Debates of Nov. 6th, 2020

Income Tax Act

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Guelph.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I feel as though we are on one of those nightly conference calls we had every night of the week, seven days a week, in the first two and a half months of the pandemic, given what was happening in our communities.

The member mentioned by name the businesses he has been advocating for. We all had a list in our communities. I was also working with the downtown business association in Guelph to try to get direct support.

Going through the province was difficult. As the member said, the coordination with the province would be eliminated by this new program, and it would introduce a scaled approach. That was another thing we were advocating for internally: How can we do this for businesses that do not quite meet the thresholds?

Could the member comment on how this is going to improve as business volumes go down or up during the pandemic? Will this will be able to match the needs of businesses?

[Randeep Sarai, Liberal, Surrey Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, absolutely. I sincerely appreciated the federal cabinet ministers, who listened not only to the governing side, but also to members of the opposition when they gave suggestions and provided the input of their BIAs and small businesses.

The bill would help those with the most need, such as a business that is in complete lockdown. In Surrey, it is the banquet halls that have been completely shut down. They have a large square footage, huge rents and huge tax bills. They did not get much support from the provincial government and were left out, in fact, but now all will be supported. They will get up to 90% until they are able to get back to business. Changes will also help restaurants that have had to shut down a large capacity of their seating. They have still been able to do some business, so they might not need 100% of their full rent. They might need 50% or 40%.

The scaling will help them, as opposed to a one-size-fits-all program, which was for businesses that had a reduction of, say, 30%. They would get 75% or 50% from the federal and provincial governments. The new program will actually incentivize them to do better in their businesses, get back to 100% and, in fact, increase business. It is a very good model that incentivizes business growth and helps businesses in this most difficult time.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise here this afternoon as one of the final speakers on Bill C-9. It is a key piece of economic legislation with much-needed support programs for businesses, not only in eastern Ontario where I reside but in every part of the country.

I have said this before during debates, particularly ones where we are dealing with economic measures for small businesses. I am not a fan of pushing bills through at some of the pace and time that we have done during COVID-19. I was not a fan last time when we only had about four hours of debate back in September to put some of these things through. I am happier with the process this time around. Albeit not perfect, it is a step in the right direction in terms of the committee of the whole and more debate. I appreciate the chance to rise here today.

A lot of times people see us in the chamber and see their local member of Parliament put their speeches up and wonder why we go through what we do with the legislation. They think that once we see the bill, we should vote on it and get it over with, whichever way we fall. We have to keep reminding not only us here in the chamber but all Canadians that this process is so fundamental to getting the best piece of legislation we possibly can. We need proper scrutiny of legislation to make sure that we get it right and get the best bill possible, and now, more than ever.

We are spending billions and billions of dollars of new money in the new programs in a very quick period of time. This scrutiny, the back-and-forth debate and discussion that we have, is so key.

When things are rushed through too fast, mistakes sometimes happen. We learned this morning that, for the Minister of Finance and the House leader's team, one of the amendments that was proposed or suggested by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, a reasonable proposal, was actually struck down by the Speaker earlier this morning because it was not organized and prepared properly. I think the term used was that it was a procedural error. The reality is that it was a mistake on the government's part because we are rushing things through at the last minute, and it was not able to be votable in that circumstance.

We were told with the prorogation of Parliament for six weeks that the government was going to be doing a reset. That was the real reason we had, apparently, for prorogation for six weeks. It was in the name of getting organized, having a cabinet retreat and getting all these bills lined up and ready to go.

As much as I talk about the concerns and sometimes about the lack of debate, my understanding is that this amendment is now going to have to be brought forward likely in a separate piece of legislation with debate and scrutiny, so we are going to have more time in this chamber and hopefully in committee to look at some of these issues and their responses in the coming weeks.

On Bill C-9, the vote was unanimous at second reading. I think the way the direction is going today we will find the same thing again, in favour of these programs and sending the message to small businesses wherever they are in this country that their Parliament and their MPs understand the seriousness and severity of the situation they are in.

