Debates of April 30th, 2003

Canadian Environmental Assessment Act

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad to have the opportunity to make comments and put a question to my hon. colleague, who also sits on the Standing Committee on Environment. I really enjoyed working with him on Bill C-9.

Several non-governmental organizations have made representations on this issue. Some have approached the committee, others not. However, having had the chance to talk with some of these groups in the past, I have come to realize that many of them would like entities such as Export Development Canada to be subject to the environmental assessment process.

I know that this was one of the requests made by groups like Development and Peace and also Halifax Initiative. These groups would like Export Development Canada to be subject to the federal environmental assessment procedure.

I would like to know what my hon. colleague from the Progressive Conservative Party thinks of this suggestion and recommendation.

[John Herron, Progressive Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Speaker, my short answer is the concept the member for Rosemont—Petite-Patrie is advocating is one that has an immense amount of merit. He is also very much aware that our committee was really restricted in terms of what members could review given that a major flaw in CEAA is that only the minister can essentially ordain what we are even allowed to study with respect to environmental assessment. We were limited to only the clauses that the minister deemed relevant to a study at this time.

I am more than amenable to adopting a regime of that nature. As he well knows, because of the scope of the act, we were limited from reviewing that type of section. It will be left to other parliamentarians to do that when they do the comprehensive review seven years from now.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—St. Clair, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we are in the process in my area of the country of considering whether we need a third crossing for vehicles between the province of Ontario and the state of Michigan, between Canada and the United States. It is the busiest crossing area in the country and in fact in the world in terms of commercial traffic. The proposal is tentative but this crossing would involve four jurisdictions, which are Canada, the United States, Michigan and Ontario, and would have a significant impact, whether a bridge or a tunnel, on the environment.

My question to the member for Fundy—Royal, the environment critic for the Progressive Conservative Party, is this. We are probably talking something in the range of $5 billion to $15 billion in terms of construction for all aspects of this development. Would that project automatically get a panel review?

[John Herron, Progressive Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I am going to preface my comments by saying that I am not aware of the particulars of that project.

A panel review is supposed to be a core of fundamental strength of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act process itself. To be a core of strength, it has to be utilized once in a while. In my view that project likely has an immense amount of need to be done given the amount of traffic that occurs along that Windsor corridor. However it still does not mean that we do not have an open process where we could ensure that the public could ask those hard questions if they had some serious concerns about the proposed construction of the project itself.

I would like to add that perhaps a comprehensive study might be strong enough under the existing act. If there are serious questions and the community wants to seek an independent review from a panel perspective, under the current act the minister has the capacity to say that there are still more questions and that he will refer it to a panel review. The minister now has to say that it will be either a comprehensive study or a panel review. He has denied himself the flexibility to go both ways in that regard.

If I had to answer it, my instinct would be that there is nothing wrong with a comprehensive study if we still have the panel review in our tool kit. The minister has extracted that capacity and that is probably one of the most significant flaws of this bill that we have been asked to review.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today regarding Bill C-9, which seeks to amend the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.

I spoke previously on this bill, at second reading a few days ago, and I said then that with this bill, the federal government was duplicating what we had already done very well, what we had created in Quebec. In addition to having our own environmental assessment act, we wanted to confirm everything and reassure the public by creating the BAPE, the Bureau d'audiences publiques sur l'environnement, which makes it possible to assess large projects at another stage.

Before I give my opinion, I would like to congratulate my hon. colleague from Rosemont—Petite-Patrie. Just now, in his 40-minute speech, he gave us an excellent picture of what is happening with this legislation. He explained why we in the Bloc Quebecois are opposed to it, and why both the Government of Quebec at the time—the Parti Quebecois—and the newly elected government—the Liberal Party of Quebec—have opposed it.

A unanimous resolution by the National Assembly made it clear to Ottawa that the Government of Quebec was in total disagreement with the creation of such a law. Thus, I congratulate my hon. friend and I say it could not have been expressed more clearly.

Nevertheless, I can see that the Liberal members and those from other parties may not understand Quebec's environmental procedures. At present, we are going through the environmental assessment process in my region.

After the extraordinary flooding in 1996 in the Saguenay, which has cost over a billion dollars, the Parti Quebecois government of the day set up the Nicolet Commission. This commission examined everything that happened in relation to the flood and in its recommendations said that the Lac Kénogami basin had to be consolidated. Then, the government acted.

It began putting infrastructure in place, but then went even farther. After the initial steps toward correcting the problems that identified, we are now in the second phase which is the project to regularize the water levels in the Lac Kénogami watershed, and this is being done within the BAPE.

This commission is headed by a chair and members who travel to the region concerned and hold hearings. So, this commission has a maximum time period in which to consult the public and table its recommendations.

In the Saguenay, the BAPE process will last four months. There are two stages. The purpose of the first stage of the public hearing is to allow the public and the commission to ask questions about every aspect of the project.

