Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Avalon.
I am pleased to speak to the motion, which asks the government to reverse the devastating changes it has made to employment insurance, and further, to reinstate the extra five weeks pilot project. I support unequivocally those two points.
The changes the Conservative government has made to employment insurance are punitive, ill-conceived and penalize seasonal workers. I want to emphasize that it penalizes seasonal industries and will undermine the seasonal economy. The seasonal economy in this country is responsible for about 20% of our exports. It is responsible for a substantial amount of our GDP. In fact, those seasonal industries require skilled workers. If those seasonal industries and seasonal businesses are to survive, prosper and contribute to the Canadian economy, it has to be understood that they require skilled workers to come back.
As a farmer, I have a neighbour who runs a multi-million dollar operation. He has three full-time employees year round and there are three seasonal employees. He has had those seasonal employees coming back every year for somewhere between 10 and 15 years, depending on the person. They know how to run a $300,000 piece of equipment. They know his operation well. He does employ them sometimes two days a week in the summer, and so those folks with skills are there for him in the following season.
The punitive penalties the government is putting in place with the EI changes will affect that person substantially. The employees who work for him are penalized 50¢ on the dollar for the two days they work. That is a penalty. They want to work. They want to earn more income. They want to spend the income they earn in the economy, and the government is taking that away with these changes.
I see the parliamentary secretary frowning. I wish she would come down to meet some of those people. The fact of the matter is that if those people are penalized, they have to look at whether or not they should stay in their communities, whether or not they should leave their families, whether or not they should go to work in Fort McMurray or whatever. This does two things. It affects the community and it affects that farmer's business. It does a third thing as well. It affects the families. The economy as a whole would be injured.
These changes came in, and I look at the parliamentary secretary again, and were done without consultations with the provinces. They did not have any real hearings in this place. There was absolutely no cost-benefit analysis done in terms of the economy. I would submit that these changes not only hurt the workers, they will undermine our seasonal industries and the businesses that operate in those seasonal industries.
I find it remarkably strange, and I listened to a lot of the speakers here today, that words are being expressed by government MPs that do not in any way at all have any relationship with the reality on the ground for the people who are affected by these changes. Conservative backbench MPs are quite brave to stand up in this place and spout the government's talking points, or the ones that the parliamentary secretary allows them to spout. However, they seem very reluctant to explain these changes beyond this place.
I will reference the Moncton Times & Transcript, Saturday, February 2, 2013 with the headline, “Labour groups demand EI meetings”. It says:
A new coalition of anti-poverty and labour groups from across New Brunswick is asking the province's eight Conservative MPs to set up public meetings to explain controversial changes to the employment insurance program.
It goes on to say in the article that most Conservative MPs stayed away from any such meetings.
In fact, last Thursday night I attended a meeting in Alberton, Prince Edward Island, that was called by those concerned about the employment insurance changes. That is the riding of the Minister of National Revenue. The seasonal workers there expressed lots of concerns. However, I was shocked by the initial remarks of the chair of that meeting. The chair, from the microphone at the meeting, directed the media not to take any photographs of people who were speaking at the microphones because she had been informed by the people there that they were fearful that if their photographs were taken, HRSDC might retaliate against them in some way.
This is Canada. People should not be operating out of fear in this country, but that is what they are doing. We hear it all the time from people on the phone who call in to our office.
The parliamentary secretary laughs, but this is no joking matter. The fact of the matter is that this is what people are saying on the phone to us.