Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to what my colleague from Mississauga—Brampton South had to say. It is one of these difficult things because we all have compassion for people who are out of work, and particularly people who are out of work either frequently or for long periods of time.
In the modern economy it is not unusual for people to change jobs and to have a number of careers in a lifetime. It is different than it was 10 or 15 years ago. I mention also that the nature and size of our labour force has increased extraordinarily to where the unemployment level is now at 6.8% nationwide. It was 12.2% in the early 1990s, the sort of period that we are looking at. The ideal rate of unemployment is zero but that is impossible given that people are in transition.
In the Atlantic provinces the rate fell in that time from 15.7% to 10.4%. Quebec's rate fell from 14.3% to 7.9%. Ontario's rate fell from 11.5% to 6.8%. The rate in the western provinces fell from 10.2% to 5.1%. We now have less long term unemployment in Canada than any other G-7 nation and that is because of the job growth that my colleague was talking about. Job creation is very important.
I have great concerns about the unemployed but the unemployment program is for employed people and unemployed people. I would like my colleague's comments on that.