Debates of Feb. 13th, 2001

Employment Insurance Act

[Bev Desjarlais, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak to this very important piece of legislation, a piece of legislation that has been a long time coming.

Before I get into the legislation itself, I do want to take this opportunity to thank the people of Churchill riding for their support of myself and the staff in my office. I believe that by re-electing me they were also showing support for the work that the staff in my office have done over the last three and a half years in acting and speaking on their behalf in the Parliament of Canada. Churchill is a huge, very diverse riding, with aboriginal and non-aboriginal populations that are almost an even split. There are industrial communities and very poor communities. I truly thank the people from the riding for their show of support.

Within the riding I have 31 first nation communities. The unemployment rates in those communities are extremely high. I am not talking about 15% to 20% unemployment. I am talking 70%, 80%, 90% or 95% unemployment in a number of those communities, so I can tell the House that it has been a very tough haul in the last few years.

Many who do work in those communities work at seasonal and part time employment. A lot of that employment is reliant on winter roads: logging and the shipping of equipment and goods over those roads while they are in place. Others fish, trap and are guides at some of the best world class fishing and hunting lodges. Others find work in the construction industry in the spring, summer and early fall, the only times that we are really able in the north to do a lot of those things.

Through no fault of their own, the seasonal and part time workers have suffered severely under this Liberal government's employment insurance strategy. It is no wonder, because I listened to a previous Liberal colleague indicate that the Liberal government planned its program so that people would not be dependent on EI. I do not know which people on EI he knows, but most I know would gladly be working rather than be on EI. They do not plan their lives to be on employment insurance.

I suggest that when a government has a warped sense of guidelines as to what a program is based on, chances are that it will come up with a program that does not meet the needs of the unemployed. That is why we saw people struggling to survive on low EI payments or being forced to go on welfare. Let us be clear about this: when the government cut EI payments, the numbers on social assistance increased and the numbers using food banks increased. In my riding alone, in the year 1998, EI benefits were reduced by just under $17 million. A riding of about 78,000 people saw a reduction of $17 million in money coming in. Most of those people had very low incomes.

Who suffered from this misguided Liberal program? Those people exactly, those least able to cope: the aboriginal and seasonal and part time workers and the women, pregnant or otherwise, were those whose suffering was greatest.

This program failed drastically to meet the needs of those people and not at a time when there was not money in the program to benefit those people. With huge surpluses in the program, what did the government do? It used those dollars to make it seem like the government, with its great planning, was reducing the deficit.

That was not the case. It was not the government that was doing a darn fine job of management. It was the government doing a darn fine job of ripping off those people paying into EI, the employers and the workers who were out there working and supporting a program that they wanted to have available for workers who did not have the opportunity to work. The workers who are out there do not begrudge paying EI, but they want to know that the dollars in the EI program are going to unemployed workers and to training and not going to making the finance minister or the Prime Minister look good. They want the money to go to what it was designed to do.

Before I get into more of my thoughts on the government's misuse of EI dollars, I also want to comment on an article I have in front of me. My staff often think I am a little crazy because I read almost everything that comes across my desk. I often find really good work. This is from Health News , from the University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine. It is from an article from early last year called “Can Unemployment Make you Sick?”

It's not just the fact of losing a job and an income. People's identities can be highly tied to their jobs—traditionally the case for men—so a job loss can be psychologically traumatic. —The stress of job loss can produce actual biochemical changes in the body (although not all of those are necessarily negative). —higher levels of cortisol, prolactin, growth hormone, cholesterol and HDL-cholesterol, as well as lowered immune reactions compared to when they were still working.

I listened to all these people that have been talking today on EI and I ask them to think of the number of adult men in the fishing industry, in the part time jobs and the seasonal jobs in my riding. How many fall into this category?

The article continues:

Among adult men in particular, unemployment is associated with a higher risk of heart disease. Unemployed workers visit doctors more often and are admitted to hospital more frequently than employed people. There's even evidence of an increased death rate among unemployed people—particularly unemployed middle aged men—with suicides, accidents, heart disease and lung cancer accounting for the increased mortality.

Did these people need the added stress and hassle of the Liberal government's employment insurance plan cutting the number of weeks that they were able to work, adjusting the intensity rule and not allowing them to get as much from their benefits as before? Did they need that? No. Added to the stress, they got an employment insurance program that did not meet their needs. They were made to feel like criminals for wanting their own dollars that they put into unemployment. Also, the government could make itself look good.

