Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36 I would like to present two petitions from constituents in my riding in the greater Nanaimo area.
The first petition deals with the employment insurance program. The petitioners state that over $35 billion in unpaid insurance benefits have been taken out of the program by the federal government since it started the EI program and that in 1999 the EI program paid more money to the Department of Finance than it did to people who were unemployed.
The petitioners ask that Parliament enact legislation that would modernize the employment insurance program according to the plan proposed by the Canadian Labour Congress.