Debates of Feb. 21st, 2005

Civil Marriage Act

[Peter Adams, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development]

Madam Speaker, this government has a long history of ensuring that the employment insurance program remains responsive to the needs of all Canadians.

As the member knows, we are giving careful consideration and will respond to a variety of recommendations concerning the program. We have two reports from the standing committee on human resources, of which my colleague is a member, the report from the public accounts committee and the Prime Minister's task force on unemployment. We are looking at all those recommendations, which include the aspects of employment insurance that my colleague mentions.

We have in fact been reducing the premiums every year for 11 years. As a result, the premium rate dropped from $3.07 in 1994 to $1.95 in 2005, the lowest level since 1940. Our objective is to balance revenues and expenses and we believe we will achieve that this year.

In setting the premium rate for 2005, the government took into account a number of factors, including the EI chief actuary's estimate of the break-even rate.

We have also made commitments in the Speech from the Throne to look at employment insurance and to propose improvements to the program.

We are looking at changes to further reduce disincentives to work and to ensure we are targeting our joint skills development efforts with the provinces to the right people.

Employment insurance continues to provide a temporary income support to people who involuntarily leave their employment. For example, in 2002-03, 1.4 million people received $8.2 billion in regular income benefits. According to the 2003 monitoring and assessment report, 88% of employed workers would have been eligible for EI benefits if they had lost their jobs with just cause.

Employment insurance helps Canadians re-enter the labour force. Nearly 640,000 people participated in active employment measures and 222,000 people returned to work.

It comes as no surprise that the Speech from the Throne referred to employment insurance. It clearly shows that the government is fully aware of all that has to be done to resolve the problems that affect all parts of the country, including the Atlantic provinces, which my colleague represents so well.

May I remind the member for Acadie—Bathurst of all the changes this government has made to the employment insurance program so that it can continue meeting the needs of Canadians and a rapidly changing labour market. For example, the intensity rule was repealed. The clawback provision was amended and no longer applies to Canadians who seek temporary income support for the first time. As well, the parents who re-enter the labour market after staying at home to take care of their young children can establish eligibility benefits by accumulating the same number of hours of employment as other workers.

This government has understood what Canadians need, which is why we continue to make improvements to this program.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Madam Speaker, what my colleague does not say is that of the people working and paying into the employment insurance, only 33% of the women qualify and 38% of the men qualify.

My colleague was at the parliamentary committee when the human resources witnesses came and told us the truth about it. They said that if a young person going to school is working he does not qualify for employment insurance, but he is still in the statistics of the 88%, where he should not be because he is not going to get employment insurance. The people who do not qualify because they do not have the 910 hours are not being calculated and should be. It is only 33% of the women who qualify in our country. Eight hundred thousand people do not qualify for employment insurance and 1.4 million children are hungry in our country

The EI program has had problems since the Liberal government made changes in 1996.

I would like to hear my colleague talk about the changes the government made and how much they have hurt the people who have lost their jobs. That is the reality.

[Peter Adams, Liberal, Peterborough, ON]

Madam Speaker, this is a huge and complex program. We have, by the way, accepted that various aspects of it should be reviewed and they are being reviewed.

I want to remind the member of the initiatives that we have already accomplished. The maximum benefit period for EI, parental and maternity benefits was increased from six months to a year, as the member knows. The premium rate was decreased, as I described. To ensure that claimants can accept lower paying jobs without reducing the benefit amount to which they will be entitled, we made the small weeks provision a permanent and national feature of the program.

In addition, we increased the threshold from $150 to $225. We brought in the new six week compassionate care leave program. We introduced the two year pilot project providing five additional weeks of EI benefits to claimants in regions with high unemployment rates.

We will continue to review with interest the recommendations of the committees which I mentioned and the Prime Minister's task force, and we will report back to Parliament within the prescribed period of time.

[Joe Preston, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board for attending tonight to listen to a follow up on a question that I put to the President of the Treasury Board on the rules that were posted last spring on the appointments for board members, board chairs and CEOs of Canada's crown corporations.

The criteria of March 2004, while not perfect, was what the Canadian public was asking for. I want to read from a recently released “Review of the Governance Framework for Canada's Crown Corporations”:

Good governance requires transparency and accountability.

What Canadians are Saying About Accountability

Canadians are seeking the same assurances from all levels of government: that governments willspend taxpayers' money as though it were their own; provide better and more accessible information on how public funds are being used and what outcomes result from public expenditures; keep the promises that they make;

With that asked for, I can only assume that when the following was posted on the website of the Treasury Board, Canadians looking for accountability cheered and said that after years of cronyism in crown corporations, the rules would now prevent the rewarding of buddies and pals and stop the “who you know” from being the only criteria used when selecting the leadership of our crown corporations.

