Madam Speaker, the rules guiding the notional surplus in EI, $45 billion to $50 billion, indicate that two years of surplus should be kept and the excess drawn down through reduced premiums or improvements to the benefit plan. If anything, we have been asking for EI premiums to be reduced.
I think the member may have inadvertently misled the House. He just said that his government has frozen EI premiums, which should normally go down, and then he said that is a stimulus. If we do not decrease EI premiums, then we are taking dollars away from employees and employers and that is anti-stimulative, not stimulative. The member said it is $4.5 billion of stimulus. I think he better explain himself, because I think he has actually flipped it on its head and has it backwards.