1971-04-20

PRIVILEGE


Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege in respect of which I have given Your Honour notice. Since it affects an issue which we discussed yesterday in the House, I understand that oral notice has been given to the Solicitor General as well.
When I raised my question of privilege yesterday I think Your Honour quite wisely indicated that before the matter was decided Your Honour might wish to avail yourself of assistance and advice from other members of the House on the general issue of whether or not there is a prima facie case of privilege, in the absence of which, of course, no motion could be put.
Let me make it clear at the outset that I do not challenge the right of the authorities, including the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, in matters involving the criminal law or security to deal with Members of Parliament as Canadians in the same way as other Canadians are dealt with, subject, of course, to their traditional rights and privileges which I shall cite to Your Honour later.
There was one exception to this. There was a fascinating case in the United Kingdom in 1939 when Mr. Duncan Sandys, a Member of Parliament, came into possession of certain information with respect to the armed forces. This is a well known case and is cited in many of the authorities. How the information came into Mr. Sandys' possession is not clear, but he went to the Minister of Defence and asked that it be confirmed. He said if the information was given to him he would remain silent. The minister did not confirm the information but shortly afterward Mr. Sandys was served with a summons. He went into the House, raised the matter as a question of privilege and, as I understand it, the House took the position that only with the approval of the chamber could the summons proceed. This approval having been given, the matter went forward to trial. That is really not the case here.
What we are dealing with here involves the traditional and proverbial rights of Members of Parliament. Both May and Beauchesne deal with this question to some extent. May, for example, in the eighth chapter of the seventeenth edition at pages 122 and 123 states that it is not proper to impugn the conduct of members in the House or to threaten them with future exposure if they take part in debates of the House. The author goes on to say-I am now quoting from page 123:
Conduct not amounting to a direct attempt to influence a member in the discharge of his duties but having a tendency to impair his independence in the future performance of his duty will also be treated as a breach of privilege.
I intend to establish my case by quoting to Your Honour statements from Hansard and from an interview conducted outside the House with the minister. It may be possible that the information collected with regard to Members of Parliament has been collected for no good reason and with no thought of future action, but if this is the case these files are no more than the product of a bureaucratic pack rat and ought to be destroyed.
I should like to quote from the British Bill of Rights:
That the freedom of speech in debates or proceedings in Parliament are not to be impeached or questioned in any Court or place out of Parliament.
This surely remains in force, Mr. Speaker, even if Members of Parliament do not know whose conduct is being impeached or questioned or for what reasons.
Beauchesne's Fourth Edition, paragraph 119 (2), reads as follows:
Freedom of speech is a sacred principle and if there is a place where it should be fully respected that place is the Parliament of the nation, and it is the Speaker's responsibility to see that this principle is not infringed upon.
Attached to the fourth edition of Beauchesne is a very interesting annex dealing with a report brought in by the United Kingdom Parliament on April 5, 1939. It is a very lengthy and useful report but I shall quote only two brief paragraphs. At page 428 of Beauchesne we find this statement:
The dignity and independence of the two Houses...are in great measure preserved by keeping their privileges indefinite. If all the privileges of Parliament were set down and ascertained, and no privilege to be allowed but what was so defined and determined, it were easy for the executive power to devise some new case, not within the line of privilege, and under pretence thereof to harass any refractory member and violate the freedom of Parliament.
My second quotation from the report is as follows:
Your committee would emphasize a point mentioned in the report which they made to the House in the last session of Parliament, namely, that the privilege of freedom of speech enjoyed by Members of Parliament is in truth the privilege of their constituents. It is secured to members not for their personal benefit, but to enable them to discharge the functions of their office without fear of prosecutions civil or criminal.
Having cited that as a very brief synopsis of some of the law, practice and precedents, I now put before Your Honour some of the statements made in this House yesterday and later outside the House. I am referring to page 5032 of yesterday's Hansard, and my first quotation is from a question put by the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander). He asked:
In view of the fact that some time ago one of the officials of the RCMP indicated to me during a meeting of the justice committee that perhaps there would be files on Members of Parliament in the event that complaints were made by constituents

April 20, 1971
RCMP Files on Members of Parliament
or members of the public, would the minister now advise whether, in the event of such complaint against a Member of Parliament, it is the policy to compile a dossier relating to that member?
Your Honour intervened at that point and then the hon. member resumed by asking:
May I ask whether, in the event of a complaint by a constituent against a Member of Parliament, the RCMP, rightly or wrongly, would compile a dossier relating to that member?
The ultimate answer given by the Solicitor General (Mr. Goyer) was:
Mr. Speaker, I do not intend to make a statement on motions. I feel I have replied to the question and if the member does not understand me clearly, I wish he could be more specific.
A little farther down on the same page the hon. member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald) asked this question:
However, at this time I should like to ask him-
He is referring to the Solicitor General.
-through you, Sir, whether it is now the practice of the RCMP to photograph, and in other ways cover public meetings in which members of this House, as well as civic officials, might participate, as was recently indicated by the premier of Prince Edward Island?
The answer of the Solicitor General was:
Mr. Speaker, some hon. members seem to think that they are in the United States. I do not know whether it is the practice or not. What motivates the decisions of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police is the need to take action. There is certainly no systematic policy about citizens. Events lead us. If some methods have to be used with regard to an individual, it is because there is a clear indication that it is necessary.
On page 5033 the right hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Diefenbaker) asked a question, the last part of which is as follows:
Will the minister give his unequivocal answer that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, for whom he speaks in this House, have not, and are not continuing to have, dossiers on Members of Parliament? Let that be clear and let the House have the answer.
The minister replied and I shall only read the latter part because the first part consisted of an eulogy of the RCMP, with which none of us differ, Mr. Speaker. He said:
Now, I find no provision in the law-and if there is, I should very much like to be enlightened about it-to the effect that Members of Parliament are not also citizens, that they enjoy complete immunity and that they can do anything. If the House wishes to pass such a provision, the people will think that hon. members constitute a special category of citizens in this country.
The right hon. member proceeded to ask another question:
Mr. Speaker, there is no debate. I asked the minister the simple question: Are there dossiers on Members of Parliament? Members do not expect to be treated differently from anybody else, but Members of Parliament have the right to know whether this government has launched upon a system of looking into the lives of individuals through the Mounted Police.
The minister replied:
Mr. Speaker, I said that the department applied no general policy in this respect, and I might add that for the time that
I have been Solicitor General, I have not seen the file of any member.
Mr. Speaker, later, outside the House, the minister was interviewed and the report contains two or three brief statements which I think are very relevant to this issue. This question was asked:
Does the RCMP have dossiers on all Members of Parliament?
A. I prefer this way to put questions than to be a little arrogant.
Q. No, sir, but you can't have dossiers on every citizen in Canada so I know that the RCMP have dossiers on some Members of Parliament?
A. Personally, as I said in the House, personally I never asked to see one dossier of a Member of Parliament and I have never asked to make an inquiry on one Member of Parliament-
The minister gave a further answer with which I should like to conclude, Mr. Speaker;
They might have dossiers on Members of Parliament. I am sure that they have dossiers on some Members of Parliament. You have Members of Parliament who are former civil servants and when a civil servant has to have access to top secret of course he has to accept the security clearance. This is normal and I think this is good.
Q. Now are you saying that it is not the policy to have dossiers on all M.P.S and you are also saying that you are not sure whether or not these dossiers do exist?
A. I am saying that there is no policy to the effect that we will have a dossier on all Members of Parliament. This is the information I have and this is the instruction-and also I am ready to give at any time but I am sure that I don't have to give those instruction. This is the practice.
Mr. Speaker, let me conclude with this very brief argument. I suggest that if you consider the compilation of all the questions and the answers given by the minister you will find there is no clear and categorical denial of the fact alluded to in the form of these questions, that dossiers are being kept in respect of some Members of Parliament as legislative representatives and that this constitutes an infraction of the privileges and immunities of this House. I suggest that this constitutes intimidation and a type of constructive blackmail that can only result in the diminishing of the freedom of members of this House. Surely it comes squarely within the definition of privilege which I have just outlined.
This refusal to give a straightforward and honest answer would be bad enough in connection with any government, but when it comes from a member of this administration which, with a few exceptions and in spite of some rather unbelievable expressions of affection for the parliamentary system, has shown by its actions that it is dedicated to the continuous erosion of legislative independence and freedom, it is unacceptable.
The neat question for Your Honour to decide now is whether a prima facie case has been made out, because more hinges on this than just this question alone. The minister's refusal to answer a consistent line of questioning both inside and outside the House must be interpreted as meaning that the minister is refusing for a very definite reason, and that reason lies in the fact that some dossiers are being kept and some scrutiny is being maintained on some Members of Parliament in their capacity as members. Does this extend to the point of interfering

April 20, 1971

with the telephones of members of this House? There is no question that if they can do the one they can do the other. I think this is an extremely important issue to be decided.
If the facts raise a reasonable probability of a prima facie case, then I suggest to you as Mr. Speaker and as a lawyer that the implications of a prima facie case are not such that we have to establish the point beyond a reasonable doubt and not even by a preponderance of evidence. If the facts indicate to Your Honour there is a doubt, that there is a possibility that the actions of the government and of the police authorities suggest there has indeed been maintained some form of scrutiny or some form of dossiers on Members of Parliament in the exercise of their legislative capacity as representatives of the people, that is a prima facie case. I would go further and suggest that if there is any doubt a parliamentary committee might well make an examination and assist Your Honour on that point. The matter is one which is entirely for Your Honour to decide and in doing so I think Your Honour is entitled to ask for assistance either in the form of advice from individual members or from a committee. I suggest further that if Your Honour should conclude there is a prima facie case on these facts, I would be prepared to consult with Your Honour and the House leaders concerning the form of the motion which might be put.


Mr. Speaker:: I have listened with much interest and attention to the hon. member for Peace River. I do not wish to suggest that no reply should be made by someone on behalf of the government in respect of the hon. member's question of privilege, but in view of the prescription of the new rules the Chair has had an opportunity to give the matter serious thought, to look into the precedents and to consider the background of such questions. Therefore I believe I am in a position now to give my view, right or wrong, but I can assure hon. members that the conclusion to which I have come has been reached after listening very attentively to the hon. member and particularly after considering the matter since yesterday when it was first raised by the hon. member for Peace River.
The hon. member has, according to the provisions of section 2 of Standing Order 17, given notice to the Chair of his intention to raise the question of privilege he has now stated to the House. In his written notice the hon. gentleman stated that it was his intention to raise the same issue in relation to which he endeavoured to propose a motion during yesterday's sitting. That point may not be material at this time but I do suggest to the hon. member that what he raises today is a new and much broader question than the one he raised yesterday. In the notice given by the hon. member it is stated:
The issue involved of course is the breach of privilege involved in the extent to which there is likely to be intimidation of Members of Parliament to the extent to which they are subjected to scrutiny and inspection, and have records kept of them in their capacity as Members of Parliament by the RCMP or others on behalf of the government.
RCMP Files on Members of Parliament
This morning I had occasion to look back over the records of the House beginning with the year 1946 and I find that the question of alleged dossiers on Members of Parliament as such has been raised on a number of occasions. I might even say that it has been raised regularly and that there are many citations or quotations which hon. members might want me to bring to their attention. In particular, I might refer hon. members to Hansard for July 5, 1946, the first year in which my search began, at page 3201, when the then Minister of Justice stated in part:
The hon. member also asks if there are any dossiers on Members of Parliament. There are no dossiers on Members of Parliament as such.
Again, on January 29, 1958, as recorded at page 3948 of Hansard, the matter was renewed in relation to a question on the order paper. The then Minister of Justice provided an extended reply to the question. A similar reply has been made in answer to similar or related questions on a number of other occasions. In the time at my disposal I have come across the following examples: Hansard for October 29, 1962, at page 1011; Hansard for November 4, 1963, at page 4341; Hansard for November 28, 1963, at page 5210; and Hansard for May 3, 1966, at page 4632. Additionally, hon. members may be interested in reading the debate of some length on the very same subject which is recorded at pages 5161 to 5166 of Hansard for June 25, 1959.
The conclusion to be drawn from the questions asked and the answers given over an extended period of years is that hon. members have had reason to believe that dossiers might well exist in relation to individual Members of Parliament in their capacity as citizens at least, if not in their capacity as members as such. Also, in the same period the suggestion has come from successive ministers that if such files exist they relate to individuals in their personal capacity and not in their capacity as Members of Parliament.
The question is whether there are any special circumstances which might indicate that what was not considered privilege in previous years might be made the subject of such a question at this time. In my view there could be a prima facie case of privilege only if there were specific allegations or special circumstances leading to the conclusion that police or other activity is of such a nature as to interfere with a member in the discharge of his responsibilities in Parliament.
Hon. members may refer to Erskine May's classic definition of privilege often quoted in this House as it appears at page 42 of May's seventeenth edition. Parliamentary privilege is defined as the sum of the peculiar rights enjoyed by each House collectively as a constituent part of the high court of parliament, and by members of each House individually, without which they could not discharge their functions, and which exceed those possessed by other bodies or individuals. Thus privilege, though part of the law of the land, is to a certain extent an exemption from the ordinary law.
According to this definition, privileges are those special rights recognized as belonging to Members of Parliament