The government has come up with this legislation and I should note that they waited long enough to do it after the great work of members of this House of Commons. I want to commend my colleague, the member for Acadie—Bathurst, as well as a number of Bloc members who worked very hard to continually bring up the issue of changes needed in the EI program, time and time again.

It must have been two and a half or three years before the government finally listened and came up with this legislation, saying yes, it would identify some of the areas that need to be changed. Is it going to solve the problem? Not a chance. The problem is still there, and again, not because the dollars are not there in the EI program. They are there. I believe it is $38 billion a year we are looking at. That surplus is going to be a huge amount of money, which was intended for the use of unemployed workers and those who needed training. These changes are definitely not going to meet those needs.

There are some other areas we could look at improving. The government could have looked at amendments to eliminate the two week waiting period for apprentices. I hope and I am sure they will be introduced at committee stage or in the House of Commons later on. Why on earth, with a surplus in the fund, would the government not put in place amendments allowing apprentices this? These men and women are apprenticing. They are in the workforce, but they want to go back to school. They need money coming in. EI will pay them, but there is a two week waiting period.

Why on earth is there a two week waiting period? Why on earth do they have to be penalized for being in the workforce and continuing their education? Why on earth would the government put in a two week waiting period and leave it there when there is a surplus in the EI program? There is no reason whatsoever other than to give a pat on the back to the finance minister.

We could increase the maximum insurable earnings and give those people who are working in high income jobs the opportunity to pay in on that and then get an increased amount back. Also, the qualifying period should include any period of employment, 52 weeks in the 260 weeks preceding. Give a fair chance to people who are going out there looking for whatever job they can get. It can be sporadic, with a week here or a couple of days there, but they are out there, so give them a fair chance to benefit from the employment insurance plan.

Again, as a number of Bloc members have mentioned today, allow the self-employed to be active participants in the EI program. It is not as if the program is suffering. It is not as if these people would not willingly pay into the program. A good insurance program does not look at how it can cut and slice and take away parts of itself. It looks at how the program can be enhanced. Let us enhance the program and allow more people to access it. Allow the self-employed to pay into the program and access it.

We need to allow persons receiving workmen's compensation payments to continue making EI payments. Right now they are restricted from doing so. I have situations in my riding where persons who are getting workmen's compensation do not have payments made to EI or CPP due to the nature of the way the structure has been set up. As a result, they are in a crucial period.

Madam Speaker, I know you are giving me the timelines, so I just want to follow up and say that I also support the setting up of a separate commission or insurance board to look after EI.

I also have just one comment. I suggest that what has happened with the Liberal government is that the finance minister is acting as Robin Hood and Prince John has joined him in taking money from the unemployed and giving it to the rich.

[Diane St-Jacques, Liberal, Shefford, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would first like to point to something very important. The bill was introduced in the House before and got to second reading. Then an election was called, and Canadians gave us the mandate to continue along the same path. This is why we are bringing forth the bill again.

It is very important to put things in perspective. The establishment of the new employment insurance system, in July 1996, was the first major reform of the program in 25 years.

The old unemployment insurance system had served Canadians well, but it had become obvious that it no longer met the needs of the active population. When reforming a system as old as the unemployment system, one has to expect that adjustments will become necessary later on. This is why the government is putting forward the legislative amendments before us today.

We are not going back to the system that existed prior to 1996, as some of my colleagues suggested earlier. The 1996 reform original objectives remain unchanged. The government still wants to bring more fairness to the system, to reduce dependency on benefits, to assist low income families, to reduce the costs associated with the program and to give greater priority to active measures to help some workers get back to work. These objectives are as important today as they were in 1996.

As my hon. colleagues in the House know, the government has reviewed and assessed the effects of the 1996 reform. Our studies show that most of the elements of the employment insurance scheme, like the divisor and the hours based system, are working well, but that some elements need to be changed.

On the whole, the employment insurance scheme is up to its raison-d'être, which is to act as a security net for workers temporarily out of work. We are constantly reviewing its implementation, and we find that it is indeed the case. However, it is not perfect. Perfection is hard if not impossible to achieve.