The second stage of the public hearings, which will follow, ensures that the commission hears the public's opinion and suggestions. Any individual, group or municipality who so wishes may express a view on the project, whether in the form of a brief or oral presentation. I will give members a general overview of the project.

I hope that what happened to us will never happen again anywhere. What happened in the Saguenay during the 1996 flood was horrendous.

This project is to build infrastructures for regulating water levels in the Lake Kénogami drainage basin, in Ville de Saguenay. This is where the whole thing started, and we all know what happened.

The project has five parts: modernization of the spillways, work above Lake Kénogami, construction of the Rivière-des-Sables sill, and consolidation and forward management.

The first phase of the project, now underway, aims to improve existing spillways and deploy additional measuring instruments in the drainage basin. The second phase, addressed by the current environmental impact study, would include the work at the Péribonka reservoir, Lake Kénogami and Rivière-des-Sables, as well as provide for the implementation of a forward management system.

This process and Quebec's legislation show just how hard Quebec has worked. People always say that Quebec is so picky about environmental issues that it created another process to allow for public participation.

I have attended many of the hearings, and I am even going to present a brief of my views because this is in my riding. Even though this is the Quebec government, I will be presenting a brief.

This is a transparent process. It is why the statistics the member for Rosemont—Petite-Patrie was reading a while ago on public satisfaction with the environmental assessment process and the Bureau d'audiences publiques du Québec show how satisfied and reassured the public is when this whole process is followed.

Why would this government come along and duplicate what we are doing and doing well ourselves? Why spend millions of dollars to duplicate efforts in an area that is not even under their jurisdiction? There may be somewhat of a shared jurisdiction, but we do our utmost for environmental protection. What the federal government is proposing is a waste of time.

It has been months, years maybe, since the last time this was brought up in a bill. With this one, time and energy are being wasted here in Ottawa in order to duplicate what is being done so well in Quebec. I would like to ask this government to withdraw its bill and to exempt Quebec from it, because we do not need it.

Given what is going to be happening with Rivière aux Sables and Lake Kénogami, the people in my region are afraid this government will take advantage of this bill to slow down the democratic process we are engaged in.

We do not need that. We know what has to be done. We have created structures, and it was not even the Parti Quebecois that did so. This dates from the time of the Bourassa government. Oddly enough, the present member for Lac-Saint-Louis was the environment minister at that time. Today, instead of objecting, he is unmoved that this Liberal government is interfering in our areas of jurisdiction—when one is the sponsor of a bill one needs to be behind it at all times. I find that curious.

I think what I have said here and to the other parties of Canada is important, and that is that the process ought to be applied in the same way where they live. What I am saying to the federal government is “Stay where you belong, look after your own areas of jurisdiction and we will keep on doing a good job. It may not be perfect, but we will keep on making improvements”.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

It being 5.30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's Order Paper.

Family Supplement

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

The hon. member for Ahuntsic, on a point of order.

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Ahuntsic, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I need the consent of the House to show that a number of hon. members wish to support my motion. I therefore seek the unanimous consent of this House to add to the list other opposition members who support my motion.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

Is it agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Ahuntsic, QC]

seconded by the hon. member for Beaches—East York and the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Jean—Saguenay, moved:

That, in the opinion of this House, the government should index the family supplement to the cost of living in the next Federal Budget.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise before the House today to seek support for Motion No. 395, which aims to have the family supplement indexed to the cost of living in the next federal budget.

It is with great pleasure that I address the House today. I ask my hon. colleagues to support this motion which, in my opinion, addresses one of our main concerns in the riding of Ahuntsic, and other parts of Canada.

I have always made it my duty to help the less fortunate. I am therefore pleased that this motion is geared mainly toward the two most important and vulnerable groups in society: women and children.

Before I begin I would like to thank my hon. colleagues and other members who agreed that the hon. member second the motion. I am sorry that some of the other members who wanted to second the motion were not physically in the House to do so, but I will mention their names: the member for Beaches—East York, my good friend and colleague; the member for Vancouver East, who was not in the House unfortunately when we asked for unanimous consent; the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Jean—Saguenay, thank you; and the hon. member for St. John's West, who wanted to second the motion but was not physically here. I thank them all.

I thank all my hon. colleagues who support this motion.

Indexing the family income supplement under the EI program is important and timely. It is important, and this motion refers to the Government of Canada action plan to help children and their families. It is timely because it has been six years since this family supplement was established. After six years, it seems appropriate to conduct a review to determine whether changes, like the introduction of indexing, are required.

What we are attempting to do is to add one more brick to the existing foundation built by the Government of Canada to help Canadian families and their children.

Allow me to begin by presenting a brief synopsis of some initiatives that the Government of Canada has undertaken to combat poverty and provide Canadian families with the necessary tools to meet their basic needs. That does not mean that we in this House have eliminated poverty. I am sure no member of Parliament is proud of the fact that we have 1.5 million children who live below the poverty line.

Since 1993, one of the principle platforms of the Government of Canada's social and economic agenda has been the support of children and families. In 2002-03 alone, federal investments in child benefits, through the national child benefit and Canada child tax benefit, amounted to about $8.2 billion. Low income families received approximately $5.9 billion of this sum.