April 20, 1971
Inquiries of the Ministry
over and above the law of the land as it applies to other citizens. Parliamentary privilege is the sum of extraordinary rights claimed by Parliament for itself to ensure that Parliament can function freely and without hindrance. These privileges are very limited in scope, and parliamentary law itself prescribes that this scope cannot be extended. Essentially, parliamentary privilege is, therefore, freedom of speech beyond the prescriptions of the common law in reference to libel and to slander.
Does parliamentary privilege as thus defined include a special right and exemption from the law, a special privilege providing an exemption from a practice which applies to other citizens equally? Do the very particular circumstances alluded to by the hon. member for Peace River constitute a prima facie case of breach of parliamentary privilege which might be referred, as suggested by the hon. member, to a committee for the purpose of advising the Chair?
I must say in all honesty and after much consideration of the matter raised by the hon. member for Peace River and the very important points made yesterday by the right hon. member for Prince Albert that it would be difficult for the Chair, in view of past practice, to conclude that in the present circumstances there is a prima facie case of breach of privilege. I suggest to hon. members that it would be imprudent of the Chair to project the question of police flies beyond the circumstances or conditions raised by the hon. member and beyond the particular circumstances alluded to by the minister in his reply to the House and in the statement made outside the House to which the hon. member for Peace River has alluded.
For the time being, and considering the very special circumstances, I cannot find a prima facie case of privilege on the facts as presented to the Chair thus far. I think I should insist that I consider the matter to be a very serious one, that certainly I recognize the duty of the Chair on behalf of all hon. members to ensure that it will be possible for them to discharge freely their responsibilities as Members of Parliament, and if any special circumstances were brought to the attention of this House and to the Chair that hon. members in any way, by police or other practices, were in some way intimidated in their work or prevented from discharging their duties freely and without hindrance I would have no hesitation in recognizing the matter as a breach of privilege. But I must rule at the moment on the particular circumstance brought to the attention of the Chair and decide whether there is a prima facie case of privilege on this basis. My finding must be that there is not.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD

Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Dartmouth-Halifax East.


Mr. J. M. Forrestall (Darimoulh-Halifax East):: Mr. Speaker, I shall wait until the Minister of National Defence returns to the House in order to welcome him back to Canada properly.



PROPOSED TRANS-ALASKA PIPELINE SYSTEM-STUDY OF EFFECTS OF POSSIBLE POLLUTION FROM TANKERS- MEETING WITH UNITED STATES OFFICIALS

Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Transport. It arises out of the growing evidence of increasing support in the United States for the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System, now supported by the President's Economic Council and by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce, Mr. Maurice Stans. Has any study been made by his department as to the possible effects of large oil tankers travelling between Valdez and Cherry Point and other points on the Pacific coast and, if such a study has been made, has it been completed and will it be made available to the members of this House?


Hon. Donald C. Jamieson (Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, I would assume that by "possible effects" of the transportation of oil the hon. member means the possible effects of some disaster, natural or otherwise, in the transportation of oil. The answer is that studies are under way on this question and have been for some time, not all related to the particular project to which the hon. member has referred but generally in connection with our environmental studies. With respect to the west coast route we also have a study under way at the present time with regard to additional navigational aids and various forms and devices that might make the route safer. This study is not completed, but when it is I see no reason why it should not be made available to the House.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the minister if the information which his department has already collected as to the possible damage to the fishing industry and to the coast of British Columbia has been transmitted to the government of the United States, indicating the Canadian government's concern and the Canadian people's concern regarding the possible ecological damage to the west coast?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, the normal channel for the transmission of such information would be through our own Department of External Affairs. The Department of Transport has certainly made all of the data available to that and other departments of the government, and I am sure that at least in part it has formed the basis of the communications and the fears that have been expressed already by that department.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct one further supplementary question to the right hon. Prime Minister. In view of the fact that the Secretary of State for External Affairs has been corresponding with the United States Secretary of State regarding a possible meeting, may I first ask the Prime Minister if such a meeting has definitely been set, and if in the meantime the Canadian government has made any representations that the TAPS program not be proceeded with because of the possible dangers to the west coast of Canada?

April 20, 1971


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I do not know if the meetings to which the Secretary of State for External Affairs has referred in this House have taken place. I do not know when they were or are to be scheduled.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I have an answer to a question which the leader of the New Democratic Party asked me earlier, if I might be permitted to give it. It relates to the meetings between the Canadian government and the Department of State in Washington on the question of the pollution of the Pacific as a result of possible oil transportation from Alaska to the northwestern United States. I have been informed that there has been agreement to set the meetings for May 3 and they will take place on that date.
[Later: ]


Mr. Speaker:: I believe the hon. member for Comox-Alberni has a supplementary to the prior question.


Mr. Thomas S. Barnelt (Comox-Alberni):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question related to those asked by the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands of the Minister of Transport. Are any discussions or negotiations going on with the province of British Columbia leading to the establishment of permanent protective arrangements, along the lines recommended by the Arrow task force, for oil leakage prevention and clean-up on the Pacific coast?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Not specifically with the government of British Columbia as of this moment. However, the recommendations that came from a committee of this House and from the McTaggart-Cowan group with regard to the establishment of a contingency plan are nearly completed. Many parts of them are in fact complete, and when this is done we will be discussing them with all of the provinces that have coastal waters and that are concerned about those waters, as we are. That should be within the next month.



NATIONAL PARKS


Mr. Real Caouette (Temiscamingue):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to address a question to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development who is also responsible for national parks.
Are discussions taking place with Quebec authorities at the present time concerning the establishment of a national park in Temiscamingue?


Hon. Jean  Crelien@Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development: Mr. Speaker, there are no discussions taking place at the present time concerning the establishment of a national park in Temiscamingue. I know that all Quebecers feel it would be desirable to develop national parks not only in Temiscamingue but in other areas of the province as well.
Inquiries of the Ministry


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister.
Can he tell us if any action is now being taken by his department for the restoration of the ancient fort of Ville-Marie?


Mr. Speaker:: I believe that the supplementary question could be put on the order paper. And I wish to point out to hon. members that I have always had serious doubts about questions of the kind asked by the hon. member. In any event, I assume that he has obtained the information that could be useful to him.

I believe the hon. member for Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe has a supplementary question.



BONNE BAY-LETTING OF CONTRACT FOR SURVEY WORK

Mr. Jack Marshall (Humber-St. Georges-Sl. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, would the minister indicate whether a contract has been let to do survey work on the national park in western Newfoundland, Bonne Bay park?


Mr. Speaker:: Again I suggest that question might well be placed on the order paper.



THE CANADIAN ECONOMY


Mr. Georges Valade (Sainle-Marie):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs.
Can he tell us what are his intentions as regards the substantial increase in the cost of living during the past month? Since this increase affects low-salaried employees and people receiving old-age security pensions, does the minister intend to take steps to offset the effects of this increased cost of living on elderly people or low-income groups?


Hon. Ron Basford (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the annual increase at 1.9 per cent was the lowest experienced by any western country, and therefore any change in policy to deal with that for the moment satisfactory situation would have to be made by the government and announced by the Minister of Finance from time to time as would be appropriate.


Georges-J. Valade: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs.
Could the minister say whether, following this cost of living increase, he has given new directives or contacted the Chairman of the Prices and Incomes Commission in order to request explanations on the failure of this agency?

April 20, 1971
Inquiries of the Ministry



INQUIRY AS TO INTRODUCTION OF COMPULSORY WAGE AND PRICE CONTROLS

Mr. S. Perry Ryan (Spadina):: As a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker, in the light of the recent statement by the Dominion Bureau of Statistics to the effect that the all-item cost of living index rose by 1.2 per cent in the first quarter of this year, the largest advance in over a decade, is the government now considering compulsory price and wage controls for specific industries or for the entire economy?


Stanley Ronald Basford: Mr. Speaker, of course any announcement like that would be made at the appropriate time and not during the question period.


Sylvester Perry Ryan: Has the minister caused preparations to be made in the event a decision is taken by the government to impose controls, and has he consulted with the provinces about expected or anticipated co-operation in the event a decision is taken to bring in controls?



NATIONAL SECURITY


Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prince Albert):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. It has to do with the Public Order (Temporary Measures) Act which will die a natural death, as I hope it will, at the end of the month. Is he now in a position to say whether the government intends to permit it to die and not introduce other legislation or whether the government has in mind changes in the Criminal Code designed to cover the general situation?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I can assure the right hon. member that an announcement will made on this before the end of the month.


John George Diefenbaker: I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. There is a delightful air of uncertainty about the Prime Minister which I can understand in view of the division in the cabinet. I would ask him, however, if the government has replied to the request of the government of the province of Quebec for permanent legislation to cover situations such as that which arose last fall? Has there been a reply and, if so, what was the nature of that reply?


An hon. Member:: Take it up with Dalton Camp.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, there has been no written reply by myself to the Premier of Quebec. We have considered his letter and are taking into account representations which he made to me. He, too, will know the answer before the thirtieth of the month.


John George Diefenbaker: A further supplementary, Mr. Speaker. I realize it is very imprudent to try to get an answer from the Prime Minister on this but I would ask if a reply was sent by any minister of this government to the
government of Quebec in consequence of the request that was made in this regard?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I feel sure I am right in saying there was no reply. It is conceivable there has been one but I doubt it very much. The letter was addressed to me and I did not answer; therefore I cannot see how any reply would have been sent to that letter.


John George Diefenbaker: You were away at the time.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I might add that, as I told the House earlier, there have been verbal discussions on this subject between the Premier of Quebec and myself.


Mr. Donald Maclnnis (Cape Breion-East Richmond):: have a supplementary question for the Prime Minister in connection with the request made to Ottawa by the Quebec government, Mr. Speaker. Is any further legislation necessary since the premier of the province of Quebec has assured the European countries that all is well in that province?


Mr. Roch La Salle (Jolietfe):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a supplementary question.


Mr. Speaker:: I recognize the hon. member for Joliette, who wishes to put a supplementary question.

I wonder whether I could invite the co-operation of hon. members so that we might try to consider more subjects than we did yesterday. I still have to recognize a number of hon. members who did not have an opportunity to ask their questions yesterday. I undertook that I would look in their direction early in the question period and I am counting on the co-operation of all hon. members in order that I might be able to achieve that.


Roch La Salle: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a question of the Prime Minister. Since the special measures must be repealed at the end of the month, can he tell the House whether there will be a meeting with the Quebec premier in this connection before then?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I am not
aware of any such meeting being planned, Mr. Speaker. Apparently, the Quebec premier is in Europe and I personally do not expect to meet him to discuss the matter referred to by the hon. member before the end of the month. However, as the hon. member knows, I am always open to such proposed meetings.



ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE


Mr. Andrew Brewin (Greenwood):: Mr. Speaker, my question is addressed to the Solicitor General. I would
[Mr. Valade.l
April 20, 1971

ask whether he has received a report from a Mr. Cos-sette, chairman of a section of the St. Jean-Baptiste Society of Montreal, that his personal residence was bugged by an electronic device and, if so, what is he proposing to do about it?


Hon. Jean-Pierre Goyer (Solicitor General):: Mr. Speaker, I indeed received a wire from Mr. Cossette, which he had first sent to the Minister of Justice, and in reply I intend to point out to him that no Canadian law forbids such practices, as the hon. member knows. Naturally, the practices are open to anybody, police forces as well as private detective agencies and ordinary citizens. This means that anything goes.
As for this case, I shall simply say that the established practice in the House has been, for a long time, even when the right hon. member for Prince Albert was Prime Minister, to consider such matters as not in the public interest, which does not mean that my answer is either positive or negative.


