Michael Ignatieff, National Post
Published: Saturday, May 23, 2009 We're in a recession that is rewriting the rules of our economy.
Unemployment is surging, bankruptcies are increasing and the deficit is climbing to record levels. More than 300,000 Canadians have lost their jobs since the crisis began.
Our Employment Insurance system just wasn't built for a national crisis of this scope. More than 40% of the unemployed in this country aren't eligible for EI, even though they have paid into the system. As a result, Canadians aren't getting the help they need when they need it.
That's why we have to reform EI. Improving eligibility will bring help to workers who have paid in but don't currently qualify. It is also the most effective, rapid and targeted form of stimulus the government can offer our economy right now.
We're facing a single, national crisis. But EI maintains 58 different regional standards of eligibility. That doesn't make sense.
The distortions produced by the current EI rules are striking.
Unemployment is up 83% in Alberta and 68% in B. C. -- but it's still twice as hard to qualify for EI in Western Canada as it is elsewhere in the country.
The rules end up pitting worker against worker. In Magog, Que., 200 people who lost their jobs at Gurit Canada at the same time and who have paid the same EI benefits are now receiving different levels of assistance because their town happens to straddle the border of two EI regions.
Every day, Canadians come into the offices of their Members of Parliament, seeking help with the EI system. A father of four in Mississauga with a wife on disability has paid into EI but can't claim because, under the current rules, he is eleven hours short of what the government demands.
The current rules aren't fair, and they aren't right for the times.
The Liberal party has proposed a national, 360-hour standard of EI eligibility, for as long as this crisis lasts. If implemented quickly, up to 150,000 more Canadians -- who've lost their jobs through no fault of their own and who have paid into the system --could qualify for EI benefits.
That kind of change will have a positive effect on the Canadian economy.
One-hundred-and-fifty-thousand more unemployed Canadians on EI mean 150,000 more Canadian families spending on food, rent and transportation. It means money flowing into communities that have been hit the hardest by this recession.
That's the kind of immediate, targeted and effective stimulus we need right now. We're half-way through 2009, and the government has only managed to roll out about 6% of its stimulus package. Red tape has paralyzed federal infrastructure spending, and billions of dollars are being held back by the federal government from municipalities that are desperate to get shovels in the ground and to start creating jobs. We can help those communities directly, right now, by improving access to EI.
Under our plan, the cost of improving access to EI will come out of the federal government's general revenues. Payroll taxes will remain frozen, as they are now. Duration and level of benefits would remain unchanged.
Day after day in the House of Commons, Conservatives have defended the current EI system. Their evidence that it works well is perverse: They point to regions of the country where so many people have lost their jobs that, under the current rules, it's now easier to qualify for EI than it was before.
The Conservative government's answer to the crisis in EI eligibility is to wait for more Canadians to lose their jobs. That's wrong.
In the closing weeks of the spring session of Parliament, the Conservative government has a choice to make. Stephen Harper can continue to resist a good idea simply because someone else thought of it first. Or else he can make a simple but critical change to EI that will provide benefits for thousands of Canadians who have paid into the system and who now need that money to support their families.
We hope the Conservative government will choose wisely.