Mr. Speaker, I think that the unanimous report by the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills Development, Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities is clear. They want a program where workers would be eligible for employment insurance with 360 hours. That was a unanimous report. Even the Liberal members dared to vote in favour of this report, yet this evening or tomorrow they will be voting in favour of a budget that does not include this.
Everyone was in agreement on it. So once again it was a matter of much ado about nothing, when everyone is well aware of what is needed. This is not the first unanimous report, but the second. There was one during the last Parliament as well. That unanimous report recommended 300 hours for eligibility. If people were entitled to EI after a reasonable number of hours, this would go a long way toward solving the problem of the seasonal gap.
The committee studied the situation, and I think it was a committee made up of so-called experts. Not that we MPs can really be experts, since we are not the ones that have these problems with EI. The public will understand, but the members are well aware of the situation their constituents are in and made some quite clear recommendations. How can it be that, once again, the member does not get it, and the Liberal Party has not included these 28 recommendations in the budget just brought down?