Roch La Salle: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a supplementary question to the minister. Has the Solicitor General ordered that the device be removed from the home of Mr. Cossette?


Jean-Pierre Goyer: Mr. Speaker, if someone loses a pencil in a house, I doubt that it is up to the federal government to go and find it. Now, as I have indicated, there is nothing illegal about the object in question, or any other for that matter, being in the possession of the government or an individual.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. There are a number of supple-mentaries but I believe I should return first to the hon. member for Greenwood.


Francis Andrew Brewin: Mr. Speaker, in light of what the Solicitor General has told us, can he say whether the government is giving consideration to bringing in legislation which would make it illegal to instal these electronic listening devices in the private residences of citizens without a court order.


Jean-Pierre Goyer: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member knows full well that a committee of the House has looked into the question and submitted a report; the cabinet is now in the process of studying the matter.


John George Diefenbaker: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I do not intend to reply to the gratuitous falsehood expressed by the minister but I do intend to ask him a simple question.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John George Diefenbaker: Did the Mounted Police plant a listening device in the home of Marcel Cossette? It is as simple as that.
Inquiries of the Ministry


Jean-Pierre Goyer: Mr. Speaker, I merely wanted to remind the right hon. member that when he was Prime Minister, the Minister of Justice of the day used to answer exactly as I have done.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, these hypothetical
statements do not in any way answer the question. The Solicitor General should be able to tell the House whether this was done. Members of Parliament are beginning to wonder if this is happening elsewhere as well.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. My backbenchers are again being lost in the shuffle and I propose to defend their rights this afternoon.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!



NATIONAL PARKS


Mr. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development if he has had an opportunity to review the situation at Elk Island Park which resulted in mass suffering and starvation of elk and other wildlife and the subsequent mercy killing operation? Can the minister indicate whether a full investigation will be launched into the functions and responsibilities of the Canadian Wildlife Service and the parks administration with particular reference to this incident?


Hon. Jean Chretien (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, my Parliamentary Secretary answered a similar question on the day the House adjourned some time ago and there is nothing that I could add to the comments he made on that occasion.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: In view of the fact that an elk feeding program was not instituted as suggested by the minister in answer to a question I posed to him and which is recorded on page 3865 of Hansard, can the minister indicate whether this development reflects a change in policy or is it a failure in the administration of existing policy?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, the National Parks Branch or the Canadian Wildlife Service cannot possibly foresee all the weather changes liable to occur during the winter season. That was an unusual situation in that area and I am sure that the National Parks Branch and Canadian Wildlife Service employees will record this experience and know how to face any similar conditions in the future.

April 20, 1971

Inquiries of the Ministry INDIAN AFFAIRS



REQUEST FOR STATEMENT BY MINISTER ON TRIP TO AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND

Mr. Paul Yewchuk (Athabasca):: Mr. Speaker, my question is also directed to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. I want to welcome him back from his south seas holiday. It is nice to see him again.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Paul Yewchuk: Could the minister indicate if he will be making a statement on motions to report on his trip?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, on a question of privilege.
I have visited many countries for the benefit of Canadians, and I know that the hon. member deeply resented not being chosen by his party as a member of the delegation.


Paul Yewchuk: Mr. Speaker, I still want to know whether the minister will be making a report to the House of Commons by a statement on motions.


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I intend to discuss my trip to New Zealand and Australia before the Committee on Indian Affairs and Northern Development, where I will be able to have very useful exchanges with the members of the committee.



REGINA-FEDERAL GOVERNMENT ASSISTANCE

Mr. John Burton (Regina East):: I was going to direct my question to the minister in charge of the Post Office but as he has stepped out of the chamber I will direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture. Since it appears that recent flooding conditions in Regina were contributed to by a more rapid run-off of spring water caused by the greater acreage of summerfallow encouraged by Operation Lift last year, will the federal government give consideration to assisting the province of Saskatchewan and local communities-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I suggest to the hon. member that his question is asked in the form of an argument.



OPPORTUNITIES FOR YOUTH PROGRAM-ALLEGED DELAY IN SUPPLYING INFORMATION TO MANPOWER CENTRES

["Order, please. It being five o'clock it is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the House that the question to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment is as follows: The hon. member for Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe (Mr. Marshall)-National Parks-Bonne Bay-Letting of contract for survey work.\nCanada Pension Plan"]
Jack Marshall: wish to direct my question to the Minister of National
Defence. In view of the fact that information on the student militia and civilian employment phase of the Opportunities for Youth program has not yet reached Manpower centres, even though it was indicated that it would be done early in April, will the minister investigate this situation in order to avoid similar delays under the works projects and report to the House at the earliest opportunity?


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (Minister of National Defence):: My understanding is that it has been circulated Mr. Speaker, but I would be glad to check on the hon. member's allegation.
* *
*



Mr. Lincoln M. Alexander (Hamilton West):: I wish to direct a related question to the Prime Minister in view of the fact that a question regarding manpower has been raised. My question deals with the recent report to the effect that constitutional hangups have shut down the biggest project in Quebec, the Ste. Scholastique airport, and my understanding that the jurisdiction of the federal government regarding manpower has been challenged by the province of Quebec. How long has the government been aware of this situation and what means has the government at its disposal to resolve this very serious problem?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I am not sure that the first part of the question is in order but certainly the second part is. Perhaps the Prime Minister may want to reply.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Certainly, Mr. Speaker. We have been aware of this very regrettable problem for several months. There has been a long series of meetings with Quebec officials to try to resolve this problem. I hope it will be satisfactorily resolved. It is an almost nonsensical situation when there are so many unemployed-


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -that because of a constitutional quarrel workers are not working on this very large and important project. The point of view of the federal government has been made known to the province of Quebec. We have repeatedly indicated our desire to go ahead with the project. Of course, we have no authority over labour laws in the province. We are trying to get the province of Quebec to find a solution which would be in the best interests of the workers.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: In light of the fact it appears that the province of Quebec denounces the authority of the federal government in this very touchy area, is the Prime Minister in a position to advise the House what further steps are being contemplated if the province of Quebec

April 20, 1971

continues its stand regarding the position of the federal government?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, as a long-term solution the hon. member probably knows that the question of jurisdiction over the whole area of Manpower has been raised at the constitutional conferences. It has been discussed at the constitutional conferences and will be discussed again. In the meantime, I cannot see any solution which could be imposed by force by the federal government. I repeat that we are continuing to seek an amiable solution to this problem with the provincial authorities.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Brandon-Souris.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: A supplementary question.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. We are running short of time. The Chair will recognize the hon. member for Brandon-Souris on a further supplementary.


OPPORTUNITIES FOR YOUTH PROGRAM-ALLEGED CUTBACK IN EXPERIMENTAL FARM SERVICES SUMMER JOBS
Hon. W. G. Dinsdale (Brandon-Souris):: I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Agriculture. Can the minister indicate whether there has been a cutback in summer job opportunities in the experimental farm services related to the Opportunities for Youth program?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I suggest to the hon. member that this is hardly a supplementary, but as the question has been asked the minister might reply briefly and quickly.


Hon. H. A. Olson (Minister of Agriculture):: I will check into it, Mr. Speaker. I do not believe there has been a cutback in summer job opportunities.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Rod Thomson (Ballleford-Kindersley):: I wish to direct my question to the Prime Minister. Did the governments of Ontario and Quebec consult with the federal government on whether the legislation passed by those provinces restricting the import of farm products might be considered ultra vires by the federal government and contested in the courts?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I am not
sure I seized the import of the question. I might attempt to answer by saying that the question has been raised at federal-provincial conferences at least twice. As we indicated in the House following those conferences, there was general support for the federal legislation on farm
Inquiries of the Ministry
marketing and there was general support for the position that this would be the best possible solution. Some provincial delegations did, of course, suggest a reference to the courts, but the consensus seemed to be that legislation was the proper way. At that time we indicated our regret that the legislation had been stalled for so long by the opposition.


NAVIGATION
Mr. Andre Fortin (Lolbiniere):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the hon. Minister of Transport.
Can the minister tell us whether it is correct that his department, in co-operation with the Department of Public Works, is making a study on the cleaning and development of St. Lawrence river shores between Quebec City and Montreal?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: I am
not certain about that question, Mr. Speaker. I will have to take it as notice and get an answer when I can.


Mr. Speaker:: There is an hon. member who is a frontbencher who claims the privileges of a backbencher. The Chair will recognize the hon. member for Toronto-Lake-shore.


HOUSING
Mr. Kenneth Robinson (Toronto-Lakeshore):: I wish to direct a question to the Minister without Portfolio responsible for housing. In view of the fact that Montreal has applied for financial help from the federal government to renovate 100,000 homes over the next 10 years, will the minister give the same consideration to metropolitan Toronto?


Hon. Roberl K. Andras (Minisier without Portfolio):: Mr. Speaker, the question of rehabilitation of homes in Montreal was the subject of discussion about a month ago with Montreal and Quebec government officials and members of my staff. We made no precise commitment to a program of rehabilitation except to examine it as well as many other urban programs and problems in Montreal. As far as Toronto is concerned, several months ago we offered the city of Toronto a loan fund at low interest rates to be applied to the rehabilitation of homes. We are asking the city of Toronto to advise us on the details they would like to apply to the implementation of that program. I am certain the people there are aware that this is a much more complicated situation to deal with than had been apparent at first. With no criticism of them, I think they join us in recognizing that we have a lot to learn about this. We want to proceed with this program.

April 20, 1971
Inquiries of the Ministry NATIONAL DEFENCE


EFFECT OF IMBALANCE UNDER UNITED STATES-CANADA PRODUCTION SHARING AGREEMENT ON FUTURE CANADIAN PROGRAMS
J. Michael Forrestall: Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of questions I would like to ask the Minister of National Defence arising out of his discussions with United States Secretary of Defence Laird, but I will accept Your Honour's admonishment. Arising out of his discussions with the Secretary of Defence, Mr. Laird, and having in mind particularly the imbalance Mr. Laird has drawn to our attention with reference to the 12-year old defence production sharing agreement, will this be a major determining factor with respect to programs that we have in the offing such as the replacement for the Argus, will we go ahead with the Orion or will the economic factor not be a consideration?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I would like to thank the hon. member for giving me notice of the question. I confirm that the primary dominating factor will be the defence consideration. With regard to the military question as to what position will be taken on the long-range patrol aircraft, I confirm that no decision has been made. While the primary consideration will be the military one, a very important subsidiary one will be the opportunities through this program for creating further employment for Canadians.


J. Michael Forrestall: Can the minister give the assurance I am sure all Canadians are looking for that there will be no serious reduction in the number of jobs available to Canadians in the coming year, 1971-72, as a result of the attitude of the United States with respect to defence sharing? In other words, are we going to lose any jobs in the next year?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: That is rather difficult to predict, Mr. Speaker. It depends on United States orders. With regard to defence programs, either in the United States or Canada, obviously there is not as much buying in Canada as there was in years past. I cannot give that definite assurance.


OPPORTUNITIES FOR YOUTH PROGRAM-SUFFICIENCY OF FUNDS-REQUEST FOR STATEMENT ON CRITERIA AND OBJECTIVES
Mr. David MacDonald (Egmonl):: I had hoped that today, Mr. Speaker, I might have been able to direct this question either to the Secretary of State or to his parliamentary secretary. In view of the importance of the Opportunities for Youth program, would the Prime Minister tell us, now that the deadline has passed and the projects have been received, whether there will be sufficient funds available to cover the projects in respect of which applications have been made and, second, when we may expect a more complete statement on the criteria
and objectives involved since there is uncertainty in the country as to the extent to which this program will help those in need of jobs so that they will be in a position to return to school in the fall?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I did discuss this matter with the Secretary of State following the hon. member's question yesterday. He tells me he will bring the subject back to cabinet in order that the success of the program, together with various questions raised by the hon. member, may be assessed. I am sure he will wish to report in due course on the success of the program which he tells me is very great.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: I am grateful to the Prime Minister for his assistance in this regard. Can he tell us how soon we may expect a more complete statement from the Secretary of State, having regard to the shortness of the time available and the large number of students who are even now coming on to the job market?