This financial support clearly illustrates the Government of Canada's commitment to supporting children and families. In budget 2003 the government built on this foundation with increased support for Canadians, especially children, by, among other items and other programs, increasing the national child benefit supplement to $965 million a year by 2007 and committing $900 million over five years to improve early learning and child care programs and services.

I am hopeful that if our economy continues to grow and the government's budget surplus increases, we can increase more rapidly and quickly the amount of the national child tax benefit and other benefits for children.

The government's economic and social action plan contains more examples of initiatives, such as the national homelessness initiative, designed to help children and the most disadvantaged families. I am in a position to confirm that such initiatives contribute efficiently to the well-being of families and children.

In my riding of Ahuntsic, Café 18-30, an organization working with youth at risk, is but one example of our commitment to fighting poverty among young people and securing a good start in life for all our children.

The government assists Canadian families through the employment insurance program. In 1996, following extensive consultations with Canadians, the Government of Canada replaced unemployment insurance with employment insurance to reflect the changing needs of the economy, the labour market, and workers. At that time the government committed to monitoring the impact of the program on people, communities, and the economy.

As part of this reform, we introduced the family supplement to replace the unemployment insurance dependency provision. Under the previous unemployment insurance legislation, any claimants with low weekly wages could qualify for a 60% benefit rate instead of the standard 55% if they had dependents as defined under the Income Tax Act. Eligibility was based on the income of the claimant regardless of total family income or earnings of the spouse, with low income defined as average weekly earnings of less than $408 in 1996.

Both spouses in a family meeting the criteria were eligible for the 60% benefit rate and both could receive the rate simultaneously.

However, eligibility for the employment insurance family income supplement, which replaces the unemployment insurance dependency provision, is based on family income. Only one of the spouses may receive the family income supplement for a given period. The monitoring and assessment report says that the family income supplement targets low income families more effectively than the unemployment insurance dependency provision.

The family income supplement is an additional support for employment insurance recipients who have children and whose annual family income is lower than $25,921; it supplements the basic benefit that they receive.

Recipients of the family supplement get an 80% employment insurance benefit rate of their insurable earnings compared with the 55% that most claimants are paid. These same families also receive the Canada child tax benefit. The most recent statistics for 2001-02 indicate that $175.7 million was paid in family supplement benefits to a total of approximately 187,000 recipients, of which 134,000 were women.

In addition to the regular employment insurance benefit, low income recipients with children received, on average, an additional $44 per week. According to the 2001 Employment Insurance Monitoring and Assessment Report, nearly 11% of all EI claimants received higher weekly benefits through the family supplement. Women and youth especially benefit from the family supplement as the statistics show. Approximately two-thirds of recipients are women and 14% are youth. Women accounted for 88% of the growth in family supplement top-ups paid to sickness benefits claimants.

I just provided the House with a picture of the situation concerning the family income supplement program that shows the obvious advantages of this benefit for low income families. These families still need other support programs, and not only the supplement. However, it is a step in the right direction. I believe this is a good program. Members may therefore wonder why we are asking them to examine Motion No. 395.

I will take this opportunity to address that question. First, I would like to make clear that evidence shows that the employment insurance program is working and is providing unemployed Canadians the support they need when they need it. The commitment to monitor and, if necessary, amend the EI program was not an empty promise.

In the intervening years the government has made changes to improving the program and some of the changes came from members of Parliament from both sides of the House. We made small weeks a permanent and national feature. We enhanced parental benefits and repealed the intensity rule. We modified the clawback provisions and repealed the undeclared earnings rule.

Obviously there is more to do and we can all agree that hon. members in the House have often brought forth motions like my own and others in order to improve the program and improve the system that we have right now.

In keeping with our promise and our tradition I would ask that the government index the family supplement to inflation. There are many reasons for looking favourably upon this motion. One is that the income ceiling for receiving the family supplement has been frozen at $25,921 since its inception in 1996. The result has been that owing to the strong labour market, earnings have increased and family supplement claims have decreased by 4.2%.

On the surface this decrease in reliance on the family supplement would seem auspicious for low income families, but in truth, the increase in earnings that would put some families over the maximum income to be eligible for the family supplement may, in part, be due to rising wages in response to inflation.

The cause of the decrease in claims is something that we would want to examine more carefully. The fact is that many federal program eligibility requirements and payments are already indexed to inflation including among others, the Canada child tax benefit, the Canada pension plan and the guaranteed income supplement.

The indexing of the family income supplement would support the government's efforts to reduce poverty, particularly among groups that are the most affected, that is women and children. The indexing of this component of the program would constitute an additional federal contribution to many provincial anti-poverty strategies.

Before continuing to work and to find new ways of helping families and women, I want once again to thank all my colleagues, both from the government and the opposition, who supported my Motion No. 395. I encourage all my honourable colleagues to support this motion. I want to thank them in advance, as I said, on behalf of all Canadian families and, particularly, all the children who will benefit from it.