We said that where things are good we will support the government and where scrutiny is needed, we will certainly give it. Because of that scrutiny and feedback, I am going to say that, in this legislation, the government has taken up some of the good ideas and good fixes.

There is one thing this pandemic has created. There never was a shortage of acronyms in the parliamentary world, and there certainly have been a few more in the last seven months. We have the CEWS, the Canada emergency wage subsidy. We have the CERS, the Canada emergency rent subsidy, which replaces the CECRA.

Before I get into some of my comments about the details, I want to first thank the businesses in my riding of Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry. I am very fortunate as I am one of the few members of Parliament who can drive back to my riding in about an hour or an hour and a half.

One of the things I enjoy every weekend, lately by Zoom, is having a lot of meetings with chambers of commerce and local business owners, and dropping by with what I call a bit of a wellness tour, asking for their feedback and if they were able to get the CEBA emergency business loan or able to get the wage subsidy. It is from those tours that I am able to share on social media some of my visits and encourage constituents to learn about the businesses in our community. More importantly, it is a good way to get feedback that I can bring back here to Ottawa to say, “Look, this program is not running effectively. There are gaps and there are holes in there”.

The wage subsidy was a perfect example. In the opening days of the pandemic, the government proposed a 10% wage subsidy. That was not helpful in the minds of many businesses. Many did not find it would be enough to keep their employees on the payroll. Many transitioned to CERB.

We advocated for a much higher number, and at 75% it was certainly an improvement. We appreciated the government taking up the calls we heard from businesses and the calls we made. In created a bit of chaos in terms of businesses laying some people off onto CERB and then coming back, but nevertheless, we will take that step in the right direction.

One of the other things I know our shadow finance minister, the member for Carleton, raised several times as well was that the cut-offs are an issue in a lot of these programs. It was actually pitting businesses when it came to the rent subsidy and the wage subsidy and their drop in revenues, where if they were able to recover 70% of their pre-COVID revenues, they were totally cut off the program. By finally taking the idea of indexing these programs, it was not an “all or nothing” situation.

We actually had businesses saying they did not want to bring on more staff or that they wanted to be careful about the number of hours of their stores because they did not want to lose the benefits keeping them afloat. It is really more of a cliff's edge. I feel this legislation had some challenges, and I am glad to see our idea of indexing it and having a sliding scale being used, as it is certainly going to help businesses in the country.

CERB was the same way. If someone made more than $1,000 they were cut off. There were people who wanted to go back to work but could not get full-time hours. They had to decide whether to take the $2,000 in CERB or go back. There was no hybrid model on that. We are seeing that advocacy from our side of the aisle, which will be continuing as these programs continue and we go through the second wave and back to more normal times.

On the rent program, the original program was rushed, and frankly, I do not think it was very effective. My understanding is that 10% of businesses were eligible for that program. It was a messy situation with landlords and tenants, and there was sometimes the sharing of financial information by tenants with their landlords, who had to apply. It was just not the best program. Thankfully, months later, the government has now listened to opposition members and made some changes to it.

The big thing I want to mention on the rent subsidy program is why opposition parties matter when it comes to this kind of matter, and why parliamentary scrutiny and asking the tough questions and digging a little are so important. When I saw the rent subsidy program being announced, I thought, yes, we do need this support program, and I thought CRA, the Canada Revenue Agency, would be the natural body to administer it. We then received information that it would be the CMHC, another acronym for the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. I thought that was kind of weird because it handles residential mortgages, not commercial ones. I thought it was kind of a strange organization to run the program.

We were told by the government that there was nothing to see, that we should stop complaining, stop delaying, stop attacking, and that we were team Canada and all in this together. That is the case, but we also need to make sure we are scrutinizing each other in the decisions we are making, so we started to dig and ask questions. All of a sudden, we found out that the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation was in fact not administering it. It was the organization that had it from the top but it was now subcontracting it to MCAP.

Who is at MCAP? It would be the Prime Minister's chief of staff's husband. We were told there was nothing to see, that we should stop suggesting a conflict of interest and that it was a ridiculous line of questioning. Now we realize there were inappropriate meetings at the Prime Minister's Office, and the lobbying commissioner is now investigating this potential scandal. Actually it is not “potential”; it is a scandal now. I am just waiting for the report to come out from the lobbying commissioner.