An hon. Member:: Very shortly.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I heard the answer from over there, Mr. Speaker. I hope it will be very shortly.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: In
view of the statement by the Secretary of State that one in three of these projects may have to be rejected because the $15 million allocation is not sufficient, and bearing in mind the disappointment which many who have worked hard preparing these projects will undoubtedly feel, may I ask whether the $15 million is a fixed sum or whether the government would be prepared to consider increasing it so that all legitimate projects submitted can be accommodated?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The $15 million or thereabouts was part of a larger sum amounting to $57 million, I believe, set aside for summer projects. In considering the report to which I have just referred, we shall see whether there is any money left over from some of the other projects and, if so, it might be reassigned. This may not be practicable, however, because according to interim reports the government's program has been effective and successful in most areas.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. P. V. Noble (Grey-Simcoe):: I should like to address this question to the Minister of Agriculture. Has the minister made representations to the Minister of National Revenue with a view to the necessary action being taken to bring some relief to the hard-pressed apple industry by curbing the importation of apples and apple products?


Horace Andrew (Bud) Olson: Yes, Mr. Speaker. There have been several interdepartmental meetings respecting that matter.
[Mr. Andras.l
April 20, 1971


MANPOWER
Mr. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North):: My question, Mr. Speaker, is directed to the Minister of Supply and Services. In view of the sharp staff reductions at the Winnipeg aircraft overhaul base, and in light of the commitments made earlier to the government of Manitoba and to former employees of Air Canada that the base would continue as a viable operation for a number of years, may I ask whether the department has worked out any plans for further employment for the hundreds who are being dismissed?


Hon. James Richardson (Minister of Supply and Services):: It is correct, Mr. Speaker, that the United States Air Force intends to phase out the T-39 program. This will be done during the summer months, and there will still be some planes going in as late as September. During this period my department and other departments will be working to find ways to increase the workload.


TRANSPORT
Mr. B. Keith Penner (Thunder Bay):: Yesterday, Mr. Speaker, the government received and heard an important submission from the Canadian Railway Labour Association. My question is directed to the Minister of Transport. Have the minister and his department given any consideration to amending the National Transportation Act in such a way as to provide new directives and thereby open the way toward a more relevant and realistic rail passenger policy in Canada?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Yes, Mr. Speaker, and I will consult Hansard because that sounded like a pretty good preamble.


POST OFFICE
Walter Gilbert Dinsdale: I have a question for the minister responsible for the Post Office. Is it the policy of the Post Office Department, as charged by the president of the Letter Carriers Union, to cut back delivery in high-rise apartments, large office buildings and shopping centres?


Hon. Jean-Pierre Cote (Minister without Portfolio):: No,


Mr.   Speaker.Mr. Dinsdale@: Can the minister give an assurance that there is no threat to job security as charged by the president of the union?
Inquiries of the Ministry


Joseph Julien Jean-Pierre Côté: We have hired over 600 more letter carriers than we had in 1969.


NECESSITY FOR STAMPS IN MAIDING INCOME TAX RETURNS
Mr. Cliff Downey (Battle River):: My question, too, is directed to the minister in charge of the Post Office. Has there been some change in the postal regulations which makes stamps necessary on completed tax forms going to the tax data centre in Ottawa?


Joseph Julien Jean-Pierre Côté: Stamps have always been necessary.
* *


NORTHERN AFFAIRS
Mr. Randolph Harding (Kootenay West):: My question is for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. Has the hon. gentleman's department any plans for a sewage treatment plant at Faro in the Yukon Territory, having regard to the involvement of the federal government in the building of the new townsite?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I must take the question as notice. I shall inquire and get in touch with the hon. member directly on this subject.


INDIAN AFFAIRS
Mr. W. B. Nesbitt (Oxford):: I have a question for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. Is an observer from the minister's department watching the progress of the Lavell case which is presently before the courts?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I don't know if there is an observer on the scene but we are following with much interest the legal proceedings that are being carried out in Ontario.


Wallace Bickford (Wally) Nesbitt: Would the minister undertake to give Mrs. Lavell some sort of relief by legislation or regulation if the courts are not able to do so?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member's question is hypothetical.

April 20, 1971
Inquiries of the Ministry ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE


ASSURANCE THAT ELECTRONIC SURVEILLANCE DEVICES
Mr. C. Terrence Murphy (Sault Ste. Marie):: My question is directed to the Solicitor General. In cases where dossiers are prepared on Members of Parliament for whatever reason, will the minister clearly and unequivocally assure the House that the RCMP has not used and will not use electronic surveillance devices when compiling such dossiers?


Jean-Pierre Goyer: Mr. Speaker, as I said, I believe police methods have to be applied to all citizens and that in law, they are all equal. That means that when the RCMP have reasonable motives to make an inquiry they do use all legal methods available.


Paul Yewchuk: Can the Solicitor General tell us whether members will be allowed to see these dossiers, if they exist, particularly their own?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


TRANSPORT
Mr. Heath Macquarrie (Hillsborough):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Public Works. Has the hon. gentleman now been advised of Premier Campbell's representations in favour of the construction of the Northumberland causeway by private interests, and can the minister tell us what role he will be playing in this latest resurrection?


Hon. Arthur Laing (Minister of Public Works):: So far, all I know is what I read in the papers.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Malpeque.


Paul Yewchuk: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I apologize to the hon. member for Malpeque. Is the hon. member for Athabasca rising on a point of order?


Paul Yewchuk: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I am sorry my question sounded funny, but I think the minister was ready to reply and I should like an answer.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Malpeque.


BORDEN-TORMENTINE FERRY SERVICE-REQUEST FOR STATEMENT ON PROPOSED CHANGES
Hon. J. A. MacLean (Malpeque):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Transport. Would he make a statement on motions, or at least table
a statement on motions, in the near future giving a comprehensive outline of the proposed changes in the connecting ferry services between Prince Edward Island and the mainland?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, I was under the impression that during my absence the letter or wire that I had sent to Premier Campbell of Prince Edward Island was at least made available to members from that province. That is as comprehensive a statement as I have at the present time. If there is anything further or more specific any hon. member would like, I will do my best to get it, but that is the situation at the present time.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Transport. In
view of the fact that in that statement there was no mention whether the Gray would provide winter service at a time when it is vitally important to have icebreaking as well as rail service to and from Prince Edward Island, could the minister clear up what is a matter of major concern to the people of Prince Edward Island?


Donald Campbell Jamieson: Mr. Speaker, I am in the process of doing that. I had a wire from the premier of Prince Edward Island this morning asking me that very question and a reply to it is being drafted. I should be glad to make that available as well.


Mr. Speaker:: Orders of the day. Is the hon. member for Timiskaming rising on a point of order?


Mr. Peters:: Yes, Mr. Speaker, on a point of order. I should like to ask the House Leader whether, in view of the interest of the government in Bill C-176, he would have it reprinted now so that we can satisfy requests for copies of the bill. I did raise this point in committee and requested that 2,000 copies be printed. The committee agreed to my request and then it was found that this was a responsibility of Your Honour. This is the reason I raise the point in this way.


Mr. Speaker:: The information which the Chair has received through the usual channels is to the effect that there has been a reprint and that the reprinted copies are available at the present time. Orders of the day.


GOVERNMENT ORDERS
[Stage Direction]
The House resumed, from Monday, April 19, consideration of the motion of Mr. Mackasey that Bill C-229, respecting unemployment insurance in Canada, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration.

April 20, 1971
Mr. David Weaiherhead (Scarborough West):: Mr. Speaker, in making some comments shortly before ten o'clock yesterday evening on the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971, I was pointing out I was going to discuss some of the main points that came before the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration during our long hearings on the white paper on unemployment insurance last fall. I stated that the first point we should consider was the question of universality, whether all employees should be covered by unemployment insurance or not. Then, I went on to say that we had heard a great number of briefs on this subject, that some of the new groups, such as the Canadian Teachers Federation, did not appear to favour universality as far as their teachers were concerned. But other groups coming in for the first time, such as the nurses, did favour universality because some nurses are now finding themselves unemployed for the first time.
Continuing my remarks, I should like to say that some of the teachers are not happy at being covered by unemployment insurance, and Members of Parliament have been the object of a quite well organized campaign by some teacher organizations in recent months to make their objections known. They have every right to mount such a campaign, as has any other group or individual who wish to make their views known to the government and to Members of Parliament.
However, it was the committee's opinion, and my personal opinion also, that the contingency of interruption of earnings is not now restricted to certain groups in Canada, as it may have been in earlier years, and that therefore no employee should be excluded from coverage if it were possible to include him. Many of us, including myself, would like to see as a matter of principle the self-employed covered also in order that the sharing of the financial burden of unemployment be as widely spread as possible. So far, however, neither the unemployment insurance commission nor the government have been able to come up with any formula that would enable them to decide when a person who is selfemployed could justifiably claim he was out of work. I note that in his remarks last night the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) pleaded for coverage under the Unemployment Insurance Act for the selfemployed, but he did not say just how this was to be done or how abuses could be prevented.
Many tend to think that most of these 1,200,000 employees being insured for the first time are relatively highly paid people with very secure positions. However, more than one-half of these new entrants, including many working in hospitals and charitable institutions and many working for governments at the various levels, earn under $7,800 a year at the present time. Teachers have been very secure in their positions in past years. However, with the introduction of the birth control pill, the strict financial restrictions being placed on school boards for the first time since the depression of the 1930's, and with the introduction of new teaching techniques via closed circuit TV, cable, etc., it would be a brave teacher who could be sure that his or her job is completely and absolutely secure for the next 20 years.
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 There are similar uncertainties in the public service at all levels. People in certain job categories are being let go for almost the first time, and the armed forces are being reduced in numbers and becoming more selective in personnel; and the same applies to other groups to a greater or lesser extent.
Although groups such as the teachers and public servants do have more risk of unemployment than before, it is true to say that they are still a very good risk as far as unemployment insurance is concerned. By including in the scheme these better risk groups and all employees earning over $7,800, we will be able significantly to help the financing of the main reforms in this legislation- much higher benefits, shorter qualifying period, etc. This will help keep off welfare people who have contributed to unemployment insurance, often for a great number of years, but who are unfortunate enough to find themselves without work for perhaps the first time.
Many of the unemployed find themselves getting various small amounts, up to $58 a week in benefits, and there is no way they can finance themselves for very long without many of them going on welfare. However, if the same workers who have paid into the plan for years get two-thirds of their income in benefits, which in areas like Toronto would mean that most would receive benefits of between $75 and $100 a week, then they could hold their heads high and get along without welfare for a considerable period of time. Similarly, the much shorter entry requirements of eight weeks for partial benefits and 20 weeks for full benefits, rather than the 30 weeks over a two-year period as before, will be of particular benefit to younger people who have a difficult time getting established in the work force, and who unfortunately make up a disproportionately large share of the unemployed.
After the tax deductible features are considered, the teachers and others being covered for the first time will be asked to pay a net of about 40 cents a week commencing on January 1, 1972, which will be increased to a net of about 80 cents a week once the plan is completely operative. In my personal discussions with teachers both at a recent teachers convention here in Ottawa and at meetings in various parts of my constituency, I have found them very reasonable and largely willing to be covered once they are made aware of the whole situation; and I believe this is the case with the other groups also.
Before leaving the subject of new groups who will be covered for the first time, my friend the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander) devoted considerable time in his opening comments yesterday to what he called the adverse financial impact on the local school boards of having to pay the employers' share of the cost of covering teachers under unemployment insurance. He recited some escalating figures in that regard for the next few years, and I must confess I did not jot them down. However, I believe my figures more or less agree with his and show a cost of $3,600,000 to Ontario school boards in 1972 and a cost of $6,500,000 in 1975.
I believe though that additional costs, Mr. Speaker, should be kept in perspective. It should be noted that the