Since I do not have this opportunity often as Acting Speaker, I would like to thank my constituents who gave me the honour and privilege to represent them, here in the House.

[Charlie Penson, Canadian Alliance, Peace River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to this private member's motion moved by the member for Ahuntsic.

The motion is one which the Canadian Alliance supports. I know it is a private member's motion, but it fits with our notion that families are hard pressed in Canada, that families are the building block of society, and therefore need all of the help they can get in terms of tax relief.

In this case, it has to do with employment insurance and a provision that deals with an additional benefit to low income families for those people who are collecting employment insurance. Under that system, families are eligible for the supplement if their net income is under $25,921. It is not a big amount, but the principle is right that we should index this to inflation, in keeping with the idea that we are trying to keep a neutral cost. Inflation does eat away at these things if it is not indexed, and therefore we are supportive of this motion.

As the member who introduced the motion told us earlier, the same concept works with the Canada pension plan, old age security, guaranteed income supplement and the Canadian child tax benefit. The preliminary cost of indexing would be about $7 million annually. While that is a substantial amount, we believe that it is important that this still be done.

We strongly support and believe that families should benefit and those people who are unfortunate enough to be out of work and having to collect employment insurance should benefit from this provision.

However, I do want to take the opportunity today to talk about some of the problems with the current EI system. This is a band-aid. We believe that reforms need to go far beyond this motion today. While we are supportive of it, we will be pushing hard and are pushing hard for basic reform of employment insurance.

One of the problems we have seen in this place is that the government has used the employment insurance fund, or employment insurance premiums from employers and employees, to build up a tremendous reserve. It has overtaxed or overcharged Canadian employers and employees to the tune of something like $40 billion over the past eight years.

While people might think that this amount is sitting in a fund someplace, available for employment insurance premiums, that is simply not true. It has gone into general revenue and been spent on a lot of government programs. I would make the case that some of those programs should not be priority programs, and that employment insurance premiums should be reduced for employers and employees so that it is revenue neutral.

We hear from the various people who look at these things, the chief actuaries, that there is a need for about a $15 billion fund for employment insurance. We think it should be a hard fund that is put in place and should not go into general revenue, but that fund would have to be built up over a period of time. However $15 billion is what they suggest is necessary to ride out an economic downturn or a cycle in the economy. Unfortunately, that fund has now reached over $40 billion, which represents $25 billion being overcharged by the Liberal government over the past several years.

It gets worse than that. The fund continues to build about $3 billion a year. The government is conscious of this. It knows that the fund is building and that it is overcharging, but it will not reduce the amount that is needed to bring this into a revenue neutral position. It is not just families who are collecting EI, about which the private member's motion talks, but families in general are being overcharged because they are employees, and in many cases employers as well. That is our biggest complaint with the EI program. The federal government must simply stop overcharging Canadians on this account.

In addition to that, we believe that the employment insurance program should be brought back to a true insurance program for job loss. That was the original intent some 25 years ago and that has changed. It has become more of a social program these days and we believe it needs to be brought back to a true insurance program and run in a business-like manner. That is what our Canadian Alliance supports and would do if we were elected. We would revamp the EI program.

The minister has told us that the government wants some transparency and that it is looking at that but in the recent budget we were very sorry to hear that the minister had postponed those reforms for a further year. We have to wonder how serious the government is about really making the changes that are necessary to the EI program.

Under our proposal, employment insurance premiums would be set by an independent commission and would be based on the recommendations of a chief actuary, as I have just said. That would vary from time to time, depending on how much is required in the fund, but it would be adjusted to be as revenue neutral as possible. As I said earlier, there would be a hard reserve there that would not be just put into general revenue and spent at the discretion, or lack of discretion in some cases I would point out, by the government.

In addition to that, employer premiums would be experienced rated so that employers who have a record for fewer layoffs than other employers in the same sector would pay lower premiums. I think this would help in the rationalization of the industry.

In addition to that, there are different methods to resolve the problem that the member who introduced this motion brought forward. We think families are hard-pressed in terms of paying too much tax right now. One of the things that the Canadian Alliance has suggested is that there should be a child tax deduction of $3,000 per year, which would be off the taxes payable. That would represent about $3.5 billion in savings to Canadian families per year, which is a substantial amount.

In addition to that, we think there may be some room to do something within the four personal income tax brackets, especially for hard-pressed, middle income families that pay so much tax.

We have a little different point of view. The Liberals seem to think that families earning $60,000, $70,000 or $80,000 a year are rich. We do not think that at all. We know there is a high cost to raising a family in this country. We believe those hard-working taxpayers, who are trying to raise families, trying to put their children through university and trying to do everything they can to provide their children with opportunities for the future, need some relief. We would reward them by giving personal tax relief.

