Madam Speaker, we agree with the member that the government should not have prorogued Parliament and delayed the rollout of fixing the benefit program, the CERB, which ran out last night at midnight. We completely agree with him that the government waited too long and people are struggling.
I am concerned, though, about his statements around paid sick leave. As I cited earlier from The Huffington Post, 14% of workers earning less than $16,000 took paid sick leave versus 74% of those earning over $96,000. Clearly, workers are going to work because they are afraid they will be unable to make ends meet, feed their families and pay their rents, and they are desperate.
Paid sick leave would allow people who have COVID symptoms to stay home and protect themselves, their co-workers and the businesses where they work. If COVID spreads in the workplace, it is going to be shut down. If a person works in a restaurant, becomes sick and continues working with the whole team at the restaurant, that could take the restaurant down. A restaurant previously closed by public health could get shut down again and be wiped off the map if an employee became sick.
I would like my colleague to speak about what the Conservatives would do to protect those workers in the workplace. We have not heard what they would have done with CERB. Would they have cut it? What would they have done with paid sick leave? We have not heard what they would like to do, so I hope my colleague can talk about what the Conservatives propose to do to protect those workers who have lost their jobs or those businesses that have closed their doors. Those people have relied on CERB and have nothing right now.