Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to the EI provisions in the budget implementation bill. My riding is part of steel town, Hamilton, the city that was built on a vibrant manufacturing sector where industrial workers earned family sustaining wages. Unfortunately, today those decent paying jobs are disappearing. They are being replaced by minimum wage, service sector jobs with no job security, few if any benefits and certainly no defined benefit pension plans. In that regard, Hamilton is a microcosm of what is happening in the country as a whole. We have lost 350,000 manufacturing sector jobs in the last five years alone and we are still hemorrhaging 300 additional jobs each and every day.
As the manufacturing sector is confronted with the tsunami of job losses, we as elected members have a responsibility to mitigate its impact on the hard-working Canadians who are losing their jobs through no fault of their own.
That of course was the original reason for creating EI, or unemployment insurance as it was originally known. It was established so workers who lost their jobs would not automatically fall into poverty. EI is the single most important income support program for Canadian workers.
In 2004-05 almost two million workers received some $13 billion in benefits. Just under two-thirds of that amount was in the form of regular benefits for temporarily unemployed workers actively seeking work, while most of the remainder was for parental and maternity benefits, which allow a new parent to take up to a year's supported leave from the workforce.
It is a myth that the EI program is mainly accessed by frequent users in high unemployment regions. While the program is indeed of vital importance to seasonal workers and other workers in high unemployment areas, only about one-third of regular claims in 2004-05 were filed by so-called frequent claimants.
In today's labour market, many workers can and do experience periods of interrupted earnings and require temporary income support. But even workers who never, or very rarely, make a claim have the knowledge that support would be there if needed. In short, the EI program was designed to help reduce poverty and insecurity. In the process, it stabilizes community economies.
It is true that the stabilization effects were significantly weakened by the cuts of the mid-1990s. When the Liberals were in power, the then finance minister took almost $50 billion of workers' money out of the employment insurance program and used it to cut taxes for his friends in corporate Canada. By the end of their 13 long years in office, the system had been gutted so badly that only 38% of unemployed workers were receiving benefits, down from more than 75% in the early 1990s before the Liberals took office.
Women were particularly disadvantaged because they make up the bulk of the part time workforce. Only three in ten women who lose their jobs are now eligible for EI.
Similarly, long years of service in the workforce no longer count for anything when it comes to collecting EI benefits. Workers on leave for training, the key to staying employed and employable in a modern economy, are also no longer covered. Why? Because after the Liberals took close to $50 billion out of the employment insurance program, there was little left to meet the program's original mandate, except it was not their money to take.
Employment insurance is funded solely by worker and employer contributions. The government simply administers the fund, so why are benefits being denied to those who have faithfully paid their premiums? Why do Ontarians get on average $5,000 less in EI than people in other parts of the country? Why is it virtually impossible to access retraining benefits when disaster strikes? New Democrats have been raising these questions in the House of Commons since the former Liberal government first started this unscrupulous raiding of the EI fund.
With the change in government in 2006, voters could be forgiven if they thought that a Conservative government might lead to some positive change. After all, before the election, it was the Prime Minister, then serving as the leader of the opposition, who joined us in harshly criticizing the raiding of the EI surplus, but that was then and this is now. Once elected, the Conservative government simply continued to rob workers of what is rightfully theirs.
It is totally unacceptable and frankly incomprehensible that last year when there was a $51 billion surplus in the EI fund, 68% of women and 62% of men who pay into the system were not eligible for benefits. It is time to say enough is enough. Workers' rights have been pushed to the side for far too long.
That brings us to the bill that is before the House today, Bill C-50, the implementation bill for the 2008 budget. What does it do? Instead of doing right by hard-working Canadians and returning all of the employee and employer contributions to the EI fund, it does the unthinkable. It legalizes the theft of $54 billion. That is the biggest theft in Canadian history and it is being perpetrated in the House of Commons and in the Senate. That is wrong and it is completely unacceptable. That money belongs to workers and their families. It is time to give it back. Workers deserve enhanced benefits, not enhanced bureaucracy, but more bureaucracy is all that the workers are getting from the government.
The Conservatives are setting up a new Canada employment insurance financing board that is mandated to use surpluses to reduce premiums instead of using them to improve access to benefits and the quality of benefits for Canadian workers.
Moreover, the reserve fund is limited to just $2 billion. Even then the bill says that the finance minister may give that sum to the board, not that he has to. How can we ensure there will be enough money in the reserve permanently?
The EI fund is supposed to protect workers in the case of economic downturns. It needs to be recession proof, but the Auditor General has estimated that $10 billion to $15 billion would be the amount required to balance the employment insurance account in the event of a recession.
I could go on forever, but I realize that I am running out of time, so let me reiterate my main concerns.
I have concerns about the legalized theft of the $54 billion surplus. I am concerned that the surpluses will not be used to improve access to or the quality of benefits for Canadians, which may even be a step toward the covert abolition of the employment insurance program altogether.
I am concerned about the reallocation of the most recent employment insurance surplus. I am concerned about the government's evasion of its obligations to workers since it will not have to answer for a crown corporation in the House. I am concerned about the uncertain funding for the reserve fund. I am concerned about the possible inadequacy of the reserve fund. I am concerned that the establishment of the board in no way improves Canadians' access to benefits or the quality of those benefits.
I am concerned about a potential suspension of benefits. I am concerned about the government's focus on establishing the board rather than attending to the employment insurance program's real problems.
These concerns are shared by thousands of hard-working Canadians in my riding of Hamilton Mountain and, indeed, right across our country. Yet today, the government is ramming it through the House just like it rammed it through committee.
There were no meaningful consultations. There were no cross-country hearings nor indepth study. The finance committee closed down debate on the bill. The Conservatives imposed a five minute limit to each speaker, and the Liberals supported that motion, five minutes to steal $54 billion. Workers deserve better. The EI surplus comes from their pockets. Unemployed workers desperately need these funds.
I urge all members of the House to do the right thing now, especially my Liberal colleagues. They should put the needs of working families in their ridings ahead of their own electoral needs. I know the Liberals do not want an election this spring and to vote against the government would trigger one, but this is not about their future; it is about the future of workers in our country. This is the time to stand up and be counted.
I am proud to stand with my NDP colleagues in voting against the bill. We know which side we are on.