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
province of Ontario gave about $814 million to the Ontario school boards last year and the school boards raised about as much again through municipal taxes. Accordingly, even in 1975, $6.5 million out of a figure now spent by Ontario school boards of $1.6 billion would be less than one half of one per cent of their education budget. On the other hand, the Ontario taxpayers will be benefited by paying an estimated $22 million less for welfare because of the increased benefits, a shorter eligibility period, etcetera, under the new legislation. Therefore, we have a $6.5 million additional cost on one hand, against a $22 million saving on the other, and the same principle applies to the other provinces.
One of the other matters that kept coming up in brief after brief was that of the proposal to experience rate employers. The proposal was that employers be experience rated according to their particular lay-off patterns as compared to the lay-off patterns of employers as a whole. On this basis, it would be possible for employers with a very high lay-off rate to pay up to double the employee rate. The basis for these proposals was primarily to try to encourage employers to plan their work better over the whole year and to avoid as much as possible lay-offs for seasonal or other reasons. The other reason was to make the industries with the worst lay-off patterns pay more of their share of the unemployment insurance benefits that result from the lay-offs they initiate. The Unemployment Insurance Commission showed our committee figures which stated, for instance, that in 1968 the manufacturing and trade and commerce industries put $37 million more into the fund than their employees drew out in benefits, while the construction, forestry, fishing and trapping industries withdrew $94 million more from the fund than they contributed in that year.
The briefs indicated mixed views on experience rating, with some labour briefs being in favour and some opposed. The same split in opinion appeared in management briefs. Perhaps the strongest argument against experience rating was that lay-offs in some industries were due to causes beyond the control of the employers; weather, seasonal factors, economic policies, and so on. However, only industries with abnormally high lay-offs will be affected by higher contribution costs. Another criticism is that experience rating would constitute a penalty to high risk enterprises. However, there may well be employers who find it profitable to operate with a highly fluctuating labour force, relying on unemployment insurance to provide assistance to those who are unemployed. This practice should certainly be discouraged. It should be emphasized that the lay-off factor in all likelihood will be based on a running three-year average which will smooth out abnormally high single year costs over surrounding years.
The committee, after listening to these and other arguments on the subject, agreed to the concept of experience rating of employers in general, but suggested that each employer within a given industry be experience rated against others in that industry rather than against all employers in all industries in Canada as a whole. It
seemed to the majority of the committee that it would give more incentive to, say a firm in the construction industry, to reduce wide variations in its lay-off patterns if it were competing in experience rating against other construction firms only and not against the lay-off patterns of all employers in Canada. The new act does provide that the "commission may make regulations to provide a system of experience rating" with respect to employers premiums to the fund, which I believe is fully justified and in many ways essential to the new plan. However, the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mackasey) has indicated before our committee and elsewhere that he has an open mind regarding the application of experience rating and he is fully committed to discuss all the details of its application with all interested groups, before it comes into effect in 1974.
One of the other proposals that received great attention in our committee was the inclusion of sickness and pregnancy benefits in the unemployment insurance program. This new legislation allows the payment of benefits of up to 15 weeks, after a two-week waiting period when the employee has worked 20 weeks in the past year, has had to leave work and has had his or her unemployment benefits interrupted because of sickness or pregnancy. There is no question that this varies one of the supposed long-standing requirements for unemployment insurance benefits, namely, being ready, able and willing to work. However, this requirement has been subject to an exception since 1953 which allowed those who fell sick to receive benefits, but it did not extend to employees who lost their earnings because of sickness.
In other words, if any employee at the present time falls sick after he commenced receiving benefits he is allowed to continue to receive them, but an employee who has to leave work because of sickness is not covered. This seemed to be a great anomaly to the committee, and very detrimental to an employee who had to leave work because he was sick. The International Labour Organization convention advocating the provision of maternity benefits is accepted by most as one that ought to be dealt with. It is also recognized that wage loss insurance or salary continuation insurance is not available to a large part of the labour force, and that it is a desirable objective that most employees require this protection in the early years of service with any one employer before they have acquired much seniority.
I believe I am right in saying there are about three million employees at the present time who are not covered by any private plans for salary continuance during sickness. Most of these work for employers of fewer than 10 people and it is very difficult for such groups to be insured under private plans. Some groups that came before our committee stated they favoured the pregnancy and sickness proposals in general, but they thought they should not be included in an unemployment insurance act. However, it should be emphasized that this is not sickness and pregnancy insurance as such. It is not available to everyone who becomes sick or pregnant, but it will provide unemployment benefits only for employees who have worked for 20 weeks in the last year in the

April 20, 1971

case of interruption of earnings due to sickness and pregnancy.
There are about three million working women in the labour force today and they are and have been for a long time a very vital part of our work force in Canada. Many have worked continually for a long time, have paid into the unemployment insurance fund for a long time, and then decided to have a child. As the minister stated yesterday, a large number of women work to provide the necessities for their families. Therefore, I believe they should be entitled to unemployment insurance benefits for a 15-week period to enable them to have a child. This, tied into amendments to the Labour Standards Code now before the House with respect to maternity leave, will give the female employee significant new rights to which, in my opinion, they are well entitled.
There was considerable discussion in our committee on the impact that the unemployment insurance benefits for interruption of earnings caused by sickness would have on present private employer-employee sickness plans. It was originally envisioned that the Unemployment Insurance Commission would be a second payer, to pay the difference between a private work-related plan and the total of a two-thirds benefit for the up to a 15-week benefit period. However, it soon became evident at our hearings that these private work-related plans would be quickly renegotiated between employers and employees to put the UIC into the position of first payer, with the private plans picking up supplementary coverage to top off the UIC and/or plan for coverage after the 15-week period.
While about two-thirds of the employees in Canada have either no sick leave insurance at all or else have sick coverage inferior to that proposed in this new legislation, there is about one-third of the work force that is covered by private work-related plans which give them as good or better coverage in this field than that proposed now by the government. It, therefore, became highly questionable whether the government should disturb these good plans which now provide this adequate coverage to these workers. Accordingly, there is a provision in this new act which allows the UIC to give a rebate in premium to an employer to cover the sickness insurance portion when that employer has as good or a better private sickness plan for which he is already paying. If part of that private plan is being paid for by employees also, then the employees will get a pro rata share of that rebate.
Before leaving the subject of sickness and maternity benefits, I think I should mention that the question of abuse control in this area has been thoroughly considered. I believe the member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander), expressed some fears on this subject last night and it was discussed from time to time in our hearings. However, the duration of benefits payable in sickness will be governed by consultation with medical authorities and will be payable only on presentation of a medical certificate authenticated by a member of the
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medical profession. The UIC has a great deal of experience in control and prevention of abuse which is just as applicable to sickness as to other benefits. Indeed, the UIC has been criticized by some in the past for being too strict in abuse control. The two-week waiting period for benefits of course will automatically rule out eligibility for short-term illness which causes great expense in some of the private plans where the waiting period is sometimes as short as two or three days. In addition, any work related sickness or injury will not give rise to a claim for benefits under unemployment insurance as such contingencies are covered under various provincial workmen's compensation acts.
I certainly do not have the time now, Mr. Speaker, to go into a detailed commentary on all the other diverse aspects of this new legislation. However, one of the points that both the hon. member for Hamilton West and the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre raised last night concerned the advisability of making a non-returnable three-week lump sum benefit payment in advance after the two-week waiting period. We heard in committee the argument that it would be a deterrent to looking for a new job quickly and, on the other hand, that it would be an incentive to do so. It seems to me that those who see it as a deterrent to seeking early alternative employment have too gloomy a view of human nature and have also ignored the high cost of living, particularly in our urban areas.
Let us consider the case of the $150 a week worker in Scarborough who is suddenly laid off. First of all, he will have to go two weeks without any income at all, and so loses $300 less tax right there. Then, he is entitled to receive $300 unemployment insurance benefits less income tax of say about $60 for the next three weeks instead of $450 less tax if he were still working. Accordingly, for the first five week period of unemployment he would receive a net of about $240 from unemployment insurance benefits rather than $750 less tax which he would have received from his ordinary employment. Now, the member for Hamilton West or others may think that this unemployed man, who is probably a skilled worker, will be tempted to stay home and not look for work in these circumstances. However, I strongly agree with the member for Winnipeg North Centre on this particular point. I believe that particular, proud, skilled craftsman will want to get back to work as quickly as possible; that he really will not be able to afford to stay at home, and that the three-week guaranteed benefit payment will be an incentive to search for new work immediately. Our committee did recommend that this lump sum three-week payment be made in two instalments, to help tide the worker over that period. I understand that the government is thinking seriously of doing this, but the basic right of the unemployed person to three weeks of benefits after a two-week waiting period, whether or not he finds a job in the meantime, should remain.
I am sure other members will have very worthwhile contributions to make in this debate and I shall look forward to hearing them. I could have said a lot more about the value of the greatly increased benefits, the

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Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
reduction of the premiums to those presently covered, the shorter number of weeks that have to be worked to establish eligibility, the tax deductible features of the premiums or deductions for the first time, the fact that benefits will be taxable for the first time to ensure that the more highly paid seasonal worker pays his full share of tax, and the financing arrangements which will be purposely very costly to the government if unemployment is at a high level. I believe the minister and the government are to be strongly congratulated in presenting to the House this new unemployment insurance act which includes so many kinds of benefits for the Canadian workers, male and female, and indirectly to their families. I am looking forward to the thorough discussion of the bill in our committee.


Mr. Gordon Riichie (Dauphin):: Mr. Speaker, my first observation regarding Bill C-229 respecting unemployment insurance in Canada is that the wrong minister is taking responsibility for its introduction. The bill is, in all essential respects, a piece of welfare legislation and, as such, it should be the responsibility of the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Munro) to guide this complicated and exceedingly baffling piece of legislation through Parliament. If any hon. member thinks I am being facetious in my observation, I would suggest that he turn to the white paper entitled "Unemployment Insurance in the Seventies" on which the bill is based. In the second column on page 8 thereof he will find the phrase: "benefits will be higher, more related to earnings and given more on the basis of need than length of time in the work force".
What insurance scheme, Mr. Speaker, provides benefits more on the basis of need than on earnings? This is not a concept found in insurance schemes, but it is certainly the basic concept of every welfare measure. Now, if the government wishes to establish a guaranteed annual income, then let it have the courage to come before this House with measures which clearly state such intentions.
I have studied with great care the government's white paper "Unemployment Insurance in the Seventies" and the bill now under consideration. I have studied the minutes of proceedings and evidence of the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration in an effort to come to as broad an understanding as possible of the government's proposals and the extent to which they represent a genuine improvement over existing legislation. I have no quarrel with the proposition that the present scheme requires overhauling. However, Bill C-229 certainly does not accomplish what is needed in this vital field. The scheme which the government now proposes is doomed to failure from the outset, within their concept at any rate, because it is actuarially unsound. It is most interesting to note that the white paper makes no attempt to document statistically the claim that the government will be able to provide increased benefits to a much larger segment of our work force on the basis of reduced premiums. This is simply an absurd impossibility.
The whole matter of the actuarial unsoundness of the proposed legislation is one with which I should like to
deal at length on another occasion. However, for the moment I should simply like to make some short observations regarding the alleged savings in costs under this proposed legislation. The Minister of Labour (Mr. Mackasey) claims that there will be two major savings, one in the amount of $160 million which will result from having an extended waiting period for benefits from the present one week to two weeks before a claimant is eligible for benefits, and a second major saving of $120 million, allegedly to result from the elimination of the government's seasonal unemployment benefits. Unless the government intends to deprive certain people who now have benefits under the existing act from having them under future legislation, these savings are entirely illusory. The matter of the alleged savings of $160 million, which the government claims will come about by extending the present waiting period for benefits from one to two weeks, is in no way supported in the government's white paper.
While the government proposes that one must be unemployed for two weeks before he becomes entitled to initial benefits which then become payable to him on the first day of the third week of his unemployment, it ought not to require a great deal of imagination or foresight to see that many eligible claimants will simply defer taking employment until they have been unemployed for two weeks and one day, thereby becoming eligible for three weeks of benefits, rather than accepting employment a few days prior to this date and thereby depriving themselves of the three week's benefits to which they would then be entitled. The proposal the government has made in this regard simply invites flagrant abuse. Moreover, the first week's benefits to which a worker is entitled by reason of having paid into the fund are confiscated if he secures employment within the first two weeks of his unemployment. The repudiation of the validity of the alleged saving of $160 million by extending the waiting period to two weeks is contained in the government's white paper. Again, I would direct hon. members to page 20 thereof and this paragraph dealing with phase one:
Past experience indicates that it takes three to five weeks to find employment under normal conditions.
By the government's own admission, Mr. Speaker, under "normal conditions", which we have not had for some time, it takes a job applicant longer than the two week waiting period provided in this legislation to find employment. How, therefore, can they say that the legislation which they propose will effect a saving of $160 million by increasing the waiting period before entitlement to benefits from one to two weeks? This merely delays payment of benefits, but that is not the same thing as saving the benefits.
The government also alleges a second saving under this proposed legislation of $120 million arising from the elimination of seasonal benefit payments. What then is to become of the people who now receive these benefits? Surely, they will have them replaced by some other type of benefit, or is the government simply going to leave them to their own fate? Fishermen were one class of

