Elsie Wayne

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

To keep the service, yes indeed. It is important for employers as well. If employers pay lower premiums they can expand and create jobs. That is what we are looking for. That is what we are asking for.

I thank you, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to speak on behalf of our people back home and on behalf of all people across the country.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

Yes, indeed. We will fight for an independent commission to look after that money. There is no way it should be used to pay down the debt. There are men and women who need that money. They paid into employment insurance but are not eligible to receive it.

I appeal to all my colleagues. We will all vote in favour of the bill but we will not let the issue go away. We need more changes. We need more members to speak out and to work to make sure our people have dignity.

I cannot believe someone out west would say that people in the maritimes are sitting with their hands out, that we are lazy and that we do not want to work. I cannot believe anyone would say that about our people.

When people from B.C. and Alberta come to the maritime provinces they say it is the most beautiful part of Canada and that the people are wonderful, kind and gracious. In Atlantic Canada that is how people are. They reach out to their neighbour. They help each other. We in the maritime provinces will continue to build this country and to make all Canadians equal.

I appeal to my colleagues on the government side to please take another look at the bill and to lower EI premiums for those who pay in.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

Yes, that is right. That amount is before they pay their EI premiums and clawbacks. After those are paid they make around $200. How does a family feed a child? How does a family buy Nike sneakers for their child so they can be like the boy or girl who sits next to them in school? How do they do that on $200 a week?

There is a need for all of us in the House to come together and make those men, women and children our number one priority, not the large corporations. I am not opposed to corporations. They create jobs. However let us be fair and just.

How come the government can take a surplus of $35 billion from the workers? It does not belong to the minister or to the government. The hon. member from Newfoundland, who is sitting over there blushing, knows that. He bloody well knows that money does not belong to the government. He knows it belongs to workers in Newfoundland and New Brunswick. The hon. member from P.E.I. knows it as well. His face is as red as an apple.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

That is right. There is a ban in P.E.I. and that will have a tremendous effect on its economy.

Because the changes to the intensity clause and the clawback are a small step in the right direction, we will join our NDP colleagues in voting in favour of the bill. However no member in the House should think for one minute that we will sit here and be idle. We will work until the government corrects the bill all the way and makes it fair and just for all the men and women who want to work.

Those people want to work 12 months of the year. Do members know how much some of them make? Some of them make $240 a week.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

It was just before the election. The hon. member is right.

Those members who sit in the House, no matter which side, and do not have the heart to deal with the people who need us to speak out for them, to fight them and do what is right for them, should not be in the House of Commons. That is what we are here for. We are here for the grassroots man and woman so that they can educate their children. That is what they want to do.

We lose many of our people to the United States these days. They have no work here because of cutbacks in the health care system and in the educational system. There is no work in my riding because of what has happened with shipbuilding.

Tomorrow there will be an announcement with regard to shipbuilding, but it will not be made in the House of Commons. It will be made at a press conference. Shipbuilding is high tech. Frigates are high tech. When ships are built a multiplier effect takes place in communities. Steelworkers work and supply the steel. Other jobs are created because of all the equipment needed for the ships. We should be dealing with the issue in the House of Commons instead of having a press conference. I am really upset about that.

This is the peoples' House. The government should come in here with the bills and tell us what changes will be made. It should come in here and tell us if a shipyard will be in P.E.I., or Nova Scotia or Saint John, New Brunswick. It should not ask us to read about it in the newspaper. We do that these days with everything. We pick up a newspaper or turn on a TV to find out what is happening instead of finding out in the House.

Every member in the House knows that some men and women must take on seasonal work. Let us look at Newfoundland. For heaven's sake, with the storms it has had do members think people there can go out and plant flowers this week like they can in Vancouver? Do members think they can go out and plant potatoes? No. They have had snow for the last six months in Newfoundland.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

Yes, and women as well, the hon. member for Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough reminds me.

Members should look at what it is like today. It tugs at my heart. A man who worked at the shipyard came to me almost with tears in his eyes. They no longer have EI and they do not have another job. I had never seen this before.

They do not want welfare. They want their dignity. As far as I am concerned, if they go on welfare they will have their dignity because they will not have done so by choice.

I suppose Bill C-2 and Bill C-44 were designed to make significant changes to our employment insurance system, and all of us here would hope for the better. However that is not necessarily what has happened. Most of the debate surrounding Bill C-2 relates to what has been called the intensity clause, which would see claimants' benefits reduced if they have had to seek employment insurance with greater frequency.

In Bathurst, New Brunswick, there was a former Liberal member who was in the cabinet. Do hon. members remember? I will never forget when the government brought in the new EI regulations. The people were hurting. The parish priest, on a Sunday, marched down the main street in Bathurst with the people. Never before had a parish priest done that. The hon. member who sat in the cabinet told the priest he should have something better to do on a Sunday.

Do hon. members know what happened? Because of what happened and what the government did, the member was not re-elected. Nineteen members in the Atlantic region were not re-elected. When the Liberals almost got wiped out in the Atlantic region the government said it had better do something and take another look.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have an opportunity to speak to Bill C-2, formerly Bill C-44. I would like to say thanks to the hon. members from the NDP. They certainly can relate to the situation and the difficulties people have had, particularly in the Atlantic region. I know there are other parts of the country that have had a difficult times as well.

I will refer to the last question that was put to the hon. member. In southwestern New Brunswick communities that depend on seasonal workers are lumped in with bigger communities like Saint John, my riding, and Fredericton which have their own unemployment problems. That makes the numbers artificially low in areas where they are in fact a lot higher.

In Saint John, New Brunswick, they talk about the unemployment rate being around 8%. People in Blacks Harbour, which is not too far from Saint John, are lumped in with us. The unemployment rate in Blacks Harbour is 45%, but because it is lumped in with us they say the unemployment rate there is 7% or 8%. That is not fair.

We are pleased that the intensity rule is being changed in the bill. However there is a great need for other changes in the bill that have not been addressed. Our people need their dignity.

Every one of us in the House of Commons is able to go home and feed our families. We are able to dress them. Some have young people going to college. I wonder if members ever stop to think about the people coming into my constituency office who can no longer afford to feed their families. Never have my city and my riding been like this before.

Four thousand men worked at the shipyard. Those men made good salaries and contributed to the economy. Things were booming. We had the Atlantic sugar refinery before the government took it away from us and closed it down. Those men also contributed to the economy. We had VIA Rail and those men contributed to the economy.

[National Defence, April 4th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the maritime helicopter project has already come under heavy fire from the industry and from aerospace stakeholders. The ethics counsellor has stated that he would require that people not become involved in any file on which they had been making representation.

Will the Prime Minister tell the House today that Mr. Miller will not be involved from this day forth with regard to this industry?

[National Defence, April 4th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, when speaking of his new employee, the former Eurocopter lobbyist David Miller, the Prime Minister stated in the House yesterday:

When the bids are ready, I will demand of Mr. Miller that he not participate in any discussions.

Is the Prime Minister saying that Mr. Miller will be allowed to participate in Sea King replacement discussions that occur before the bids are ready?

[Lumber Industry, March 29th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the Washington based coalition for fair lumber import into the United States has excluded Atlantic Canada from the impending countervailing duty charges to be launched by the U.S. government. The exclusion is in recognition of the lumbering practices of Atlantic Canada, and at least 72,000 woodlot owners.

In the event that the Canadian government imposes an export tax, will the government provide the same recognition and exclusion for Atlantic Canada and those woodlot owners as the Americans have?