The bill would correct a lot of the things that were rushed through earlier, and now have the CRA involved in the process. I will wrap up my comments by making two key points on dealing with this economic legislation. The reasons for rushing things through, and the lack of ability to scrutinize and hear committee testimony from stakeholders like the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, are a challenge. With proper scrutiny, we get better bills. We get better legislation that does not need corrections to be brought in, and we are able to expose corruption, conflict of interest and wasteful spending when it happens.

Second, to my colleagues on the government side, the take-it-or-leave-it approach we saw earlier needs to end. We see that when we have reasonable ideas, work better in collaboration and do not bring these bills up at the last minute and say to take it or leave it in a rushed manner, we can actually get better scrutiny, better bills and better confidence from Canadians on the things we are presenting.

I appreciate the opportunity to speak here today and I look forward to hearing questions and comments from my colleagues, as always.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great fascination to my hon. colleague's discussion. The issue before us is a very serious issue. There are small businesses across this country that have been hammered by the first wave of the pandemic, and now the second wave, with winter coming.

I feel that in the first stages, with the rent subsidy plan and the government moving fast, there was a need for urgency. We had to get stuff out the door because we knew businesses could go under, but we learned very quickly that there were problems with the program. That was the issue, and I think we were all shocked at the attitude of many landlords who would let their businesses go under, rather than respond.

When we knew there was a problem, that was when we needed to start fixing it. We have been, for a number of months, waiting and waiting, and businesses are hanging by a thread. To my hon. colleague who talked about moving too quickly, there was a need to move fast, but given the crisis of the pandemic, there is a need now to be able to fix things as we are moving so that we are not leaving businesses hanging and waiting for a good piece of legislation that might come too late for them.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I agree. We needed to have a quick response to get assurances to businesses as quickly as possible. Having said that, the one thing I have always said is to spend the extra hours here debating, scrutinizing and going back and forth and to spend some time at committee hearing from stakeholders. As an example for this piece of legislation, I am a big supporter of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and the advocacy it does.

If it had the opportunity to bring these things forward at committee, when we have all these things going back and forth, for example the rent subsidy program, we would have had a better bill months ago. We would not be having tenants having to wait months and months on end for a fix that has finally come. We could have had a better bill and a better solution, by taking a bit more time when it originally happened. The lesson is learned. Let us not do that again.

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

It being 1:30 p.m., pursuant to an order made on Wednesday, November 4, 2020, it is my duty to interrupt proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the report stage of the bill now before the House.

The question is on Motion No. 1.

If a member of a recognized party present in the House wants to request a recorded vote or request that the motion be passed on division, I invite them to rise and so indicate to the Chair.

For the sake of clarity, I am now inviting a member present in the House to rise to indicate whether the motion is agreed to on division or whether a recorded vote is requested.

[Marilène Gill, Bloc, Manicouagan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would request a recorded vote.

And one or more members having risen:

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Accordingly, call in the members.

(The House divided on Motion No. 1, which was negatived on the following division:)

Vote #21

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

I declare Motion No. 1 lost.

Pursuant to an order made on Wednesday, November 4, 2020, Bill C-9, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act (Canada Emergency Rent Subsidy and Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy), is deemed concurred in at report stage without amendment, on division.

(Motion agreed to)

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Pursuant to an order made on Wednesday, November 4, Bill C-9, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act (Canada Emergency Rent Subsidy and Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy) is deemed read a third time and passed on division.

(Bill read the third time and passed)

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

It being 2:43 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's Order Paper.

Canada Labour Code

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

moved that Bill C-220, An Act to amend the Canada Labour Code (compassionate care leave), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to rise here today to discuss my private member's bill, Bill C-220, an act to amend the Canada Labour Code (compassionate care leave). It builds on my work in the Alberta Legislature and I am thrilled to be able to share this bill with my colleagues here.

The bill proposes to extend compassionate care leave by up to three weeks after the death of a loved one. Given everything that has happened over the last several months, I think we can all agree that compassionate care leave is as important as ever for Canadian families.