I will read the four criteria established on March 15 and posted on the Treasury Board website. The criteria were as follows:

A permanent nominating committee will be struck by the board of each corporation. If the board so chooses, this committee may include outside eminent persons to support the work of the board. Among other things, the nominating committee will establish appropriate criteria for candidate selection.

A professional recruitment firm will be engaged to assist these nominating committees in the search for meritorious candidates. In addition, public advertisements will be posted in newspapers and in the Canada Gazette for all openings for the positions of chief executive officer and chair of corporations.

The nominating committee will make recommendations to the board of directors, and the board will provide a short list of candidates to the minister responsible for the corporation. Based on this list, the minister will make a recommendation for appointment.

The appropriate parliamentary committee will then review the candidate recommended by the minister.

Those four criteria from March 15, 2004 seem simple enough. While very clear and concise, however, the Treasury Board president who put them forward almost immediately watered them down and put in plenty of wiggle room when it came to the appointment of the chair at Canada Post. Almost immediately the firm accountability words like “will” and “shall” were changed to words like “may” and “if possible”. They are not very accountable words. There is a lot of room to appoint pals and buddies.

When pressed by the committee as to why the rules were softened and weakened, the response was one of denial of a difference between the two and a referral to this upcoming crown corporation governance framework.

It is upon us now and is it the firm and concise criteria of March 15, 2004, the “cronyism” saving criteria? We have received a weaker version. The people of Canada will find it lacking.

If we set our targets low enough, I guess we will always be able to hit them. Is this the standard the government wants to set? I was hoping for better.

Would the parliamentary secretary like to explain how the rules became so soft?

[Diane Marleau, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board and Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board]

Madam Speaker, since the president's March 15, 2004, announcement of a new appointment process for top executives of crown corporations, the government conducted a review of crown corporation governance.

On February 17, just last week as a matter of fact, the president tabled in the House of Commons a report entitled, “Meeting the Expectations of Canadians--Review of the Governance Framework for Canada's Crown Corporations”. This review is the most comprehensive review of Canadian crown corporation governance in 20 years.

As part of our findings, it was determined that a number of refinements to the interim process were needed to achieve a correct balance from the government's perspective as owner and shareholder of the corporations.

On boards, as in the private sector, chairs and directors represent the owner. In this case, the owner is the Canadian population through the government it elects. We believe, consistent with best practices, that the government, as representative of the owners, has to take responsibility for identifying candidates that are its representatives.

We are looking for people who are committed to the principles and values of public service and who will perform their duties with integrity. We will do so, however, in close consultation with the boards of directors, taking into account their needs.

To ensure greater transparency, we will be establishing a central website for identifying chairs and directors, accessible to all Canadians, so they can have an up to date and accurate picture of the vacancies, their selection criteria and board profiles, and a listing of appointments is the first step on this path.

The board of directors, in consultation with the government, will determine the selection process for the CEO. To ensure that potential candidates are not in conflict of interest, the government will continue to conduct background checks prior to making any appointment.

Canadians can be reassured that the appointment process for Canada's crown corporation boards of directors meets Canadians' standards and expectations of ethical conduct.

[Joe Preston, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Madam Speaker, I listened closely to the talk of how the review came about. I love the fact that we reviewed the governance of crown corporations mostly by asking crown corporations how they would like to be governed. I think if we ask cronies, we might get the answer as to how to get new cronies.

With much respect, the answers remain the same. The criteria for selecting the chairs of our crown corporations and therefore even our CEOs, since they are selected by the boards of these crown corporations, remain virtually the same, with the minister responsible for those crown corporations having a veto over the selections and an awful lot of input into the selection process to begin with.

I ask the parliamentary secretary, how is it that we did not get that far from where we were?

[Diane Marleau, Liberal, Sudbury, ON]

Madam Speaker, one of the things that everyone has to remember is that in the end the government is responsible for who is appointed and for any kind of governance that is under its rule. Much as we want to make sure that all appointments of all chairs and all CEOs are filled with qualified people, there are many ways of ensuring that this happens.

We are going to work with boards of governors to ensure that as many ways as possible are looked at and used to identify the proper person. I think it is very important for this to occur.

One must always remember that opposition members will never be happy with whomever we appoint because they did not pick them. Unfortunately, that is the case. Much as I know that we will do everything in our power to have the best, the most qualified person, the most representative person, in the end we, not the opposition, will be responsible for that appointment. The opposition is only responsible for criticizing.

[The Acting Speaker (Hon. Jean Augustine)]

The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m. pursuant to Standing Order 24(1)

(The House adjourned at 6:58 p.m.)