Local MP backs new bill for EI overhaul

It’s the issue of the month on the North Coast, the rather stringent qualification hours to partake in the EI system of Canada. With a number of local residents failing to qualify this year, the winter is setting up to be rather challenging one. And it’s something that NDP’s Nathan Cullen hopes to have an impact on in Ottawa this session.

A Bloc Quebecois sponsored bill is working its way through the governmental process, with a second reading hoped for before the Christmas break. The bill has brought together many of the suggestions of an all party committee on Employment Insurance on reforms to the system.

The Daily News had full information on Cullen’s frustrations and on the plans of how to change a government direction in its Thursday edition.

CULLEN LOSING PATIENCE WITH FED’S EI ‘CASH GRAB’
Skeena-Bulkley Valley MP backing new bill calling for huge EI overhaul.
By Leanne Rithchie
The Daily News, Thursday, October 12, 2006
Pages 1 and 2

Tired of waiting for the Conservatives to back their own recommendations, Skeena-Bulkley Valley MP Nathan Cullen is hoping a private members bill will address the inequities in the Employment Insurance (EI) system.

The NDP is working with the Bloc Quebecois on Bill C-269 in the hopes of having a second reading passed before Christmas.

“There was a list of recommendations that came out of an all-party committee for EI reforms but government was dragging its feet on it so what we decided was to go forward with a private members bill,” said Cullen.

He said the way private members bills work is like a lottery system- “they literally just draw names out of a hat,”

Both the NDP and the Bloc put in for a private members bill on the issue and the Bloc’s was drawn, so the NDP has given it their support.

The bill would address some of the current challenges faced by shore workers who haven’t enough hours to qualify for EI this winter.

In a nutshell, the bill would reduce the qualifying period to a minimum of 360 hours of work, regardless of the regional rate of unemployment; increase the benefit period; increase the rate of weekly benefits to 60 and repeal the waiting period.

The bill reflects the suggestions of an all- party committee on EI reform.
Currently, shore workers in Prince Rupert and on the Queen Charlotte islands have a shortage of hours due to a failure of the pink salmon run this year and to top it off, the number of hours they need to qualify for EI has been increased because the region used to assess the number of hours needed includes the booming economies of Prince George and the Northeast. Currently, people need 560 hours to qualify.

“We hope to get it through committee and back to the house for third and final reading and change the way EI is collected and distributed in this country,” said Cullen.

“We are really trying to come up with some solutions to what is turning into a potentially disastrous winter. Folks are really hurting. There is a responsibility both with the community and within government to answer their neighours call.”

Cullen said the federal government has so manipulated the Employment Insurance system that it has over-collected $50 billion.

“It is essentially a cash grab. The over-collection of $50 billion, was not the by luck, it was by design. You keep collecting from workers and business, but at the same time you make the program more restrictive. It allows you to say that unemployment is down, when that is completely false and allows they to have a slush fund to spend wherever they want.” he said.

“My patience is running out. Hypocrisy can only go on for so long before you start to become more aggressive.”