I would like to pause for a minute and thank the Minister of Labour, her staff and the member for Mount Royal for their advice and guidance during this process. The bill continues from their work established during the expansion of bereavement leave.

Compassionate care leave is a job-protected leave that allows an employee to take time off to care for a family member with a serious medical condition with a significant risk of death within 26 weeks from the date a medical certificate is issued or when leave is granted. The leave is available to full-time employees of federally regulated workplaces. Currently, employees who have at least 600 insurable hours during a 52-week qualifying period can seek leave for a maximum of 28 weeks during the year.

Benefits are provided for a maximum of 28 weeks, with one to two weeks of unpaid leave serving as a qualifying period. The employee receives EI benefits of up to $573 a week, or 55% of their weekly earnings. This time is vital for many families. When a loved one receives a potentially terminal diagnosis, it is stressful to figure out the logistics of who will provide their care.

Often many people do not think that they can take time off to care for their spouses or parents because they simply cannot afford it. Having compassionate care leave allows families to focus on caregiving while still receiving a portion of their salary. Getting to be with a family member in their final days is incredibly important and meaningful. Compassionate care leave has been the saving grace for thousands of families around the country.

What happens after a compassionate caregiver's loved one passes away? Right now the leave ends immediately and the employee is expected to be back at work within days of their loved one's death. This leaves little time to plan a funeral, get affairs in order and, most importantly, grieve.

Returning to work within days of a loved one's death is the least compassionate part of the compassionate care leave program. All of us in the chamber can agree that it takes more than just one day to process a death and get back into the headspace of work.

Bill C-220 proposes to extend job-protected compassionate care leave beyond the death of a loved one. The extension can be up to three weeks depending on how much compassionate care leave the employee has taken. Employees who have taken close to the maximum leave time would get one additional week beyond the death of their loved one. Employees who have taken between four and 20 weeks of leave would get an additional two weeks of leave past the death of their loved one, and employees who have taken fewer than four weeks of leave would receive an additional three weeks of leave beyond the death of their loved one.

I decided to structure the bill in this way because someone who has already taken most of their time allowed under the compassionate care leave program will likely already have made end-of-life arrangements compared with someone who has been on leave for less than a month.

While I worked on the bill, I wanted to be as fair as possible to employees while also being fair to employers. If the bill is passed, more than 18,000 federally regulated employers will be impacted by the changes. These employers are in a variety of sectors including air transportation, banks, Crown corporations like Canada Post, radio and television broadcasting, railways, telecommunications and businesses that are vital or essential to the operation of a federally regulated workplace.

We understand that employees are vital to the success of these corporations and businesses, and I think we can all agree that having employees return to work in a clearer state of mind after taking additional compassionate care leave is better than returning to work before they are ready.

About 11,000 Canadians used the compassionate care leave program in 2018. This was an uptick in usage after the amount of time allowed was extended two years prior. The average duration of compassionate care leave is between 4.8 and 12 weeks. The number of people using the program is expected to rise in coming years as our population ages and more Canadians find themselves in a caregiving role.

There is support for extending the length of leave. The Quality End-of-Life Coalition of Canada recently submitted its pre-budget consultation brief to the government, and among its list of recommendations was that the compassionate care benefit should be extended to include a two-week period for grief and bereavement. This coalition is made up of 34 national stakeholder organizations dedicated to improving end-of-life care for Canadians.

In its submission it wrote:

Family members, potential recipients of the Compassionate Care Benefit, may need support as they grieve the loss of a loved one and try to manage numerous strains and stresses....

By adjusting the Compassionate Care Benefit, more Canadians will have access to the time necessary to heal, minimize economic hardships and take care of some of the more practical business following a loved one’s death.

At the beginning of this speech I mentioned how the past few months, as our country and the entire world has dealt with COVID—19, have demonstrated how important a compassionate care leave program is. The virus has given us perspective on the value of spending more time with family and friends. We have all heard the news reports about family members who could not see their love ones in hospitals or nursing homes before they died. This is heartbreaking and I am sorry that any family members have found themselves in that situation. There is a huge importance to being with a loved one in their final days and compassionate care leave facilitates that. It allows families to be together and even for the terminally-ill person to die at home in some cases. This program has vital importance to our society.

