Mr. Speaker, in last Monday's economic statement, we learned that 87% of the $2.3 billion surplus for 2003-04 will have been taken from the employment insurance fund. That is real highway robbery.
How can the government accept the fact that the surplus funds it pockets year after year are taken not only from the pockets of the workers who contribute to the EI fund, but also from the unemployed, who have been brutally denied access to EI benefits?