Mr. Speaker, too many Newfoundlanders and Labradorians and too many Canadians are thinking of starting a family but are worried about the financial costs. Too many people have to choose between a career and a baby. Our support for young families is not where it should be.
I held a public forum in my riding of St. John's South—Mount Pearl last week. The overwhelming message is that, at 55%, parental benefits under the employment insurance system are inadequate. Parental benefits should also fall outside the EI system. New parents are not unemployed and are not searching for work. New parents deserve fair pay for the hardest job.
We speak in this House about citizenship and immigration and the temporary foreign worker program as ways to address the labour shortage, but why not make our central focus the family? We must nurture our most precious resource.