If members do not mind, I would like to share a personal story about why compassionate care leave is important.

When I was starting out in my career, my grandma became very ill. At that point, I was young and in my twenties, competing with several others for a full-time job. I wanted to spend as much time as I could with my grandma, but I also worried about what would happen to my job if I did. Would I be fired? Would I be passed over for an opportunity? I decided to stay at work. That is a decision I regret to this day. My grandmother, Jeanne Babcock, passed away a few weeks later. At that time, there was no compassionate care leave program in Alberta. Employees in the same situation as me had no choice but to keep working or take unpaid time off, which could also impact their jobs.

After I was elected to Alberta's Legislative Assembly in 2012, I began to work on introducing a compassionate care leave program in the province. All other Canadian provinces had such a program at that point in time. For two years I worked on my private member's bill. I talked with researchers and families who all spoke about the importance of having such leave, as people are in their greatest time of need in their last few weeks of life. Being able to be with a loved one during that time to help them in any way they need and to say the proper goodbyes is a treasured gift for many families. I am pleased to say my bill passed and Alberta became the final province to introduce job-protected compassionate care leave in early 2014.

Six years later, I stood in this chamber to introduce Bill C-220 and build on this vitally important program. I did this because I saw a gap in the leave program. Many stakeholders and families told me how they were grateful to spend the final days with their loved one, but that the days following the death of their loved one felt rushed and stressful. Many had to return back to work before their affairs were in order, before they had time to fully process the death and start the grieving process. From these stories I saw an opportunity to make the compassionate care leave program even better and to help more families going through such difficult situations. Allowing additional time off following a loved one's death was something I felt could strengthen the program and greatly help caregivers who are grieving.

I hope my colleagues can agree with me that such an extension is important. This program has the support of all parties. In fact, the Conservative government pledged to extend the compassionate care leave program from six weeks to 26 weeks. The current government followed through on that commitment to extend the compassionate care leave program in early 2016. At the time, the government said it was also working on plans to extend the program so that more Canadians could take advantage of it. I hope my colleagues can see that Bill C-220 presents just that opportunity.

Some of my colleagues may ask why such an extension is necessary. After all, we have bereavement leave and 10 days of unpaid personal time off work. An employee currently taking compassionate care leave could use those options if they wanted extra time off. However, these options may not be realistic for some families. An employee is only allowed three days of paid bereavement leave after a family member dies. The remaining two days are unpaid. The 10-day personal time off is also unpaid. Not only is it unpaid, but it leaves no flexibility for employees if a different personal emergency comes up later in the year.

As I mentioned before, the average length of compassionate care leave is between 4.8 weeks and 12 weeks, so the majority of people who take the leave would be able to receive the extension proposed in my bill without exceeding the 26-week threshold. This would allow them to continue to receive EI benefits of compassionate care beyond the death of their loved one.

Using unpaid bereavement or unpaid sick leave after a love one's death is not feasible for many people. They just cannot afford such a loss in income. Most people cannot go two weeks without a paycheque, and that is why extending the compassionate care leave benefit is superior to using personal time and bereavement time.

With my bill, more Canadians would be able to have that extended time off. I am willing to continue to work with the minister and my colleagues to get this right for Canadians.

I have no doubt that all of us in the House have experienced the loss of a family member. It is devastating, and it takes time to recover from such a loss. We are fortunate to have a great program like compassionate care leave in Canada to help employees spend time with their loved ones in the final days. It is a great gift for many family members, who would not otherwise have the financial means to take time off work to become a full-time caregivers.

My bill aims to fix a gap that has become apparent, and that is the need of some additional time off following a loved one's death. This would allow employees who are taking compassionate care leave to make funeral arrangements, get affairs in order and start the grieving process before returning back to work. To have employees returning to work with a clearer state of mind is beneficial to employers in the long run, rather than rushing them back to work before they are ready.

