Mr. Speaker, insistent and repeated interventions by the Bloc Quebecois have finally made the Liberal government realize that employment insurance, in its current form, does not meet the needs of outlying regions, where seasonal work is an economic reality for those men and women who experience it daily.
By agreeing to extend the transitional measures until October 9, 2004, to lessen the effects on the unemployed in the Madawaska-Charlotte region of New Brunswick, and the Lower St. Lawrence and North Shore regions of Quebec, the Liberal government is merely confirming the mess it has made of the employment insurance program.
The announcement is a step in the right direction, but it does not go nearly far enough. The government needs to understand that it must do more than provide transitional measures and agree to an indepth review of employment insurance.
The government must promise to never again spend the money of the unemployed by raiding the employment insurance fund.