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people who benefited from these provisions, and the government mentions in its white paper that special provisions for fishermen will remain. I presume that these are going to cost money, and in all probability more money under the proposed legislation since the benefit payments are higher than under the existing act. The question which I want to have answered is: how much will these benefits cost and what will the real saving be which the government alleges will be made through the elimination of seasonal benefits.
Since becoming a member of this House, I have read a great many white papers and reports by special committees, but none has been so bereft of substantiating evidence or documentation as the white paper on unemployment insurance. The most elaborate and far reaching claims are made without the slightest shred of evidence to support them. On page 5 of the government white paper we find this:
Persons with a short work history may have even greater problems than those who have a long term labour force attachment. Allowing workers to take early advantage of an unemployment insurance program prevents them from falling into unstable work patterns. Instead, they are effectively integrated into the productive main stream.
My question is, very simply, how? The real problem of our economy is in creating new jobs, in revitalizing various segments of our industry and in bringing about taxation measures which offer a genuine incentive to increased productivity. Welfare measures of the kind proposed in this legislation will do nothing to create jobs. They may very well, however, have the detrimental effect of creating large classes of people who are capable of work and desirous of being gainfully employed but who, by reason of the government's mismanagement of the economy, will become nothing more than recipients of monthly handouts from the state, subsidized by those people who are productive members of the work force and by their employers.
The government's assumptions throughout the white paper have been based on a national unemployment rate not in excess of 4 per cent. Largely through the government's own efforts this country has in the past year been plagued by a national unemployment rate which is very nearly twice this figure. I wish that I could see on the horizon clear signs that in the next very few months the national rate of unemployment would return to levels of 3 per cent or 4 per cent, but I do not. I think we must, therefore, take very lightly the claims which are set out in the white paper assuming that the national rate of unemployment will be 4 per cent or less.
At current levels of unemployment, and by that I mean the level of unemployment which has persisted in the past year, the unemployment insurance fund would operate at a deficit of approximately one half billion dollars on the basis of the schedule of payments and the period of payments proposed in the act now before the House. I make this claim on the basis of a lengthy and most detailed study on the financial implications of the government's proposed changes in the Unemployment Insurance Act by a prominent Canadian chartered accountant,
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whose views were substantiated by an independent actuarial consultant. They were further discussed at length and in person by him with the officials of the Unemployment Insurance Commission, the result of which was to force him to conclude that however desirable may be certain features of this proposed legislation they cannot be implemented under existing circumstances without the fund operating at a deficit of some several hundred millions of dollars.
I note the following in the white paper:
The government is not only willing to help the unemployed and the less advantaged by providing a system of incomes support during an adjustment process; it is also ready to assume the cost of extra unemployment insurance benefits when the national unemployment rate exceeds 4 per cent or when regional unemployment is over 4 per cent and exceeds the national average by more than 1 per cent.
This certainly appears to be a very generous statement for the minister to make. However, I wonder where he believes the means will be found which will enable the government to pay these extra benefits. It is the people of Canada, the taxpayers, who will assume this cost. Who else but the people of this country provide government with the funds to carry out such programs? I suggest that the present bill is simply a further example of the government foisting on the people of this country socialistic measures which are neither wanted by the vast majority of the people nor needed, nor are they within the financial means of the country. In reading the minutes of the proceedings and evidence of the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration respecting the white paper on unemployment insurance, I was struck by the fact that the overwhelming number of witnesses who were heard opposed this bill. That should provide reason in itself for the government to consider whether it would not be best to rethink its proposals on unemployment insurance.
Perhaps these objections were best summed up in the presentation made to the committee on October 13, 1970, by the Canadian Teachers Federation. The federation said in its brief:
There is no doubt that the present unemployment insurance scheme, if it is to continue to exist requires over-all reform. Proposals to improve the financial condition of the fund by drawing in groups with a low expectation of claims are not new. We have consistently opposed them on the grounds that they represent selective taxation of an inequitable kind. They are not made more attractive by the addition of benefits which are generally already enjoyed by those whom it is proposed to include, nor by the addition of a highly doubtful claim to universality. From our point of view, even within its own terms, the present proposal for amendment of the unemployment insurance scheme creates more difficulties and anomalies-and of a more baffling kind-than it resolves.
Also, in an editorial in the Winnipeg Free Press of April 2 of this year, headed "Unfair Tax" we find the following:
It has been obvious for some time that, whatever else Canada's revised unemployment insurance plan will be, for many people it will not be insurance. People who have no need for such a plan, and who cannot hope to benefit or receive protection from it (which is what insurance is supposed to do) will be paying, in effect, an additional compulsory tax. And employers will be levied a similar tax.

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Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
As insurance, this has little to be said for it under any circumstances; it has even less to be said for it when the employer is the already overburdened ratepayer. Yet, this is what the new plan will involve with respect to unemployment insurance for teachers. The Manitoba Teachers Society has estimated that the cost to Manitoba school boards will be in the neighbourhood of $1 million a year, and this figure is borne out by an independent study made by the Manitoba Association of School Trustees.
The trustees estimate that the cost per teacher will be $25 in 1972, rising to $62 in 1975. For Manitoba's 11,500 teachers this will mean a cost to property owners of over $280,000 in 1972 and over $700,000 by 1975.
So, you can see that the cost of unemployment insurance will fall on the homeowner and will increase property taxes, something that we do not desire at this time.
When one remembers that under the proposed legislation one can become eligible for benefits with a minimum period of eight weeks attachment to the work force, and when one is mindful of our present levels of unemployment and our slow rate of economic growth aggravated by the high rate at which people are coming onto a depressed labour market, I submit that what is being proposed in this legislation is a program of such vast and devastating consequences for the public purse of this country that it cannot but result in the imposition of increased taxation measures which only remove from our enonomy money which is badly needed to lift it out of its present shameful condition.


Mr. Charles Turner (London East):: Mr. Speaker, as a member of Canada's working force for many years, I have had the pleasure of paying unemployment insurance contributions for over 25 years with the knowledge that I would not draw benefits from the plan until I retired. However, I always had the guarantee that in the event something did happen to my job, I could apply for and receive benefits for many weeks until I was once again employed. The Good Book tells me that I am my brother's keeper. Therefore, I have willingly contributed to help my sisters and brothers who have not been so fortunate as I have been.
I know what it was like to be without a steady job during the dirty thirties. I know all about the hardships of looking for a steady job and having many employers tell me, "Sorry, nothing today." I would like to point out that in the thirties we had no unemployment insurance plans for the unemployed. I was very fortunate that, because of musical training, I could always go out and make a few dollars. Thousands of unemployed Canadians were not in that position and had to fall back on welfare.
In July, 1941, the Liberal government of that day brought Canada's unemployment insurance scheme into operation. The act provided for earnings-related contributions and benefits through a systems of earnings classes, and established an earnings ceiling for coverage of salaried and weekly wage employees based on their annual rate of earnings. In these basic respects, the principles underlying the scheme are the same today as they were in 1941.
The new unemployment insurance act contains selfadjusting features which are based on a moving average
of "average annual earnings." The average annual earnings for a year will be calculated as the average of salaries and wages actually paid to employees in Canada, based on information set out in returns under the Income Tax Act and supplied by the Department of National Revenue. The people of this nation need and are entitled to three basic security plans during their lifetime: unemployment insurance benefits in the event of loss of job, lay-off or sickness; medicare coverage for all health services; and a good retirement plan when their working days are over. Bill C-229 goes a long way towards helping to alleviate the hardships of unemployment through loss of job or sickness.
The inclusion of sickness and maternity benefits in the proposed legislation has given rise to a great deal of discussion. I think it well to note that the inclusion of sickness benefits in the unemployment insurance program is not a new concept, but rather is one that has had considerable support over a period of time. The extension of payment of unemployment insurance benefits to persons who became ill while on claim became law on May 14, 1953, although the bill introduced by the government did not extend the payment of benefits to persons who lost their earnings because of sickness. The arguments against the inclusion of sickness and maternity benefits have been directed mainly to the extension of unemployment insurance into the health insurance area rather than dealing directly with these situations according to the best political and social principles.
Mr. Speaker, 35 per cent of the Canadian work force is organized and, therefore, has some form of income sickness insurance. It must be recognized that wage loss insurance or salary continuation is not available to a large part of the labour force, and it is a desirable objective. Most employees require this protection in the early years of service with any one employer. I am convinced that the unemployment insurance program is the proper vehicle with which to achieve these desirable coverages. When workers are sick the landlord still wants his rent or mortgage payment. The groceryman still wants cash for his groceries. Therefore, the sick worker must have some protection, otherwise he will find his savings eroded and he will wind up on welfare.
This bill attempts to fill what is a substantial gap in the coverage offered by private carriers. For example, most private insurers are unwilling to provide coverage for groups of fewer than ten employees. I understand that there are about 300,000 such establishments in the country. In addition, a great many existing plans do not offer a comparable rate of benefit nor a comparable ease of entrance. A federal public servant, for instance, requires five years of service before he can accumulate sick leave comparable to the 15 weeks maximum sickness benefit proposed in the new bill.
Another good feature of this legislation is the portability between employers. Very few of the private plans are portable, and this can and does create a hardship for an individual who is required to change his or her employment. I think it is important to point out that the control of abuse of sickness and maternity benefits will be governed by consultation with medical authorities, and that

April 20, 1971

these benefits will be payable only on presentation of a medical certificate.
One of the basic features of the proposed unemployment insurance program is the lowering of the qualifying requirement to eight weeks of attachment to the labour force in the last 52. This is a proposal that received a great deal of attention during the deliberations of the parliamentary committee. I note that the representative of the Conservative party has questioned the proposal to lower the barriers for entry into the plan. However, there was no suggestion made as to what the minimum entry requirement should be. The hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander) suggested that the reduction of the qualifying period would encourage abuse, but on the other hand noted that the program would be of little assistance to the growing number of young persons with no work experience who are not eligible for jobless benefits nor retraining programs. I wish I knew what the hon. member was advocating. Either he is for or against this aspect of the proposal; he cannot be for and against.
I was gratified, on the other hand, that there was very little criticism or objection in the parliamentary committee report concerning the new plan to lower the period necessary to qualify for benefits. There were a number of statements in briefs about minimum attachment to the labour force, but these varied from recommendations to increase the present length of attachment to the labour force to reducing it to zero for those just entering the labour stream. It goes without saying that setting the minimum attachment to the labour force before being eligible for benefits is a matter of judgment based on a number of considerations, such as the objectives of the program, other conditions of entitlement, and probably the administrative mechanisms that are in place to reduce to a minimum the possibility of abuse.
I must emphasize that the lower qualifying requirements have been proposed only after a considerable amount of research and study centred around the motivation of the individual, the needs of a worker when faced with a loss of earnings, and the ever-changing composition of our society, which brings with it a reshaping of the labour force and its attendant dislocation of individuals. The results of these studies have shown us that no rigid guidelines are available from which we could formulate a hard and fast rule for qualifying, but there are indications that current conditions require a re-orientation of our thinking in terms of providing protection and assistance to members of the labour force. Therefore, we must look to our objectives in deciding on a level of minimum attachment.
We cannot ignore the deplorable fact that under the current plan several hundred thousand workers who become unemployed cannot meet the existing requirements. Persons in this situation generally turn to public welfare agencies for assistance, and are faced with a level of subsistence which is inadequate to meet their needs. The psychological effect of this situation on the individual who is without work does not need to be emphasized because every indication is that he will have a much more difficult time in finding steady employment
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than the person who, through steady attachment to the labour force, receives a level of benefit which is acceptable during the time he is looking for suitable employment. One of the main purposes in reducing qualifying requirements is to provide a minimum benefit to those people who have a short work history, as it is often this group that has the most difficulty in becoming re-employed.
You are aware that benefits under the present act are related to length of attachment to the labour force and bear no relationship to the difficulty in becoming reemployed. More specifically, qualification is established by having made 30 weekly contributions over the past two years, eight of which must have been in the last year. Entitlement to benefit, therefore, is based on past history rather than on prevailing economic conditions. These conditions, of course, bear heavily on the ability to find employment and the proposals in the bill take them into account in the determination of entitlement to benefits. With today's rapidly changing economic environment, the very large relative increase in the number of younger people in the work force, and the increased mobility of the working population, it has become necessary to relate entitlement of benefits to a much shorter and more recent work history.
The hon. member has stated that any unemployment insurance scheme must maintain a proper balance between providing temporary income maintenance and facilitating reabsorption into the labour force. I could not agree more, Mr. Speaker, and the proposals of the bill are designed to do just that.
Another factor which enters into this consideration is that of cost. A balance has to be struck between what you are trying to provide and the cost of providing it. We can increase the cost of the program by lowering the qualifying requirements to nothing, as some have suggested, or we can reduce the cost of the program or provide better benefits by increasing the entrance requirements as suggested by those who are more conscious of costs and have expressed fears about abuses. Let me reassure you, Mr. Speaker, that the studies carried out to establish the costs for the new program have shown that this balance can be reasonably established with a work force attachment of eight weeks in the last 52 weeks.
The qualifying conditions that are part of the proposals of the bill will provide a substantial measure of short term financial support, in the event of unemployment, to the Canadian labour force. This financial support, coupled with the other services which the government plans to make available to claimants, will ensure that proper guidance and motivation are provided to the person who is faced with the loss of earnings. In view of the factors I have just put forward, in terms of cost and in terms of reasonable attachment, I am confident that the qualifying requirements are compatible with our rapidly changing labour environment. I would not like to depart from the principles of the bill because it seems to me that to do so
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Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 would be an injustice to Canadians who participate in the development and enrichment of our country.
In this fast changing society in which we live, the working force of this nation needs protection from loss of jobs and this new unemployment insurance act helps Canadians in the event that changes have to be made in their work pattern. Many Canadians during the past few years have found that in this machine age many jobs have been eliminated and, therefore, in the transition period of retraining for a new job some form of income protection for all Canadians is needed. Unemployment insurance in the past has helped immensely during this change period, and therefore this new bill is most welcome. In my opinion, all Canadians, including the selfemployed, should have protection and I sincerely hope that ways and means can be found to make this plan truly universal.
No government likes unemployment or inflation, but history has proven that we have high and low points in our economy and, therefore, we must have some kind of income protection during those low points. This new unemployment insurance act will help many Canadians during the trying days of sickness and unemployment and, in my opinion, it is a desirable piece of legislation. I congratulate the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mackasey) for looking ahead and providing the kind of income protection that all Canadians require.