As our population ages, we will have more family members stepping into caregiving roles and taking job-protected compassionate care leave. We need to ensure that the leave provides sufficient time for these caregiving employees and their families.

We all know the importance of family, and the last few months of chaos and uncertainty have cemented this importance. Upholding compassionate care leave and ensuring that the program has enough supports for employees who use the program is vital. One way to provide more support is by extending compassionate care leave by up to an additional three weeks to allow caregiving employees more time to grieve and settle affairs.

I hope that I have the support of my colleagues in the House. I look forward to working together so that we can make smart changes to this program to better help more families.

I am thankful for being allowed the time to speak on Bill C-220, an act to amend the Canada Labour Code, compassionate care leave. It is truly such an honour to introduce this bill.

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Labour]

Mr. Speaker, I wish I could be there in person to give a standing ovation to my friend for Edmonton Riverbend. I want to congratulate him on his bill and let him him know that I appreciate his mentioning me and the Minister of Labour. We share his aspirations of making caregiving more accessible to everyone.

The story the member told about his grandmother and his personal experience of not being able to afford to take leave was deeply moving. We have all seen recently how, because of the pandemic, people were unable to visit loved ones in long-term care facilities and how they wished could during these times.

Would the member be willing to work with the other parties in terms of amendments proposed at committee, should the House be willing to send the bill to committee?

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Mount Royal, and those in the minister's office, have been extremely helpful in terms of getting this bill right, and I thank him.

I think all members of the House can agree that compassionate care leave is an important program here in Canada. It is not a partisan issue, as my colleague and friend from Mount Royal and I have discussed many times. It is important that we get this right.

Certainly, up to this point, I have been working well with the government and other parties to ensure that those potential changes down the road are things we want to work with the minister on. Again, this is an important issue for many Canadians, and not just those of us sitting in the House.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Edmonton Riverbend for his work on this file. I think he has zeroed in on something that could do a lot of good for Canadians who are in a very difficult situation.

However, I would note, as the member spoke about the compassionate care benefit under employment insurance during his speech, that the bill before us would not amend the Employment Insurance Act, which currently states that the the benefit terminates when the family member dies. I am wondering why that is not included in the bill, and if he could speak to how we might get that included in the bill.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the member has essentially zeroed in on what we would love to do with the bill. We obviously want to impact EI. However, as the member knows well, a private member's bill cannot impact money from the government, so we cannot make changes to the bill to have EI follow along with the compassionate care leave program. With some of the work at committee, hopefully we can address that in future legislation with the government.

Again, the member's point zeroed in on exactly where we would go if this were not simply a private member's bill.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Mr. Speaker, this will just be a comment.

Many of the constituents in Elgin—Middlesex—London, whom I worked with as a constituency assistant, saw these types of things happen. I thank the member for bringing something so important to so many Canadians and their families. I thank him on behalf of the members of Elgin—Middlesex—London.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for the comment. I appreciate it.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada and to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I want to recognize that over the years, we have seen many changes to the EI program. They have all been fairly encouraging, as it has become a bit more liberal in its ability to support people.

What the member is proposing would go a long way in providing better-quality care for a lot of people, and I see that as a very strong positive. Maybe he wants to add some additional thoughts on other aspects of the impact on the recipients of the support.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary has certainly addressed the key aspect of this bill. I spoke about my grandma. It is one of millions of stories in this country that we have heard over and over again.

I will highlighting what we have seen in this pandemic. In a number of instances, people have had to say goodbye to their loved ones at a window, as opposed to embracing them in a hospital bed. Some have not been able to see their loved ones for months and months, only to suddenly find out they have just hours left to live. These stories are essentially what we want to address with the bill. I hope it is a step in the right direction.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour for me to rise in the House today to take part in the debate on Bill C-220.

However, before I begin, as we are in Veterans' Week and today is red Friday, I would like to take a moment to thank those who have served, those who are still serving, and the parents and family members of military across the country for their service. I also want to say how, as a military mother, I was disappointed this morning to read about Whole Foods. I hope it will do the right thing.