This does not mean, however, that we should not be making adjustments. That is why we are putting forward these proposals to the House. This is not the first time changes are being made to the employment insurance scheme. We have changed elements in the system before. For example, in 1997, we launched a pilot project on shortened work weeks, which help ensure that people whose income is low at times do not see their benefits cut.

The close monitoring of the implementation of the new system and the analysis of the opinions expressed by workers directly affected by certain provisions now allow us to make new adjustments.

Regarding the intensity rule, we have to admit that it is a measure that did not work as expected. Because it did not result in the work effort increasing while dependency decreased, and because it is seen as having a punitive effect, we propose to eliminate it.

On the other hand, the clawback provision, or more specifically the benefit repayment provision, is a different matter. That measure was introduced to deter high income earners from frequently relying on employment insurance. The majority of middle income earners pay premiums for many years without ever claiming benefits. Since the purpose was to deter repeated claims by high income earners, first time claimants should not be affected, because they are certainly not abusing the EI plan.

We are suggesting that all first time claimants should be exempted from the clawback provision.

I am sure hon. members will agree with me that the clawback provision should not apply to Canadians who get benefits because they are too sick to be working or because they stay home after the birth of a child to take care of a baby. That is why we are suggesting that claimants collecting special benefits also be exempted.

We are deeply convinced that the clawback provision should apply only to high income earners who rely frequently on employment insurance, and not to middle income earners.

We have realized also that rules governing re-entrants should take into account the extremely important role of the parents in the early development of their children. Nothing is more important than the responsibility to raise the next generation. Those who do assume that responsibility ought not to be penalized if they choose to withdraw from the work force to do so.

This is why the government proposes to adapt the rule that applies to people returning to the work force. We propose to make it easier for new parents to qualify for regular benefits if they lose their job after re-entering the work force after a prolonged absence raising children.

Thus, the increased requirements for eligibility for regular benefits will not apply to people who have returned to the work force after drawing maternity or parental benefits in the four years prior to the present two-year period of retroactivity.

The bill before the House includes a recommendation on maximum insurable earnings. This is an important figure, because it determines maximum benefits under the program, as well as maximum contributions. The present bill proposes maintaining insurable earnings at $39,000, until the average industrial wage exceeds that figure.

Once it does, we propose that there be an annual adjustment in maximum insurable earnings according to the average industrial wage in subsequent years.

Until 2006 the Canada Employment Commission will continue to monitor and assess the effects of the new employment insurance program.

The changes we are proposing, and the vigilance of the commission, will ensure that the EI program conforms to its objective of meeting the needs of Canadian workers in need of a temporary source of income when they are between jobs. The commission will also help us to determine how the EI program is responding to labour market changes.

Canadians know their government is attentive to their needs. We are determined to make the employment insurance program one of the best of its kind in the entire industrialized world.

Of course, the best guarantee of financial security is stable employment. That is why the Government of Canada will continue the work undertaken with the provinces and territories, with business and local leaders in order to help create an economic climate that provides employment opportunities to all Canadians.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to speak to the House when you are in the chair, but this should not divert our attention from the extremely despicable, antidemocratic and deplorable nature of the practice which started during the previous parliament and which brings the government to act offhandedly and to resort to gag orders on issues of crucial importance for our fellow citizens.

I know that the citizens of Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, those of Shefford and those of every other region in Quebec will remember the disregard of this government for members of parliament and the arrogance with which it deals with important issues.

The Bloc Quebecois has always been very much concerned about the employment insurance reform. It goes back to the beginning of 1996, and was sponsored by Lloyd Axworthy, who has left public life. The member for Mercier and my colleague, the member for Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup—Témiscouata—Les Basques, an admirable man I am sure my colleagues will all agree, and I know they will join me in applauding him for his extraordinary work on the employment insurance issue—both were worried about the shrinking of the coverage.

I remember vividly the arrogance with which the government answered our questions, particularly the minister at the time, Mr. Axworthy, whenever we said that if this system was maintained not even 50% of the population would have access to employment insurance benefits. When we talked that way, we were accused of being offhand and airy, we were compared to the nutty professor because such a scenario seemed so improbable.

However, the assessment report tabled by the Government of Canada through the Department of Human Resources Development indicates—as was pointed out by the hon. member for Chambly, a well-known authority on social democracy, whose outstanding legal knowledge has earned him, in the past, a brilliant career as a notary and who remains for me a source of inspiration—that nowadays only 4 out of 10 workers qualify for EI benefits even if everyone on the labour market does pay premiums.

