Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question, which is an excellent one.
I think offering self-employed workers the opportunity to contribute to employment insurance on a voluntary basis is long overdue. They account for about 17% of workers in Canada. I think that is enough to allow them the opportunity to contribute to the EI system on a voluntary basis. I would add that many of these self-employed workers are women, and many of them are single parents. Thus, I think it is high time we offered them the opportunity to contribute to the system.