Thomas Speakman Barnett: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) made it clear yesterday that, generally speaking, members of this party welcome this first complete rewrite of the Unemployment Insurance Act since 1955, while indicating also that there are some parts of it we would like to see changed in a way which would lead to an improvement. It is not my intention, Mr. Speaker, to attempt to cover the same ground that the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre dealt with last night, but rather to deal with a couple of particular aspects of the whole question of the application and administration of the Unemployment Insurance Act which I feel are pertinent to this debate.
In view of one or two remarks made by the hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Ritchie), I would like to suggest that his opinion that this was welfare legislation rather than insurance legislation indicated a very misleading appraisal of the intent of the bill. I suppose one could indulge in semantics by saying that any kind of insurance plan is welfare legislation because essentially it is a matter of a group of people sharing the risk of the individual suffering a mishap or disability. I would assume from what the hon. member for Dauphin said that he will be opposing this bill at the conclusion of second reading, and I will be interested to see whether he follows his remarks with his vote.
I should like to make one further reference to his remarks, Mr. Speaker. He suggested that the overwhelming number of witnesses appearing before the committee were opposed to the bill. He argued, therefore, that the bill must be basically wrong. I think his remarks would be much more illuminating had he taken the time to list
the type of witness who appeared before the committee to register opposition. I think it would be clearly revealed from the record that most of the witnesses expressing opposition were from the elements of our society most concerned with extracting their pound of flesh from the working people of this country, either by avoiding paying any increases in wages or by getting it from the workers in their capacity as consumers. I was very concerned that the greater number of the witnesses who appeared before the committee represented such an imbalance of opinion in this country. I am glad to note that the members of the standing committee which dealt with the white paper did not yield to the pressures of vested interests.
When we were considering changes to the Unemployment Insurance Act in 1955, I can remember saying in this House that I should like to see the day when all workers in Canada who had made one premium payment into the fund would be qualified for benefits. This goal is not achieved by this bill, but I mention it because the hon. member for Dauphin suggested rather sneeringly that since a person could be eligible after an attachment of only eight weeks to the labour force this was a welfare measure.
I should like to address myself to one particular aspect of the bill to which the minister made reference in his opening speech, Mr. Speaker. I refer to the stated intention of the government, which is long standing, and the stated intention in the bill as it is before us, that sooner or later coverage of fishermen under the Unemployment Insurance Act will be discontinued. The minister said that the coverage will continue until it is replaced by something else. This is certainly what the bill proposes. The minister suggested that it will be replaced with a suitable plan, but he did not say to whom it would be suitable nor did he give any indication what the nature of the plan might be. In considering this bill, we are faced with a situation where we are in effect asking the fishermen of Canada to buy a pig in a poke. They do not have any idea what may be brought forward as a replacement for the coverage they now enjoy.
There have been some rumours emanating from the Minister of Fisheries and Forestry (Mr. Davis) that there may be some form of catch insurance. It has been rumoured that this might be covered by a payment of something like 7i per cent of the gross value of the fisherman's catch. To the best of my knowledge, there has been no official statement from either the Minister of Labour (Mr. Mackasey) or the Minister of Fisheries and Forestry as to what may be in store for the fishermen as an alternative to unemployment insurance. This House should not give approval to the passage of this bill until we have some definite indication as to what the alternative will be for the fishermen. On the other hand, we could amend this bill to incorporate benefits for the fishermen under the plan on a permanent basis.
When I directed a question to the minister, he gave his assurance that coverage will continue until there is a replacement. I reported this to the fishermen in my constituency. I said I accepted the minister's word at face

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suggestion made so far from the government side about providing some other suitable plan.
There is one other matter I should like to talk about for a little while and it has to do with the administration of unemployment insurance. When this bill becomes law, the Unemployment Insurance Commission will again be charged with the administration of the system. As in the past, the Commission is given wide latitude in respect to the way in which the administration is carried out. I notice there is a clause in the bill before us which provides for the Commission to establish branch offices as it sees fit, and a similar section exists in the present act. I have been looking over a book called "Instant World" which was tabled in the House recently by the Minister of Communications (Mr. Kierans). There is one sentence in it which strikes me as being most apropos to the whole matter we are considering. If the minister will look at page 39 of this publication he will see that in summarizing the seminars which were held on the subject of telecommunications and computers the following words are used:
It was evident that most participants were deeply concerned with the need to put "soul" into the system.
I believe this is an ever-growing concern among people throughout the world. They seem to feel lost in some vast, soulless system which crushes and grinds them until they do not know which way to turn. The aspects of this feeling which are brought out in the report on telecommunications and computers to which I have just referred are in many ways frightening. I now suggest that many Canadian working people have gone through some frightening and frustrating experiences of lack of soul in the administration of unemployment insurance. The fact that we are now revising the act gives us an opportunity to deal with these shortcomings in a way which has not been possible for a long time. It is essential that we do so. We could develop the finest system of unemployment insurance benefits-on paper at least-that could be imagined; it could look perfect in its provisions, even to somebody like my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre, yet if the cheques did not get out of the computers and into the hands of the workers the whole system would be worth less than the paper on which it was written.
At least some of the working people in Canada, and, to my knowledge, a good many of the working people in my own constituency, feel so frustrated by the remoteness of the administration of unemployment insurance, so helpless when faced by these impersonal machines, that they have given up trying to get the benefits to which they are properly entitled. They say it is easier to go down to the welfare office and get social welfare payments. In fact, some of the workers on Vancouver Island have been doing just that.
I bring this up because going about my constituency during the recent recess I sensed strongly that this feeling had been growing to such an extent as to put the whole concept of unemployment insurance in jeopardy. The feeling has been aggravated by the introduction of computers into the system of administration, though it does not arise entirely from suspicion of the computer. I
have here a file which dates back to 1967 when a policy of phasing out local unemployment insurance offices was inaugurated. I suppose that in my constituency there are some 70,000 people, many of whom may be subject to interruptions in their earnings to a greater extent than are workers in other parts of the country, yet there is not one properly qualified unemployment insurance claims representative in the whole constituency.
I have been raising this matter ever since this phasing out first took place. I have some letters that admit there were some bugs because it was something new, that assert that this business of handling claims by long distance would settle down and there would be no further problems. But these problems have kept recurring and recurring, and quite frankly all the answers I have been able to get in this House have simply been an attempt to smother the situation in soft soap. That is the only way I can assess the situation judging by results. The situation in this last winter has, if anything, been worse than before.
I do not know that I want to take the time of the House to read the kind of replies that I have received from ministers of labour and top administrative officials of the Unemployment Insurance Commission in Ottawa because the list is lengthy. I have some correspondence of more recent vintage which I will refer to, but I wonder what is the use of even bothering the genial Minister of Labour about this? Certainly, unless something a little more drastic happens than has been the case in the past when I have written to the minister or the commission or asked a question in the House, this situation is not going to improve.
I should like to make reference to an answer I received on a "late show" presentation in 1969. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Labour concluded his reply with these words:
I assure you, Mr. Speaker, that persons living in Campbell River are receiving good and fast service from the Unemployment Insurance Commission, as is the case everywhere in Canada. However the commission will re-examine its operations in the area to determine whether it would be possible to expedite the system somewhat at periods of peak claim activity-
That is the kind of answer I have been receiving ever since 1967 about this administrative question. I did receive some more communications earlier this year. I have one from the secretary of the Port Albemi local of the IWA dated February 18, 1971. Part of this letter reads as follows:
The number of calls that we have had for assistance are beyond numbering and I would guess that during the months of December and January there were telephone calls at our expense at least once every second day. In addition to those calls the Nanaimo Unemployment Insurance Commission office has co-operated in placing calls back to this office.
I want to make it very clear that I am not speaking in condemnation of the attempts that have been made by some people in the field to cope with this problem; it is simply that they have not been given the tools or the

