Human Resources committee  Mr. Chair and members of the committee, thank you and good morning. My name is Rutha Astravas. I'm the director of special benefits for employment insurance policy at the Department of Employment and Social Development. As you said, joining me is Mike MacPhee, my colleague from

Human Resources committee  I can start with responding to a number of different issues you have raised. I think it's important to note that the EI program is a very large program, and we have designed benefits for.... Really, when we talk about the special benefits, there are two types of cases. One is f

Human Resources committee  I'm sorry that I cannot answer that question, but what I can say is that when you do talk about the challenges of navigating the system, we do provide as much information as we can on our websites, as well as in guides to claimants about what they need to do while on claim, and w

Human Resources committee  The parents of young victims of crime benefit is a grant. It is not part of the employment insurance program. It's a separate benefit administered by Service Canada.

Human Resources committee  It's a one-time occurrence based on an event that is due to a probable criminal cause. However, it's a weekly benefit.

Human Resources committee  It is a grant.

Human Resources committee  It's a voted grant, and it's paid via Service Canada directly to individuals on a weekly basis.

Human Resources committee  Thank you. I think you touched on a number of ideas in your question.

Human Resources committee  First, I would like to talk about eligibility. We talked about it at our last appearance here. There are several ways to look at the coverage of the employment insurance program for workers and to calculate the number of weeks of benefits. Last week, Statistics Canada released th

Human Resources committee  We have no recommendations. We are here to answer technical questions, including how employment insurance works.

Human Resources committee  We don't know the reason for the sickness benefits. We also have no data on bereavement or the death of a child. As for maternity benefits, we also have no information on whether or not the child died because the benefits continue to be paid. Maternity benefits are intended for t

Human Resources committee  I'm not aware of a specific definition of grief. Certainly within the Employment Insurance Act and regulations, we do not refer to any kind of bereavement or grief.

Human Resources committee  I personally am not aware of it.

Human Resources committee  The employment insurance program is paid for by contributions from employers and workers. It does have eligibility and qualifying criteria that are common to all the different EI types of benefits, both regular benefits and special benefits. It is therefore not universal, because

Human Resources committee  If I understand your question, you're asking if it's possible to create a new benefit and how you would determine how long it would be.