Is this not a damning indictment of our democracy and the operations of our institutions? We must understand the difference between an assistance program and an insurance program. Employment insurance is not a charity. Workers as well as employers pay premiums for employment insurance. When things take a turn for the worse and we end up unemployed, it usually comes as a complete surprise due to massive layoffs, job loss or industrial restructuring. These are all circumstances out of our control.

Why is it that we now have a plan—one of the few in the western world I am told—to which the federal government has stopped contributing? It is essentially workers and employers who contribute, not quite equally, to the plan. They do not contribute equally, but they both contribute. Is that the vision of our fellow citizens? Is that what they expect from a responsible government?

We know how fragile the labour market is. I believe I am not mistaken, Madam Speaker, if I say that you yourself are in your early forties. We have both followed a similar path. We were both involved in the labour market without being linked to a single employer. However, my 63-year-old father—whom you would like very much—worked for the same employer all his life.

He raised five children. He worked for a textile company all his life. He started working just before his 16th birthday and worked pretty much all his life for the same employer.

Today, the nature of the labour market is such that this scenario is becoming more and more unusual. It is no longer typical.

We know that most people will have at least five employers and at least five careers over the course of their life and this is why it is very important when we are between jobs to have a plan that is well adapted to this reality.

Is this the case of employment insurance as we know it? Certainly not. What is the most incredible, and I will not hide the fact that it disgusts me, is the kind of servile complacency with which the government party supports the bill. There is not one voice of dissent to be heard. What did the members from Montreal, from Quebec, from the maritimes say about the representations made to them by their fellow citizens? Because, of course, everywhere in Canada, people know that the plan does not make any sense.

Such behaviour by the majority is deplorable. Government members can rise in the House and talk about social justice, about Pierre Elliott Trudeau, about social democracy and boast about being true liberals, but, at the same time, they can, just like sheep, rise in the House and vote without the slightest thought for the poor in favour of a plan that is contributing to making them poorer.

This will end some day, because the people will not tolerate eternally such arrogance on the part of the majority.

I would like to remind the House that we had made a demand that was supported by almost all well informed groups in Quebec. It was that the government present two bills, one being for the creation of an independent employment fund.

The member for Chambly repeated this earlier: the surplus in the employment insurance fund amounts to approximately $30 billion. This is not something trivial. The chief actuary of Human Resources Development Canada himself admitted that this situation does not make a lot of sense. Despite the surpluses I referred to, the government was not able to make the employment insurance plan more generous.

The Bloc Quebecois members have asked that the rule of 910 hours be abolished. It does not make sense that a young person who is new on the labour market and submits a first claim must have worked 910 hours to be eligible. Considering the social conditions young people live in, can this be considered an egalitarian approach. It is already hard enough to find that first job. How can we justify making things even more complicated for those who find themselves out of the labour market for a first time?

Considering the huge surpluses, we had asked that the coverage rate be increased to 60%. This is an absolute minimum. We do not think we are being extravagant. Nor do we feel prodigal in suggesting something like that.

Our pleas were not heard. Because of the servile silence of the government majority, our most needy fellow citizens are being left in an extremely preoccupying situation.

[An hon. member]

The Silence of the Lambs

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC]

The Silence of the Lambs

. I think if there is one valid movie reference, this is it.

I will end by calling for negotiations. The Government of Quebec wishes to establish an improved system of parental leave. Section 69 of the Employment Insurance Act would allow it. Why are negotiations hung up and what is the government waiting for to transfer the $600 million which Quebec could use effectively, by establishing an integrated system, one that would be unique and much more generous than what the federal government is offering?

Members will understand my pressing call. I caution the government against its highhandedness and I remind it that the Bloc Quebecois remains the first political force in Quebec. Its members will be there to remind people that this government has an unfair vision of social justice and that its employment insurance bill is unfair.

I will conclude by saying that contempt can only last for a while.

[John Bryden, Liberal, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot, ON]

Madam Speaker, I wanted to speak in this debate simply to make one basic statement, and that is that I make no apology as a member on this side for the legislation that this government brought in a few years ago that reformed and changed the unemployment insurance, as it was then called, to employment insurance.