I was just looking at how much the basic personal exemption is right now. It is only $7,757 per year before an individual starts paying taxes. It just seems to me that is a very low amount. I hate to get into the debate about what is the poverty level, but I think someone who earns $7,700 a year should not be on the tax rolls at all. We think the basic exemption should be raised so that individuals working and their spouses should have the same exemption rates. That would provide some relief. The $3,000 exemption for each child would also make a significant difference so that low income families would be given a leg up. They would be able to work and earn an amount of money that would be more in line with what they need before they would even start paying taxes to the federal government.

The reason we think we have that kind of flexibility is that we think the government is spending far too much money on program spending right now. It is not necessarily the program spending that it is locked into, such as the equalization program, health care and all of that, but the direct program spending for which it is responsible.

In the budget that was brought down on February 18, the finance minister introduced $25 billion of new spending initiatives over the next three years. That is a 25% increase in spending. Those were the kinds of spending levels this same Liberal government was guilty of from the late 1960s onward for about 15 or 20 years that put us into a very deep hole and caused our national debt to rise to $536 billion. It has put us in a difficult position.

Canadian families are paying about 22¢ out of every tax dollar they send to Ottawa just to pay the interest on the national debt.

We simply have to correct some of these past failures, not go there again, and give tax relief to Canadian families so they can do things with their tax money with their priorities in mind.

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Ahuntsic, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Because the hon. member for Vancouver East, although I should not mention the absence or presence of members in the House, but I know she was not here to second the motion when I asked for unanimous consent, so may I have unanimous consent to include the hon. member for Vancouver East as having seconded my motion also?

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

Is it agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

Therefore the hon. member for Vancouver East is an official seconder to the motion.

[Diane St-Jacques, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources Development]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to a motion I find very interesting. This is a motion based on mutual assistance, generosity and caring, values we all share. This motion could make a huge difference in the lives of hundreds of Canadian families.

Before going any further, I want to thank my colleague, the member for Ahuntsic, for bringing this topic to our attention. In fact, Motion No. 395 is aimed at indexing the family supplement to the cost of living.

Introduced during the major employment insurance reform carried out by our government in 1996, the family supplement is aimed at providing more targeted assistance to low income families who are unemployed. In fact, it allows beneficiaries with children earning less than $25,921 to get up to 80% of their insurable earnings instead of 55% as do other beneficiaries.

The latest Employment Insurance Monitoring and Assessment Report published in 2003 shows that the family supplement is efficient and meets the needs and expectations of families. In 2001-02, our government paid close to $176 million in family supplements to over 187,000 low income beneficiaries. This means that thanks to this measure 10% of all employment insurance beneficiaries are getting higher benefits.

The supplement is about $42 a week. This is a significant amount of money for those going through tough times. In fact, the benefits of families receiving the family supplement are 38% higher than before the 1996 reform.

Such results are proof that replacing the higher rates for dependents found in the old system with the family supplement was an excellent decision. However, inflation has rendered it less efficient and higher salaries make it less accessible in real terms.

In such a context, there is no doubt that indexing the family supplement to the cost of living could have a positive impact on a number of families.

Several federal benefits and programs are indexed to inflation. The child tax benefit is a case in point.

When we carried out the reform of the employment insurance program in 1996, we made the commitment to keep a close watch on the short and medium term impact. That is why we provided for an annual independent assessment review. That turned out to be quite useful. First, it indicated that the employment insurance program is providing the unemployed with the help they need when they need it. Also, it helped to identify and correct some inadequacies along the way.

In the last couple of years, we made adjustments to the short work weeks, eliminated the intensity rule and changed some of the criteria concerning benefit repayments.

Today, we have an opportunity to consider a proposal that would enhance the employment insurance program. Indexing the family supplement to the cost of living would complement the work we have been doing in the last few years to fight poverty.

The February 2003 budget has helped us to move forward more quickly. Let me remind the House of some of its components. First, we will gradually increase our support to low income families through the Canada child tax benefit. By 2007, with this benefit, we will be providing $10 billion in annual assistance, twice as much as in 1996.

In a practical sense, this means that next July, the benefit will go up by $150 annually. In four years, the maximum benefit for a family will be $3,243 for the first child and $3,016 for a second child.

Also, in the next five years, the provinces and territories will receive more than $900 million to improve access to quality day care and promote the development of young children. Our government has certainly proven time and again that it takes the well-being of Canadian families to heart.

Today, the hon. member for Ahuntsic is suggesting a measure that would take our fight against poverty one step further.

Two thirds of the beneficiaries would be mothers. This measure would give low income families more help when some of their members are unemployed.

I have always thought of such measures which directly help Canadian families not as an expense, but as an investment in the future. However, our government is not in the habit of making decisions without a thorough consideration of all the impacts.

EI is a complex program and any change can have a direct impact on the viability and efficiency of the whole plan.

On the face of it, Motion No. 395 seems to be a very interesting proposal.

I urge my colleagues to consider Motion No. 395, because it will help us make a more detailed examination of the impact of indexing the family supplement when we prepare the next budget.

