Madam Speaker, it is the Liberals' lobby; we know what they are like. I believe it is the member for Saint-Maurice—Champlain who caused the problem. Let us be serious as the construction holiday begins.
For people living with a disability, there is an improvement from what was offered before. We are therefore in favour of it. There are measures concerning legal time limits; no one is against that. We support that.
There is an improvement in the wage subsidy program that makes it accessible. As I stated this morning at a scrum, that is good news. The program can be accessed by many seasonal businesses which, until now, had no support. That is important, especially in Quebec's regions and in eastern Quebec. That is good news.
We all understand that these programs will have to be phased out sooner or later. The debt accumulated as a result of the pandemic and the federal government's decisions is enormous. There are useful elements, and others that are less so. There seems to be something interesting in this measure. Adjusting the amounts that can be accessed according to the real losses incurred is in itself an improvement.
However, political parties—and above all the Liberal Party of Canada—continue to claim they have the right to receive the wage subsidy.
My understanding was that, on the short list of parties that can be considered serious—and there is one other one—the Conservatives are considering forgoing the wage subsidy. That will depend on who wins the leadership race. I firmly believe that political parties should not be contributing to Canada's national deficit at a time like this. That does not make any sense to me. This would have been a good opportunity to put things right.
I suspect that if the Liberal government had had the wisdom to drop the wage subsidy as a simple gesture, perhaps some of its party members would have donated a little more. I bet the average Liberal donor has good judgment, just like the average Conservative donor or the average Bloc donor. If I were in the Liberals' shoes, I would have thought about that.
As was mentioned earlier, the CERB was created as an emergency program. This measure could have taken several forms. In its current form, the measure was good and positive. As everyone knows, any program created in an emergency might include some temporarily uncertain aspects. That is okay; we can live with that.
Now, months later, we need to improve it. There is still a big problem with work incentives. The Government of Quebec and the economic community, among others, have raised this issue a number of times. This program is detrimental to workers' return to work. We heard a lot about this issue with respect to students, but we should not kid ourselves. There are not many weeks left.
Something needs to be done about the Canada emergency benefit. Do we need to change the program? Should we replace it with something else? Should it be integrated into the EI program? All of these are possible options, and we are open to any constructive suggestions that will serve the greater good, the economy and the interests of Quebec.
The last time we spoke about the Canada emergency benefit in the House, fraud seemed to be a very serious issue. All of a sudden, it is no big deal and it is no longer being mentioned, even though this was a good opportunity. I think all reasonable members of the House, which I suppose is almost everyone, are in favour of combatting fraud.
The Canada emergency response benefit, in its current form, does nothing for artists. It was great that big events were protected, but they would have no soul without the artists and artisans sharing their work. These people have not received any assistance from the Canadian government. Something needed to be done.
If there is one thing on which we agree with the Liberal government, it is that we must be generous in welcoming others. In Quebec, we want to welcome the guardian angels. We want their cases to be prioritized because they helped Quebec during a very difficult period.
I cannot imagine the Liberal Party not being in favour of that idea. We would have to talk about it with our Conservative Party colleagues. We are very comfortable with it, and it is something we have been advocating for for some time. This was a great opportunity squandered.
Just a few minutes ago, I got a message from Louis Sansfaçon, the father of Émilie Sansfaçon. Why is the government not doing something to address the demand, the need, for 50 weeks of employment insurance benefits for the seriously ill, who are currently entitled to just 15 weeks? The government said it would be 26 weeks, but that has not changed yet; it is still 15 weeks. Why is the government not taking this opportunity to address the issue and demonstrate some good judgment and compassion?
Those are the things that should have been done differently. Those are the things that we feel are necessary. The government should have seized the opportunity to help more Quebeckers, and more Canadians too, for what it is worth. That is the kind of progress we can get behind. Let's all get behind that and make some more progress.