Carla Qualtrough

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, I can assure the House that we are committed to finding a threshold under which Canadians can continue to work and receive the CERB. We are working out those details now, and I am grateful for the input of all parliamentarians to this effort. I can assure the member as well that honoraria, such as that received by an emergency responder or a firefighter, will indeed be either exempt or not counted as employment income to a certain threshold, but again, we are working out those details.

Once again, as was mentioned before, I appreciate how much feedback we have received on these measures.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, I am very hopeful and confident in the integrity and truthfulness of Canadians in this time of crisis. As I mentioned, we have built in integrity measures at the front and the back end. Based on social insurance numbers, we can track if someone receives a benefit and also receives a T4. We can track if someone receives the benefit and gets a second payment accidentally. There will be a certain amount of integrity measures in the weeks, months and year to come.

Quite frankly, I do not think that there are Canadians out there, in this time of need, spending a lot of time trying to defraud the government.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, I will first clarify my last answer. If we want to change the law so that somebody who is not working because of CERB, then we need a legislative change. If we want to create a threshold of income under which somebody can still qualify for CERB, we need a regulatory change. It is not apparent given the unanimous consent motion today that we will have to make legislative changes.

With respect to seasonal workers, I apologize for any confusion I may have created in the past, but we are looking at and we have committed in this House today to ensure that seasonal workers will indeed be covered.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, we do not know at this point if legislative amendments would be required, so it would be premature to even speculate when the House would have to resume, if at all.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, a key cornerstone of this benefit is the quick way in which we can get it out and we are relying very heavily on the honesty of Canadians to do that. There are integrity measures built into the front, namely the requirement for a social insurance number, and there are integrity measures built into the back.

We are asking Canadians to honestly attest that they meet the eligibility criteria as I laid them out and I would hope that no one is suggesting that Canadians do not honestly reply to those questions.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, in order to change the criteria to include groups of individuals who are not working but who have not stopped working for CERB, legislative changes would be required. In order to create a threshold of income under which individuals would remain eligible for the CERB, regulatory changes would be required.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, it is extremely simple and straightforward. The eligibility criteria for the CERB is, in fact, legislated. Someone has to have earned more than $5,000 in income, be a resident of Canada and has to have stopped working for COVID reasons.

We know that there are people earning very low amounts of money and we have committed to creating a threshold under which Canadians can continue to earn income and access the CERB. We are working on that and decisions will be made on that shortly.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, April 11th, 2020]

Mr. Chair, we know, as the Prime Minister and others have mentioned, that the number one goal of getting out the CERB was to get it into the hands of as many Canadians as possible. We are working now to make sure that in the long run there are not consequences in terms of EI eligibility, whether that be hours worked or number of weeks accumulated, that would negatively impact certain already vulnerable populations.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, March 25th, 2020]

Madam Chair, given the member's fact pattern, if that individual met the eligibility of 15 years of age, earned $5,000 in the past year and was a resident of Canada, I believe, to the best of my knowledge, yes.

[COVID-19 Pandemic, March 25th, 2020]

Madam Chair, any EI entitlement that a worker currently has will not in any way be impacted by the new Canada emergency response benefit. Whatever someone is entitled to now he or she will be entitled to after the 16 weeks.