Mr. Speaker, I think the legislation provides part of that answer. They are not going to get any of that kind of assistance. The government is not going to make sure that the program even has the capacity to offer that kind of assistance if there is even a further downturn in the economy in Canada.
The program, we all know, is a shadow of its former self. This is not just this government that has been doing that. The Liberals loved to play fancy, fast and free with the unemployment insurance program. They started us down this road during the time that they were in power. In fact, back in the 1970s there was a crisis in the Trudeau government when a minister resigned over the first attempt to gut the unemployment insurance program at that time.
Many Canadians saw that the Liberals could not be trusted either at that time to ensure that there was a program there that was really going to provide workers and communities with the kind of assistance that was needed in the time of an economic downturn and in time of unemployment.
The program is a former shadow of itself and I do not think that the language that we use is strong enough or could be strong enough. Words like “stealing” from workers and “theft” have all be used in this debate and I think they are entirely appropriately used in this debate because $52 billion has been taken from workers and employers in Canada, money that should have been used to ensure their economic security, to ensure their training, and it is gone.