Mr. Speaker, it speaks volumes that the NDP continues to say one thing about the temporary foreign workers program in public while in private they ask for more and more temporary foreign workers to be poured into their ridings. Yesterday, the member for Acadie—Bathurst was quoted in Fredericton's The Daily Gleaner as advocating for better employment insurance benefits for temporary foreign workers in his riding.
Last month in Atlantic Canada, there were 11,000 unemployed Canadians. Employers in regions with near double-digit unemployment should not have to look to other countries to get employees. Our government has made modest and reasonable changes to employment insurance to help keep Canadians attached to the workforce and better connect unemployed Canadians with the available jobs in their local areas, jobs that match their skills.
We want all Canadians in all regions to benefit from economic growth. Why does the member for Acadie—Bathurst and his NDP colleagues continue to prefer that these jobs go to temporary foreign workers before they go to Canadians?