Mr. Speaker, I would like to continue on with some questioning. A number of weeks have passed since I asked the question about extending EI benefits to those who were prevented from fishing because of ice conditions. When the question was asked on April 22, the minister said that she understood what was happening with the ice conditions. She said that the employment of fishers was very important. She said, “We are looking after these individuals, and we will be addressing that situation very soon”. It sounded promising.
Under some further questioning, as we got further into it, she said she had been working with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans on this very issue. At committee, just two days ago, the deputy minister of fisheries and oceans was asked if there were discussions between HRDC and Fisheries and Oceans. She said that there had been no discussions. There was not a problem with ice on the northeast coast of Newfoundland and Labrador.
At our fisheries committee today, we had Earle McCurdy, a representative from the FFAW. We asked him about the ice conditions on the northeast coast of Newfoundland. Mr. McCurdy said he had received hundreds of emails and calls. There were harbours on the northeast coast that were blocked in by ice and there was still nothing forthcoming. The only solution that her department was going to have was that we should wait and wait. Eventually, the ice will melt and move off and we will not have to deal with it.
Let us ask the parliamentary secretary specific questions. Were there discussions? Why was due process not given to ice compensation? Now, he might go on and talk about extending the five extra weeks on employment insurance, because that is what the government did. I have some questions on that, too. The fact of the matter is that most of the clients were already getting the five extra weeks that the government said it was generously giving. There are 58 regions in the country. Thirty-six of those regions were already getting the five weeks, so we are only talking about less than 20 regions that were going to get the extra five weeks.
When the parliamentary secretary talks about the extra weeks, my second question is this. When this was announced in January, my sources tell me that this was only going to impact the 325,000 people who were on EI, which represents less than 25% of the total client base. Could he confirm these numbers and tell us exactly how many people were going to benefit from this initiative that they were already going to get anyway? There were already 10% unemployment levels in many regions of the country and there was more to come.
It was going to happen anyway, but the government likes to say that the extra five weeks was a great thing and that it is doing a lot for EI. The fact of the matter is that it was going to happen anyway. Will the parliamentary secretary answer those two specific questions on employment insurance benefits?