In the same breath I also would say that I support the changes that are before the House now, but the point that is important to me, and I think that I can speak for certainly many of the people in my constituency, is that employment insurance could not stay the way it had been for decades. It had to change and I think it still has to change. This is a temporary fix at most and what the government tried to do a few years ago, in my mind, was absolutely correct.

We as members of parliament here represent our constituencies and different regions of the country and, more important, different economic opportunities. I take the point that was mentioned in one of the newspapers recently that this debate seems to go on regional lines and that we have on one side the western argument where they are not in need of employment insurance as much as Atlantic Canada and so on and so forth.

It is not a regional issue at all, but it is an issue of economic opportunity in particular constituencies. In my constituency the economic opportunities have long been very good. My riding is west of Hamilton and for a very long time there was a very successful manufacturing industry in Hamilton and indeed there was a lot of wealth in the region. While many people certainly were on employment insurance from time to time, or unemployment insurance, for the most part they were not as dependent upon it as those communities perhaps that are more resource based, where there are tremendous fluctuations in price for commodities that can lead indeed to sudden intervals of unemployment and where indeed there has to be a safety net.

When I was young, and I still like to think I am young, when I was entering the workforce out of high school, in my family my father was a working class Englishman but it was a point of pride that was inculcated in our household that if we could possibly help it we did not go on unemployment insurance.

I have paid into it for many, many years, and when I started in the workforce I worked in the local foundry in my community and I worked in a number of the manufacturing plants in Hamilton, chiefly to earn money for my education, but a job was a job and our family did not have much money and I certainly had to get out there and earn my keep.

Never did I ever think that employment insurance, or unemployment insurance as it was then known, was my entitlement. I never felt, and I still do not feel, that simply because I may have put many, many thousands of dollars into the unemployment insurance program over my career, I do not feel that it is something I should be entitled to simply because I put the money in.

The way I was brought up to look at unemployment insurance was that it really genuinely was an insurance program for those who were unfortunate in their employment and suddenly lost work. That is what I think it should be now and I support it 100% in that context, but as time went on abuses did creep into the system. In my own community there were some very, very obvious abuses at the time of the amendments we made to the legislation a few years ago.

One of the most notable ones was this whole question of seasonal employment. The example that comes to mind most graphically in my region was where the school boards would hire the clerical staff, the janitorial staff and the custodial staff for 10 months of the year and then fire them for two months. Then they would go on unemployment insurance and then they would be rehired after the cycle.

This obviously became a culture that the staff at the schools came to accept, that it was their entitlement to be working for 10 months of the year and then get unemployment for two months.

What was actually happening in this process, in my view, was the school boards and the provinces that financed the school boards, instead of giving a fair salary to the workers based on 12 months of the year, what they were doing was that they were giving a lesser salary and getting the top-up from the taxpayer, indeed not from the taxpayer but from those who were putting generally into the employment insurance fund.

I always felt and I still feel that this is wrong, that this is not what employment insurance was ever meant to be. Madam Speaker, you can go across the spectrum and you will find, you could find, many examples of this where employers deliberately took advantage of the employment and unemployment insurance program in order to give less wages and indeed to in another sense increase their profits, because when an employer can give less wages by hiring a person for only six or eight months when in fact they should be hiring them for 12 months, what they do is they lower their cost of operation and in fact widen their profits.

I thought it was very, very appropriate to try to address this problem of deliberate seasonal employment for the benefit not of the workers but for the benefit of the employer, so the attempt that was done a few years ago to address seasonal workers I thought was very appropriate.

Another side of the equation is when we look out of my particular area to the country and we look into those ridings—I like to think of it; it might be in Ontario; it might be in Nova Scotia; it might be in Alberta or British Columbia—where the work is seasonal because it is resource based, this creates something of a problem too in another sense.

If we have a resource base, a resource that has been exploited, be it wood, be it fish, that relies on the workers to work for six or eight months of the year and then be off on employment insurance for four months of the year as a regular year over year thing, what we are in fact doing is that we are subsidizing the collection of that resource. That is fine in the one sense, but what then happens is that we run the danger of overexploiting a resource. If people can cut trees or harvest fish at lower than the real cost and deliver them to the marketplace, then we are artificially inflating our ability to exploit that resource.