It is essential for us to talk about compassionate care, so I am happy that my colleague across the way brought this private member's bill forward. It is an important issue for Canadians, especially in these times when we can all use a little extra compassion.

Chances are that many of us will find ourselves in the position of caring for someone close to us at one point in our lives. It is a difficult and sometimes lonely journey. Caregivers deserve our greatest respect and gratitude. In 2018, approximately one in four Canadians aged 15 and older provided care to a family member or close friend with a long-term health condition, a physical or mental disability, or problems related to aging.

Unpaid caregiving provided by family and friends has become increasingly recognized as an important role in society. Reports by Statistics Canada have demonstrated that caregiving reduces the social costs associated with health services and institutionalization. In addition, those who are cared for have a much greater quality of life when they are able to remain at home.

My home province of Quebec has been devastated by COVID-19. I question whether we should be caring more for our family members, rather than institutions, so this is a very timely piece of legislation.

We understand the essential role of caregivers. We also understand the need to ensure that they have the support that they need. That said, let me begin by providing a brief overview of Bill C-220, first introduced by my hon. colleague on February 25, 2020.

The goal of Bill C-220 is to amend Part III of the Canada Labour Code to allow an employee using compassionate care leave to have more time off following the death of a loved one for whom they were caring.

The bill breaks down that extra time as follows: Employees would receive an additional three weeks of leave past the death if the employee has taken fewer than five weeks of leave, an additional two weeks of leave past the death if the employee has taken between five weeks and 19 weeks of paid leave, and an additional week of leave past the death if the employee has taken between 20 and 26 weeks of leave. An employee who has been away from work for a period of 27 weeks or more would not be provided with any additional weeks of leave.

The one question I have for the member for Edmonton Riverbend is why he did not include additional leave to employees who experience a sudden death of a family member. However, I am hopeful that when this piece of legislation gets to committee, that can be discussed as well.

I know I am talking a lot about numbers, but when taking care of a loved one, people are immersed in the day to day. When they lose that loved one, they do not have the time to grieve because they are in the business of death. They are filling out the papers. They are doing what they have to do. They are going through the motions. Having that extra time to grieve and not worry about going back to work when they are not ready is crucial.

It is our responsibility to address the difficult but real societal issues such as end-of-life care. Those things make us think of our loved ones and our own futures. While our government has taken many steps to set up a system that is just, compassionate and fair, I do believe we can do more.

We have made great progress in recent years to modernize the Canada Labour Code to ensure that it reflects the realities of today's workplaces and meets the needs of both employers and employees, now and into the future.

Last year, we implemented a comprehensive suite of significant amendments to the Canada Labour Code, including a new right for employees to request flexible work arrangements, additional leaves and other protections for employees following the death of a family member. We introduced amendments that give federally regulated workers the right to request flexible work arrangements such as flexible start and finish times and the ability to work from home.

Studies show that flexible start and finish times, the ability to take time off from work to deal with family obligations, and other types of flexible work arrangements can help employees find better work-life balance. By giving employees the flexibility to reduce the amount of time they spend at work, we are helping to ensure that those with intensive caregiving responsibilities have more time with their loved ones.

Recent amendments to the Canada Labour Code also include improvements to bereavement leave and additional leaves that could also be used by caregivers. Bereavement leave has been increased from three days to five days, but that is not enough. We have also provided for greater flexibility, so that the leave may be taken during the period that begins on the day on which the death occurs and ends six weeks after the latest of the days on which any funeral, burial or memorial service of that immediate family member occurs.

Employees are now entitled to five days of personal leave per year, including three paid days if they have worked for three consecutive months. Employees may take this leave for a number of reasons, including to carry out responsibilities related to the health or care of any of their family members or to address an urgent situation, such as the death of a family member.

In addition, the eligibility for the medical leave was improved so that every employee who was unable to work due to health reasons, including psychological trauma or stress resulting from the death of a family member, could now take up to 17 weeks of unpaid leave. We also eliminated the length of service requirements to be eligible for the leave related to critical illness, which provides employees with up to 37 weeks of job-protected leave to provide care or support to a critically ill child and up to 17 weeks of leave to provide care or support to a critically ill adult.

