Human Resources committee  Thank you. I have opened a can of worms, haven't I? First off, it is qualitative. What we did was we asked our members their opinions of their business and what they've tried to do. As we said, we want to drill down deeper and ask. Those are very good suggestions that we are al

Human Resources committee  Thank you for the question. I was in Saskatchewan last week and I met with the premier. I met with a member who ships a pulse crop, which is lentils, to seven countries around the world, and he's having difficulty finding people. I talked to people.... Saskatchewan is booming. I

Human Resources committee  I simply want to address your assumption that the reason you couldn't hold on to people was because of low wages, which from my most recent experience is not true. Secondly, having worked with EI over many years with the Canadian Labour Force Development Board, what we've found i

Human Resources committee  Very good. In terms of the makeup of the program, it hasn't changed, but in terms of the flowing of extra revenues, as we've said to you many times over many years, yes, we have been talking about the surplus since 1996, about how they've been building it up year after year, and

Human Resources committee  I agree with everything you said, and, yes, they do. I personally have met with members in rural communities who have a hard time finding people, whether it's on the farm or whether it's a world-famous Canadian artist in Moose Jaw. It's in rural as well as in urban communities.

Human Resources committee  There was a bit of cooling. They thought at least there was some improvement in the rate-setting process--for example, a fixed date they liked, November 14. They liked the fact that there'd be parameters, no big swings. What they didn't like was the continued build-up of the surp

Human Resources committee  Yes.

Human Resources committee  Right.

Human Resources committee  Yes.

Human Resources committee  As you can see on the graph, EI and qualified labour, on page 14, we have been saying for years that the shortage of labour is becoming an issue. It's an issue. Now everybody is recognizing it, but we've been saying it for years, and I've met with many of you saying that--and the

Human Resources committee  My sense is that it's failing both. I feel we need to do what we did back in 1996. We worked closely with the Liberal Party, with Minister Axworthy, to look at how we could make it more responsive to employees' and employers' needs. It hasn't been changed since then.

Human Resources committee  This is what we found when we asked our members. We did a comprehensive survey. We didn't just focus on EI. We did a comprehensive survey, and what popped out was that one of the reasons they felt they were having difficulty finding employees, for all types of jobs, was a relucta

Human Resources committee  Yes. By the way, we haven't released this information. We're just releasing this one graph today.

Human Resources committee  Yes.

Human Resources committee  Well, there are, and you can see the regional breakouts on page 18. It varies from 39% of respondents in Newfoundland to 18% in Ontario saying they had difficulty hiring people because people would rather stay on EI benefits.