[Sébastien Gagnon, Bloc, Lac-Saint-Jean—Saguenay, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Motion No. 395 moved by my colleague from Ahuntsic, which reads:

That, in the opinion of this House, the government should index the family supplement to the cost of living in the next Federal Budget.

Let me say first of all that I am the proud young father of a beautiful 8 month old girl named Léa-Pascale. I have always believed that the family unit was a place where a child had to be able to receive all the attention and the love that he or she needed to get off to a good start in life and to build a solid foundation for his or her future. I am therefore all in favour of the family.

However, for the family to be able to fulfill those fundamental functions, the parents must have the necessary resolve. I still believe that they have this resolve, but they also need the means. Unfortunately, we know very well that for various reasons, there are many difficulties and a number of well-meaning parents cannot provide their children with the upbringing they would like.

You will therefore understand that to me, the family supplement, which increases benefits for low income families with children, is absolutely essential.

However, if this welcome supplement is to be effective, it must clearly be indexed to the cost of living; otherwise families will be no better off. This is important, all the more so as low income families are the hardest hit by the increase in the cost of living. Indexing the supplement to the cost of living should go without saying.

In fact, in order to maximize this measure, as many programs as possible should be indexed, among them the Canadian child tax benefit, which includes the national child disability benefit scheduled to take effect in July 2003. There is also the early childhood development initiative, based on the September 2000 agreement, which Quebec was promised it could opt out of with financial compensation. That is something we will certainly be reminding the new government in Quebec about. There is also the child-centred family justice strategy, which comes under the responsibility of the Minister of Justice and which is a program entirely under federal jurisdiction.

Therefore I will support Motion No. 395, but not without some reservations, which are far from being trivial.

Since several aspects of the federal family supplement infringe on the jurisdiction of Quebec and since Quebec has the right to opt out of certain programs with financial compensation, it would make sense for the amounts transferred to Quebec to be indexed to the cost of living as well. To do otherwise would be blatantly and absurdly unfair.

Finally, like my party I would have preferred that the motion not put off indexing until the next federal budget but that this clause be included in legislation governing the family supplement. This would enhance this social clause, which would benefit the numerous families who really need it.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to support this motion and indeed to second it. I thank the House for agreeing to unanimous consent so that I could second the motion. I was delayed in a committee and rushed over here but did not quite make it in time, so I appreciate the House agreeing to that.

I wish to congratulate the member for Ahuntsic. This is a very important motion and I want to thank her for the work she has done on this. I know the member has deep concerns about the health and welfare of low income families and social issues.

The motion before us is a small but important step in helping low income families who are on employment insurance keep pace with the cost of living. The motion seeks approval to index the family supplement to inflation for those families who receive the supplement and who are in receipt of employment insurance benefits. Regrettably, it is only about 11% of EI claimants who receive these benefits and there is still a maximum weekly benefit of $413 per week. We are talking about income support that for many families would mean that they are still struggling to make ends meet every month when they go on EI.

In speaking to the motion today and pointing out our support for it, I want to also put it in context. The hon. member mentioned, when she began her debate on the motion, that we have something like 1.5 million children living below the poverty line in Canada. We have something like 5 million Canadians living in poverty. In fact, if one were to look at the reality of what is taking place in various communities across the country to see the kinds of circumstances that people are in, one of the reasons that we have 1.5 million children and so many families living in poverty is because of cutbacks in the EI program.

Although this particular motion would give some small relief to some families that qualify, we still have a massive EI program with cutbacks. There is a $40 billion surplus in the EI fund and yet many people who were working and who are laid off, particularly if they are seasonal workers, no longer even qualify for the program.

I want to bring this forward because it is a serious situation and devastating for hundreds of thousands of families in Canada that cannot even qualify for the EI program anymore, even though there is a massive surplus sitting there that could be used to provide benefits for people. This particularly affects women who are part time workers and seasonal workers, so we really have to put this in context.

I would point out that this particular motion would be directed at those families who are EI claimants, but who are also receiving the Canada child tax benefit. In fact, the member has pointed out that the child tax benefit also has some indexation.

However, to put this debate in context again, I want to draw the attention of members in the House to the report that recently came out from the National Council of Welfare. Its spring 2003 report called “Welfare Incomes 2002” points out that hundreds of thousands of families across Canada are actually losing ground. The reality is that unfortunately some people who are on EI end up on welfare if they are not able to regain employment. In fact, the National Council of Welfare is “very concerned by the fact that the clawbacks to the federal child tax benefit discriminate against families on welfare”. In its 2001 report “Child Poverty Profile 1988”, it was estimated that only 66% of poor families benefited from the federal child tax benefit.

The supplement was received by 79% of poor two parent families, but only 57% of poor single parent families were allowed to keep the child tax benefit supplement. As women had most single parent families, the report believed that this constitutes discrimination on the basis of gender.

I want to flag this because it is a very important issue when looking at the issue of growing poverty in Canada. While the motion would certainly assist the 87,000 low income claimants who could benefit from this provision of indexation, let us recognize that we have a huge problem in terms of hundreds of thousands of families, particularly lone parent families, who are not benefiting from the child tax benefit.