Consequently, because I really believe that we have an obligation to protect the forest, I really believe we have an obligation to protect the fisheries and any of these other resource based industries, I found it very difficult sometimes to contemplate this idea that we automatically think it is the right thing to do to subsidize the employment insurance resource based industry.

Madam Speaker, one of the reasons why I support this legislation is there is another side to this equation: if you take that attitude too literally, not only would I be subject to accusations of being a rabid right winger but quite apart from that, if you take it too literally then you are not giving other parts of Canada an opportunity to maintain their communities.

Let us just separate regionalism for a minute and just look at northern Ontario. There are many, many communities in northern Ontario based on mining and the forestry. I think it is absolutely incumbent upon all of us as members of parliament to sustain those communities and their cultural traditions as long as we can. Madam Speaker, you have to strike a balance when you are thinking in terms of employment insurance and its impact on resource industries.

I do support the changes that we see here today because I think we have tried to make some adjustments because we did not fully appreciate the impact of what we were doing before. But time is passing. We are now into another century and we have to realize that even a program like employment insurance has to be revisited and modernized.

I thought there was a very wonderful suggestion being floated around over on the other side, and that was the suggestion that maybe employment insurance should be applied to self employed people. I think that is a very worthy suggestion from the opposition and should be explored.

[Jocelyne Girard-Bujold, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Madam Speaker, on this February 13, 2001, I rise with sadness to speak to this issue.

Usually, the day before Valentine's Day, we get ready to tell those we love best that tomorrow is a very important day, when we will again offer them our very special wishes, but on this February 13, the government brought in time allocation on Bill C-2. Exactly 66 days prior, the government brought back Bill C-44 as Bill C-2.

During the election campaign, the government made a commitment, particularly to workers in the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean area, to amend the bill and make it acceptable to them. I would not think of harking back to the same old stories, but I remember that, on two visits made last September and October by the Minister of National Revenue, workers back home told him “It is too bad, but you are out. We cannot accept Bill C-44”.

During the campaign, the Secretary of State for Amateur Sport came to tell them “Vote for me, give us a strong majority, and we will satisfy your expectations”. Today I regret to tell workers in the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean area and throughout Quebec and Canada that the government told them a big lie. The government said to them “Take my word and we will give you what you want”.

However, it must be recognized that the saying “commitment made, commitment retracted” says it all. I note that this government does not want to respond to people's real expectations.

We have criticized this Bill C-2. I was at a meeting of some one hundred thousand workers in the riding of Jonquière during the election campaign. They had come to tell the government that they wanted an independent employment insurance fund. They said that, as they and employers paid into it, they should administer it, because they contribute to it to provide themselves with some security. The government turned a deaf ear, but spoke to them saying “I do not hear you, but be assured I will meet your expectations”.

The day after the election, naturally, as Félix Leclerc says “I had forgotten your name, I had forgotten the promises I made to you”. I am sad to note that the government is refusing, in the voices of democratically elected representatives, to tell the House and Canadians how much the workers in the riding of Jonquière and the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean region oppose this bill. They will fight until they are backed into a corner to get the ministers who visited us to honour their word.

At home, we keep our word, and people who keep their word have only one word. Let the members of the government understand that. When we sit in parliamentary committee, we in the Bloc Quebecois will see that this bill meets the real expectations of the workers. Government members will have to honour their word.

We are simply holding our fire. We will be waiting for them in committee. The real debate will take place there, and the real people will be heard.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

It being 6.15 p.m., pursuant to order made earlier today it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the second reading stage of the bill now before the House.

Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Some hon. members]

No.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

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

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

In my opinion the yeas have it.

Pursuant to the order made earlier today, a recorded division on the proposed motion stands deferred until later today.

The House resumed from February 8 consideration of the motion and of the amendment.

Supply

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

Pursuant to order made Thursday, February 8, 2001, the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred division on the business of supply.

Call in the members.

And the bells having rung:

[Marlene Catterall, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I believe you would find consent to deem the amendment to the opposition motion negatived on division.

[The Speaker]

Is there unanimous consent for the proposition of the chief government whip that the amendment be deemed defeated on division?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

(Amendment negatived)

[The Speaker]

Accordingly the question is on the main motion. All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Speaker]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Speaker]

In my opinion the nays have it.

And more than five members having risen:

(The House divided on the motion, which was negatived on the following division:)