Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise on the issue of employment insurance, which was not adequately addressed by the government in question period.
As we well know, we are living through one of the worst economic crisis of our existence. Certainly it is the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. It is a crisis that developed very gradually. Over the past 20 years, we have seen a huge erosion in family income. It has come into sharp relief over the last few months due to the economic crisis that has hit home in Canada because of a complete lack of industrial strategy or job strategy. It is hitting people in every part of the country, including my constituency of Burnaby—New Westminster.
We are seeing hundreds of cases for requests for employment insurance and most of those Canadians are being denied Employment Insurance.
The government has billions of dollars to bail out banking and corporate CEOs. They shovel money off the back of a truck when it comes to a small number of wealthy Canadians, but what has it done for ordinary Canadians?
It is very clear that the Conservatives have betrayed the trust that ordinary Canadians have placed in our national government. Back 20 years ago, the eligibility rate for employment insurance was 75%. In other words, about 75% of those who were unemployed could access the insurance fund into which they had paid.
I am not completely blaming the Conservatives. Under the Liberals that eroded back to about 38%. In other words, just over one-third of those who were unemployed could actually access the money they had paid into employment insurance.
Now, as the Caledon Institute of Social Policy has very clearly said, about 44% of unemployed Canadians qualify for benefits under employment insurance. This is an insurance program into which Canadians have paid.
We have heard referenced many times the $54 billion taken out of the fund, first by the Liberals and now under the Conservatives. That means only 44% of unemployed Canadians qualified for benefits.
It is absolutely absurd. These are people in Burnaby--New Westminster who, through no fault of their own, have seen local softwood mills close. Three of them have closed in my area because of the softwood lumber sellout, which was an absolutely irresponsible piece of policy that never should have been signed. Mills have closed as a result that. A couple of thousand people were thrown out of work directly. If we add the indirect jobs, we are talking about hundreds and hundreds more, yet, according to what has been a very serious analysis of employment insurance, most of those people do not qualify.
It is worse in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia than elsewhere. It is estimated, again by the Caledon Institute of Social Policy, that only about 28% of people in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia qualify for employment insurance. In areas that voted Conservative, such as Calgary and Regina, it is even lower. It is 19% in Calgary and 18.9% in Regina.
It is absolutely absurd that we have a situation where hard-working Canadians pay into employment insurance, yet they cannot access it. They cannot access it to feed their families when they are in dire need. They cannot access it to keep a roof over their heads. This is absolutely deplorable.
The government throws out these figures, saying that 80% or 90% of those who qualify get employment insurance. The question is right there. It is because the qualifications are so stringent that most people do not qualify even though they pay into the fund. That is why this constitutes a betrayal of ordinary, hard-working Canadians. They have worked hard. They deserve employment insurance.