Indeed, when the program was negotiated by Ottawa with the provinces and territories, there was a goal that no families would be worse off than they were before. Clearly, this has not turned out to be true and in fact there are many families who are indeed now worse off than they were before the child tax benefit.

The other thing that I want to add to the debate, in terms of bringing recognition to the serious problems we have with poverty in the country, is that HRDC is poised to announce massive public policy changes in moving from a measurement of poverty where we have used what is called the low income cutoffs established by Statistics Canada to a market basket measure. By the stroke of a pen this would redefine how we measure poverty in Canada. It would reduce poverty immediately by about one-third, but it would not in any way improve the standard of living of a single kid or a single family.

I put this forward in the debate because I feel that there are some glaring discrepancies in government policy. We are moving in a direction where we may change the way we measure poverty but we would not alleviate poverty. While I welcome the motion today, and that is why I wanted to second it because it is a step in the right direction, I wonder why the government would not have brought it in a heck of a long time ago to give benefit to low income families.

I want to put it in the context of this much larger picture of cutbacks that have been experienced by low income families, whether it is through EI, social income support, the child tax benefit, or lack of housing programs. We are facing a serious situation. We have a social deficit in the country where more people are falling through the cracks.

In my own community in east Vancouver, where we have had provincial cutbacks, people are now living in desperate circumstances and are finding it increasingly difficult to pay the rent, to meet basic food needs, to clothe their children, and some of those people are on EI. Some of them are on welfare and some of them are struggling in low paying minimum wage jobs.

I say to the members in the House today, who expressed interest in the motion, that we should approve the motion, but let us make a commitment, as the House did in 1989 when it supported Ed Broadbent's motion to eliminate child poverty by the year 2000, to make this a social and economic priority. Surely in a country as wealthy as Canada we should not have the United Nations chastizing the Government of Canada for failing to meet its commitments under various international agreements because aboriginal people and poor people are suffering so much as a result of the social deficit.

In closing, I wish to thank the hon. member for bringing the motion forward and I appreciate her work to draw attention to this specific issue and her concern on other social issues, but let us not lose sight of the real work that we need to do in redressing some of the disastrous public policy decisions that have been made. These decisions have victimized poor people in the country and left them isolated, marginalized, and in some places even criminalized as people resort to more illegal means, such as begging on streets. Look at what happened with the squeegee kids and so on.

I urge members not only to support this motion but also to focus on the bigger picture of addressing poverty in our country because it is something that can be done. We have the resources to do it.

[Loyola Hearn, Progressive Conservative, St. John's West, NL]

Mr. Speaker, let me first congratulate the member for Ahuntsic for bringing this motion to the floor of the House of Commons. I was pretty pleased, even in absentia, to second her motion.

The member for Vancouver East basically has said it all in a nutshell. This is a very good motion. It deals with one part of the major problem that we have in relation to poverty. However it is better to deal with one part at a time than to ignore the picture totally, which has happened.

We have to remember that for the last 10 years the present government has constantly been promising to address child poverty, to address poverty and the plight of low income families across the country. However we see very little results. I certainly hope the member, through this motion, can stimulate within her party and within government the desire to start working actively on the problem.

Let us stop talking about poverty. There are many kinds of poverty and there are many ways of helping people in need. As the member for Vancouver East just said, maybe the motion itself will not solve our problem in total, and we all know that, but solving part of it will be certainly a plus and a start. It might also generate the type of debate that is necessary in this very chamber to draw attention to some of the plights of people who live on low incomes and of young people who are out there trying to make it in society with very little help.

Let me just talk about associated issues that fit right in with the motion and that is the need to help families.

One of the major institutions in the country is our unemployment insurance. I was going to say we should be proud but employment insurance is not something perhaps of which we could be proud. It is sort of a necessary evil. We would like to have everybody working when we have such a rich country with so many resources.

My province has only a half a million people and some of the richest resources in the world in relation to hydro power, oil discoveries, our fisheries and so on, yet so many people do not benefit from such resources. Therein should be our main focus to avoid having to worry about the very issue we are talking about tonight.

We all know that will take a tremendous amount of will and work, and it will be well down the road before we will not have to have such a debate. However to even think about it and talk about it is laudable, and we should aim toward getting to that day when we can say to ourselves that we remember when we had poverty in the country. Unfortunately, it probably will not happen for a while.

While we have poverty, nobody can do more about it than the very people who are in these hallowed halls in which we now speak.

I talked about the EI fund. People strive to get enough employment to qualify for employment insurance; a small amount of work, quite often at low wages, which means they end up with very low employment insurance. The totality of the income is so minuscule that families cannot survive on that kind of money and any supplement that can be given in any way, shape or form, is a plus.

I am thinking of one particular case where a woman is working to try to make that living. She takes every opportunity to find employment. She drives 70 or 80 miles everyday to work in a cold fish plant to get the few weeks of work which the fish plant offers. Then she finds out she really needs more hours to qualify so she accepts a job which provides only a few hours a week.

