the duration of employment was significantly reduced.
As I travel around the coast it is quite sad to see what has happened to very proud people who knew nothing other than 12 months of work and through no fault of their own now work in a very seasonal industry, the fishery of Newfoundland and Labrador.
The bill was introduced last fall. Debate had begun. Then we went into a general election. Obviously Canadians gave the government a very clear mandate to proceed in the direction we were going in, which is the direction we are continuing today. That is why we reintroduced the bill.
The changes in the bill will certainly improve our ability to address the original goals of employment insurance reform that were introduced before the election. One very important amendment we see coming forward today is the elimination of the intensity rule.
I have met on many occasions with representatives of fisheries unions, logging unions and construction workers all along the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador. One thing they can never understand, and I never understood it as well, is how the intensity rule ever got passed into law. We have been penalizing people through no fault of their own because they happen to live in regions of the country where they are unable to find full time employment.
The intensity rule has penalized them each time they were laid off and went to reopen an EI claim. The dreaded intensity rule reduced their employment insurance benefits by 1%. They went from 55% down to 51%, where most of them are right now. If it had continued they would have bottomed out at 50%. They would never have gone back up to the 55% benefit rate if these amendments had not been introduced in the House. I strongly support the elimination of the intensity rule because it has penalized people in all regions who could least afford such penalization.
What really was ironic and brought it home to me was that the Government of Canada was the custodian of our fish resources from coast to coast to coast. We make decisions about how much fish we can catch and the technologies that can be used in harvesting fish. All management decisions about fish resources are made by the Government of Canada, and successive federal governments have mismanaged our fish resources. That is why our groundfish stocks collapsed and our people were put out of work.
How ironic it was to see the very people who were put out of work because of government mismanagement and a decline in fish stocks being penalized each time they re-opened an EI claim, and through no fault of their own, by the government that was supposed to be managing those resources on their behalf.
I am absolutely delighted today to see that we are going to eliminate the intensity rule and re-establish the benefit rate to 55%. Those of us who have followed EI reform for the last six or seven years know full well that not too long ago the benefit rate was much higher than 55%. Even with re-establishing it at 55%, people are still receiving significantly less in EI benefits than they were five or six years ago and are still bringing home far less through no fault of their own.
As well, I am very pleased that we are going to see the removal of the benefit repayment clawback. It will be raised to $48,750. This is very important as well to a lot of people because at the $39,000 cap many people were clawed back when they filed their income tax return. Raising that cap is a very good move.
The other encouraging thing is that the measure will apply to the 2000 taxation year and those people who are filing income tax returns about now will benefit for that year.
Representing a very rural riding in Newfoundland and Labrador, I am very pleased as well to see that there will be an adjustment to the fishing regulations pertaining to special benefits to ensure that self-employed fishers can take advantage of the recently improved maternity, parental and sickness benefits. Again, this measure will be effective retroactive to December 31, 2000.
These amendments are very positive and are amendments that I strongly support. I lobbied and worked hard within the Atlantic Liberal caucus and the national caucus to bring about those changes because I believed they were needed. It has been a key undertaking of mine to bring about changes. Even though the government, back in 1996, said it would monitor, assess and evaluate the employment insurance reforms that were brought in, and we had done that, I felt that three or four of those measures were very necessary to make the system fair. Those measures included taking away the penalties that were being imposed on people who were involved in seasonal work through no fault of their own. I am delighted that we are making those amendments.
Having said that, and realizing that my time is about up, I just want to say that even with those changes and amendments, there are other areas of the Employment Insurance Act that, in my view, still need to reviewed, such as changes to the divisor factor and some other things. We are making some very important changes with those amendments, but other important amendments and changes are needed.