While these new and improved leave provisions and flexible work arrangements came into force on September 1, 2019, COVID has also taught us more.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Government of Canada has put Canadians first, providing the support they need to continue to make ends meet, while staying safe and healthy. Earlier this month we passed Bill C-4, the COVID-19 Response Measures Act, to create new benefits. Together with temporary measures to help Canadians access employment insurance benefits more easily, these recovery benefits will help workers affected by COVID-19 and requiring income support.

To ensure federally regulated employees have access to job-protected leave, the Government of Canada amended the Canada Labour Code so these employees can access the Canada recovery sickness benefit and the Canada recovery caregiver benefit.

These are temporary measures to help Canadians overcome the many challenges they are facing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

However, we have changed. We are not where we were a year ago. The member opposite talked about not being able to see his grandma, and having to make that choice. Yes, while there may be a few days of leave available, if someone does not have the financial means to take that leave, then she or he is making that decision, and those are decisions we all regret.

This month, it will be two years since my mom died suddenly, and most of the House knows that I did not get to say good bye. I wish I did, but after, we have a chance to help people get through it. I had the luxury of being able to take some time off to plan my mother's funeral, but not everybody does. Therefore, I want the member to know that I hope his bill passes and goes to committee, because this is the right thing to do.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would first like to say that my party and I will support the principle of the bill.

Overall, it is a rather modest bill in the sense that it makes a big difference for workers. It is also modest in the sense that it amends the Canada Labour Code rather than the Employment Insurance Act for employees who are subject to it. I will talk a little more about that later.

Right now, workers who take a leave of absence to care for a loved one have to return to work as soon as that person passes away. What this bill does is give workers, under certain conditions, time between the death of the person they were caring for and the date on which they have to return to work. That is no small thing because it enables caregivers to keep their jobs.

Maintaining that employer-employee relationship can be important for some reasons and in some industries. As my colleagues said, people should not have to decide whether to take caregiver leave while wondering whether they will have to choose between continuing to care for their loved one and losing their job.

Depending on the situation, this period can be longer. As we have heard, there is the mourning period and all of the arrangements. After going through all of this, it is important for people to take care of themselves.

Naturally, the majority of this 28-week leave, which is in the Canada Labour Code, is paid, because workers can access the compassionate care special benefit through the employment insurance system. As we all know, a worker needs to have accumulated 600 hours to be eligible.

There are people who need to take this kind of leave and who will not be paid. The period set out in the Canada Labour Code will therefore help people retain the employment relationship. We think this is a major amendment, which is why we will support this bill.

I also want to point out that we are debating this bill, introduced by the Conservative member, during national caregiver week, which is celebrated across the country, or at least it is in Quebec. I think that the caregiver's experience is well documented.

I will not overwhelm my colleagues with numbers this Friday afternoon. However, we must recognize that caregivers represent more than one-quarter of the workforce. Caregivers are mostly women. In addition to the loss of income arising from their absence from work, these people must also pay for additional expenses out of pocket. This has even been fairly well documented. In some cases, it can be up to $7,000 a year. In other cases, it is more than $400 a week, which is challenging.

I think that the value of what we have before us is that it lets us see the changes made under the Canada Labour Code and the changes we can eventually make to the Employment Insurance Act, and determine how we can support these family members who make a big difference.

I think society is better off for being able to rely on people who can help, even though that is a bit harder at this particular time. Our labour legislation should also help support workers and, furthermore, support them financially by means of leave provisions in other acts.

To conclude, we will support this bill. I look forward to this bill being referred to the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities, which I am a member of, so that we can improve it if need be.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak in favour of Bill C-220, which has the potential to do a lot of good for Canadians who have just lost a loved one and who had been making use of the compassionate care leave that is already available to them under the Canada Labour Code.

Unfortunately, the leave provision has a pretty rough edge, as people are expected to return to work immediately following the death of a loved one, or the next week. This means that in cases where a loved one passes away on a Thursday or Friday, they have to report back to work immediately on the Monday. Of course, we know it is important—