However, wanting to work, she continues to work, five, 10, 20 hours a week. She works for x number of weeks before she is laid off because she would rather work than draw employment insurance. She files for employment insurance. She had well beyond the qualifying time because she continued to work, but the last x number of weeks she worked only a few hours a week. Even though it would have been better for her to stay at home, she had the opportunity to work so she kept working. Because of that, her average wage over the qualifying weeks was so small that she was getting something like $60 to $80 a week in employment insurance. Imagine what it is like trying to survive on $60 to $80 a week.

There is something wrong with our system. Whether it be in the fishery, whether it be working for some company, or whether it is in finding work wherever someone can get it, we are encouraging people who know they are not going to get full time employment to go out during peak periods, get as many qualifying hours as they can in the shortest time possible, and find some way to get out of the workforce. If the work becomes scarce, their qualifying time and amount of pay drags down their benefits. That is one way we could help people.

The other major effect low income has on the families is on the children. Families on low income face the inability to help and encourage and finance their children so they can participate in the various events in society, and in particular to attend post-secondary institutions which these days is a very costly initiative.

A real bug of mine and something I have been pushing is that many young people in this country today cannot afford to get a post-secondary education. People say there are student loans. If they borrow the maximum amount, which I am sure some people in this place know all about, then at the end of the years they spend in university, they come out with a massive debt load. It is like having a mortgage on their shoulders when they start out. What a way to begin life.

Most young people head where the wages are high, which is south of the border. They leave this country and take with them their initiative and education to the benefit of somewhere else. The more sorrowful thing is that the young people know that a student loan cannot cover the costs. If they have other costs besides tuition, for their apartments, furniture, food or travel, and unless their parents can help them they cannot cover those costs. The young pages here know exactly what I am talking about. If their parents cannot help them, the easiest thing for them to do is not to go to college or university but instead to go out and find a job.

The employment that these people find later on because of their lack of education is quite often part time employment. This means that over the next number of years they will get a minuscule wage and they will not be able to contribute to the education of their children so they will draw social benefits instead of being contributors to society.

People do not want a handout. They want a hand up. Through legislation we can start giving them the type of boost that will get them on their feet so they can not only help themselves, but they can help their children. In turn this will help this great country of ours.

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Ahuntsic, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I ask for the unanimous consent of the House to have the name of the hon. member for St. John's West, who I know wanted to second the motion, added to the other members who have seconded the motion.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

Is there unanimous consent?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am absolutely delighted to speak in support of Motion No. 395, which is a motion to index the family supplement to the cost of living in the next federal budget.

I am not surprised that this type of motion has come forward by the hon. member for Ahuntsic. She has been so very strong in terms of advocacy for families and children and a number of issues relating to the health and well-being of Canadians. This is certainly a testament to that work.

She has the support of members from all sides of the House on the motion. She also enjoys the support of seconders from all sides of the House. I think that is very telling. It is quite a compliment for the member. I want to add my compliments to her for coming forward with this important motion.

The motion asks the House to approve a recommendation that the government index the family supplement to inflation at the time of the next budget, which would be next February or March in the normal cycle.

The family supplement is paid to employment insurance recipients who are in a low income family, that is, who have an annual income of less than $25,921, who have children and receive the Canada child tax benefit.

The recipients of the family supplement have an EI benefit rate of 80% of their insurable earnings instead of the 55% which is applicable to most claimants. Like all other claimants, persons receiving the family supplement are subject to a maximum weekly benefit of $413.

This is not a substantial amount of money. Probably most members would agree it would be nice to have it be more. However, this is a step and I think members will know it is very important for us to continue to put these issues before the House, so that they remind us of the economic condition of our people.

I have often thought that the success of a country really is measured by the health and well-being of its people. In this regard this motion addresses directly the economic well-being which is directly tied in to the social well-being of families with children.

Not too long ago the House amended the Income Tax Act to provide indexation of what are called non-refundable tax credits and other credits. It was basically to take into account the fact that inflation is a reality. Without any indexation it means that over time there is an erosion of the net value, the real value of any payment to Canadians.

The effect of this motion is it is basically a motion of equity. We need to have equity within our system, whether it be the income tax system, the employment insurance system or any other programs in which assistance is available to Canadians in most need. That is precisely what the motion does. It is precisely the reason there is such strong support throughout the House for the motion.

To consider this I think is something that will happen. I think it will garner sufficient support throughout the House because it simply makes good sense. It makes good policy.

I remember a statement that good economic policy makes good social policy and good social policy makes good economic policy. They are inextricably linked. This one ties both of them in very nicely.

We are addressing social responsibility and economic equity. Motion No. 395 provides that.

I am very proud to have participated in the debate. I congratulate the member for Ahuntsic for reminding us of our responsibilities as responsible parliamentarians.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

The time provided for the consideration of private members' business has now expired and the order is dropped to the bottom of the order of precedence on the Order Paper.

A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.