Mr. Speaker, on page 71 of the budget papers, with respect to the employment insurance program, the government announced that it is going to form a crown corporation to set rates. There does not appear to be any other function but to set rates.
I wonder why the government needs a crown corporation to set rates when that expertise is in the department and it could set rates at the stroke of a pen, really. I do not think it would take a crown corporation to determine what a proper break-even rate is.
It says it will be a new, independent crown corporation and proceeds to say that the maximum annual charge set by the CEIFB will be 15ยข. If it is free, an independent should be able to set those rates on its own.
My main question is why a crown corporation, why set up a whole new bureaucracy merely to set rates for EI?