April 20, 1971

direction to do the job. The letter I have just referred to was prompted, I may say, by an advertisement that appeared in the Vancouver Province for Thursday, February 18 last. It is headed "suburban Service for UIC Claimants" and goes on to list handy addresses where people can obtain "closer to home services" from the commission. Yet if one of my constituents has a problem he wants to discuss with a properly qualified claims officer of the commission, not one can be reached within less than 50 miles and most have to go a good deal further than that.
This letter goes on to point out that during the two previous months interviews, investigations and phone calls had taken up practically half the working day for one person in one local union office. It continues:
In other words, this office has replaced the now closed Unemployment Insurance office that used to be in Port Alberni. In addition to the technical problems at this end the new computer in Vancouver has just raised particular hell. Some legitimate claims have taken as much as two months to unscramble and there are still some being processed.
The letter then gives a detailed outline of the situation, and at the end of the letter there is a postscript which I offer to the minister for this consideration. It reads:
You can tell the Unemployment Insurance Commission people in Ottawa that we want some service for our members and if we cannot get it in the way that we have suggested then we have fully qualified stenographic help in this office and the UIC can give them a course of instruction, and help pay the cost of their wages for supplying a service that is legitimately the cost of the Commission.
I have another letter from what is commonly referred to in British Columbia as the Loggers Local of the IWA. Its offices are located in Vancouver but they serve a very wide stretch of territory in the logging industry. The letter talks of the particular conditions of the last winter. Normally, the office might handle 20 inquiries in the December 1 to January 31 period. The letter continues:
This year we have been besieged with more than one hundred calls. We obviously are not the only ones receiving complaints as it has been nearly impossible to make telephone connection with any of the numbers (listed and unlisted) that we have for various Pacific Coast U.I.C. offices. Many times we have had to resort to letters to try to find someone to provide some answer to a claimant's complaint. Even when telephone connection is made, it is a matter of days (or longer) before any kind of answer is provided.
The inquiries and complaints may be mainly divided into two groups. The first is the group that file and a month later have either received absolutely nothing or some who have received bi-weekly forms and a punched code card which indicates that no decision has been made in their claim. The second group are those who not only have a frustrating wait before anything is received from the U.I.C., but then they finally receive a letter or a punch code card "number 5" which advises them they have insufficient contributions. From their own knowledge and from our records, we know that the computer has been given erroneous information. The claimant is forced to go through a time consuming and often costly process of obtaining a duplicate record of U.I.C. contributions for the past two years. This again is time consuming and when finally completed and submitted (for the second time) to the U.I.C. office, he then commences the delay problem experienced by the first group.
The answers being provided to us by Commission officers are:
a)	There has been a constant flood of claims
b)	New staff hired are inexperienced
c)	The Commission is using a new "faster" type computer
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
d)	There is a lack of communication between the Commission Office and the separate computer centre. The Commission Office does not know what the computer is doing for (or to) a claimant.
The answers are no answer! They do not speed up the handling of claims for benefit. There is no evidence of feeding the computer the correct information the first time. What effort would it require for the computer to advise the Commission office what it is doing to a claimant's claim for benefits?
Then, the letter goes on to refer to the bulk system and what that has done as far as some of their members are concerned:
Our members are not only unhappy, they have been made angry by frustration. Many have been forced into financial hardship. This government has dangled a tantalizing carrot- a white paper on future unemployment insurance benefits-but has failed to even properly provide existing benefits. This government needs to be reminded that an unemployed person needs benefits when he is unemployed-he and his family cannot live on nothing. Retroactive benefits are not the answer after a man has used up his savings or gone into debt or his employment is resumed.
Attached is a list of details about particular claims problems. I have had occasions when problems have come to me directly. I have picked up the phone and called the regional office in Vancouver, as a result of which something happened. I know of one or two instances when people have communicated directly with the Minister of Labour about a particular problem. Probably he has picked up the phone and obtained results. The number of people who do that kind of thing is very small, and the number of people who should have to do that kind of thing should also be very small. This may not be a problem all across the country, for the minister has said, if I recall his statement correctly, something like 96 per cent of claims are being processed on time. I do not know whether that is a national average or that an analysis has been made of any regional or district average. I do suggest that when this type of situation develops after the commission has had from 1967 until 1971 to iron out the bugs in closing the local offices, there must be something wrong with the concept of administration.
I think this inhuman, depersonalization of the system is basically wrong and that perhaps some of the so-called efficiency experts who may have been engaged by the government or the commission to advise the administration on how to use electronic devices have overlooked what must be a very important factor in any insurance scheme operated socially or otherwise. I mean the ability of an individual claimant to have some kind of personal contact with someone who is fully qualified to discuss a particular situation and give proper advice.
One of the steps taken was the implementation of the program of so-called unemployment insurance agents. As far as I know, these people are not properly trained claims officers. From information I have they may be able to help an individual fill out an original form, but if there is any real problem they are not competent, trained or qualified, and do not have the communications facilities to deal with these problems.

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
Just as important as the terms and details of benefits to be provided under this act is the way in which this new unemployment insurance act is going to be administered when it comes into effect. It should be done in such a manner that the whole concept of insurance will be something the Canadian working force can be proud of and support. I hope the committee will fully assess this aspect of the matter during its meetings with members of the present commission and the minister when they appear before the committee. Unless this kind of situation I have tried to describe is given some attention, the whole scheme is bound, sooner or later, to crumble and fall to the ground. I am sure the minister would not want to see that happen.


Mr. A. D. Hales (Wellington):: Mr. Speaker, this is one of the most important bills to come before this chamber in a long time. It is important because it affects 96 out of every 100 working people in Canada. Let me congratulate the minister upon the method he has chosen to bring such an important bill to the attention of the people of this country. He introduced a white paper which was referred to the Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration. At that time the committee heard many witnesses who gave their views on the contents of the white paper. The minister has now introduced the bill, and we are about to give it second reading in order that it may be returned to the committee for further study. I do not know what better method he could have adopted to make this information available to the people of Canada.
In order to keep my remarks in some sort of chronological order, I should like to deal with four points. Is Bill C-229 a welfare scheme or an insurance plan? I should also like to refer to the universality concept. I will then say a little about administration and the real problems that will be involved in this regard. Under that heading I will have something to say about the two weeks' waiting period. I will then refer to reasons for having the Department of Manpower, the Department of Labour and the unemployment insurance offices amalgamated as they used to be. The minister, by introducing such a bill is providing reason enough for having these offices united as they were in the past. What could be more related than an office dealing with a man out of work and an office paying him benefits? These are related problems. This Government separated these offices and the communication among them at the present time leaves much to be desired.
In the opening paragraph on page 103 of the Gill report, under the heading "Conclusions and recommendations", we find the following:
-we believe that a plan of unemployment insurance should be designed to take the first impact of unemployment and should be based on insurance principles-
We find the following in the next paragraph:
-insurance is indemnity for loss ... the concern of unemployment insurance is to indemnify insured persons for loss of wages resulting from unemployment.
The report goes on to point out that a man cannot be said to lose what he never had. This was a reference to
seasonal workers under the existing plan. If a man works from April 1 to December 1, and is normally idle during the rest of the year, it cannot be said he has lost any wages during his off season. It may well be that such an individual needs and deserves some form of income assistance, but that is not the role of a real unemployment insurance plan.
The Gill commission felt that the unemployment insurance fund should be confined to the payment of indemnity for wages lost as a result of the failure to obtain employment. I could continue to quote from this report but I think I have said enough to bring the thinking of the Gill commission to the attention of the minister. The report states further:
... the insurance concept has been pushed more and more into the background.
The plan is neither a valid insurance plan in its present form nor is it a socially desirable type of income supplement.
Is it a welfare or insurance plan? When I take a look at the bill and find that the following things can happen, I cannot help but think that it is a welfare scheme and not an insurance scheme. A person who has only worked eight weeks of the year can qualify for benefits. A person who had worked for a period of from 8 to 19 weeks could qualify, depending on national and regional unemployment rates, for benefits of 8 to 51 weeks. The benefits could be as high as $100 a week. It would be possible for a person to contribute as little as $15.80 to the scheme and draw out as much as $5,100. I should like to ask the minister if he believes this is actuarially sound and if so, whether it is an insurance scheme, a welfare scheme or a hand-out.
A person who works for 20 or more weeks in a year and loses his job could automatically collect three weeks benefits even if he returned to work the very next day. The amount could be as high as $100 a week. Therefore, a person could collect $300 even if he returned to work the next day. This is called an incentive to find work. I would say it is an incentive to sit at home. A person who was not looking for work could collect as much as $100 a week for three months and receive $1,200 in that period before the unemployment insurance commission would even attempt to determine whether or not he should be receiving benefits. He could collect $1,200 before the counselling service which is to be established would inquire into the problem and try to determine why he had not obtained a job. Under this bill, I understand it would be possible for a woman to work for eight weeks in order to obtain pin money. She could work during November and December in the Christmas rush in a department store earning pin money and collect $800 worth of insurance when laid off while her husband might be earning a salary of $15,000 or more a year. I ask you, is this a sound insurance plan?
When such things are possible, I hope the committee will examine this bill very closely. It would seem that by this bill we would be producing a work force with bad work habits. I believe I have said enough to bring before

April 20, 1971

the House the question of whether or not this is an insurance plan or a welfare plan.
Now, what about the universality concept? All of us have received letters by the hundreds from school teachers all across the country who complain about being included in this new plan. If the minister wishes to make this a universal plan, then I suggest that everybody should be included in it, even Members of Parliament if you like. If it is to be universal it should include all professions such as doctors, dentists and others. If there is to be universality, the plan should be applicable to all professions. If it is not to be applicable to all professions, then the teachers should not be included. We should not make fish of one and fowl of the other. They should be all treated alike and I believe the teachers have a very good argument. If they are to be forced into the plan, then they are right in saying all the other professions should be brought into it as well.
There is no provision in this plan to take care of the taxi driver, the self-employed person, or the man running the corner variety store who is struggling to make a living. He is not insured by this plan but is just as entitled to be covered as is anyone else, and perhaps even more so because he must slave away in an attempt to keep the wolf away from the door.
In talking about teachers I might mention that in my area, the Wellington County Board of Education area, I believe the figure in respect of the cost of insuring teachers is something in the area of $75,000, half of which, or roughly $38,000, will be borne by the school board. The only way this $38,000 can be raised is by taxing the poor property owners who are now burdened to the hilt with taxation. Now, by insisting on the teachers entering the unemployment insurance scheme we are placing an additional burden on these taxpayers. At a time when we are trying to relieve the property owners of extreme burdens we are about to add another burden which will virtually break their backs. We are close to that point now.
Each of the 1.2 million more people who are to be brought into the plan will have to pay, I think, $62 per year. Well, Mr. Speaker, I believe I have said enough about universality. If we are to have universality it should go all the way; if not, then we will have a real problem on our hands in respect of the teachers organizations.


PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. It being five o'clock it is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the House that the question to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment is as follows: The hon. member for Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe (Mr. Marshall)-National Parks-Bonne Bay-Letting of contract for survey work.
Canada Pension Plan



PRIVATE MEMBERS' PUBLIC BILLS


[Stage Direction]
On the order:
Second reading and reference to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs of Bill C-34, An Act to amend the Canada Pension Plan (Pension Index)-Mr. Mac-quarrie.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder if the Chair might apologize to the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie) before he begins his remarks by stating that it would seem to be incumbent upon the Chair to refer the hon. member for Hillsborough to the procedural difficulties in respect of the particular bill standing in his name. I shall ask the hon. member, and other hon. members who wish to do so, to assist the Chair in respect of the procedural point before a ruling is given. I might point out, however, to hon. members and to the hon. member for Hillsborough, that in a statement by Mr. Speaker of October 20, 1970 near the commencement of the present session of Parliament His Honour referred to this and other bills as bills in respect of which he had some doubt concerning their procedural acceptability.
I might read briefly from His Honour's statement at that time. He said:
Another aspect of the matter is that there is an increasing tendency to include money provisions in private members' bills. Honourable Members know that the time honoured practice has been to include such proposals in the form of a private Members' motion rather than in a bill.
In many cases in the past, in order to meet the convenience of honourable Members, the consideration of the Second Reading of such bills was entered upon. It seems to the Chair that such procedure is not good Parliamentary practice.
His Honour then went on to refer to several bills, including the one standing in the name of the hon. member for Hillsborough. Then, he continued:
The Chair considers that in drafting of bills more care should be exercised to ensure that financial provisions are not included in such bills. When the aforementioned bills and any others which, on closer examination, appear to contain financial provisions are called for debate, I propose to examine the question of whether or not such bills are in order from a procedural standpoint.
At that time hon. members who have sponsored these bills will have an opportunity to satisfy the Chair that the bills are in order from such standpoints before proceeding to a substantive argument about the merits of the bills.
In the light of His Honour's statement I would have to say to the hon. member for Hillsborough, as Mr. Speaker did some months ago, that there seem to be serious considerations about the procedural acceptability of this bill and that it would seem to be in conflict with the procedures in the Standing Orders relative to imposing a charge or impost. Therefore, I would like to invite the hon. member for Hillsborough and other hon. members who would like to assist the Chair to do so from a

April 20, 1971
Canada Pension Plan
procedural standpoint. I would ask them to confine their remarks at this point to the procedural argument as to whether or not the bill is acceptable. I will then make a ruling, and, of course, if I find the bill acceptable we could embark on the substantive debate.


Heath Nelson Macquarrie: Mr. Speaker, I have been reflecting upon Your Honour's words and consulting authorities, both living and dead, in the weeks since.


Mr. Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Which were the more helpful?


Heath Nelson Macquarrie: The words of the living ones were more readily accessible and more voluble. I base my right to proceed on the grounds that this measure, in fact, is not a levy upon the revenue of this country as set forth in the statutes of this country and in the Standing Orders of this House. If I believed that the enactment of such a bill did in fact appropriate a part of the public revenue, as understood by the statutes and by our rules, if I thought it was a tax or an impost, I would realize of course that we would require a recommendation to this House accompanied by a message from the Governor General. The pension plan fund is, however, not a part of the public revenue, nor is it funded by the collection of any tax or impost. Moneys are not public revenue, taxes or imposts merely because they are collected by or paid to a public officer of the government of Canada. What we have here is a measure dealing with contributions. In the government publication "The Canada Pension Plan", put out by Information Canada over the signature of the present Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Munro) we find the following opening statement:
The Canada Pension Plan, inaugurated in 1966, is a contributory social security program designed to provide a basic level of protection against the contingencies of retirement, disability,-
In other words, the moneys whereby a measure of justice would be given to the recipients of the Canada pension cannot be a result of a tax imposed by this legislative body, rather do they come from those funds which are contributed by the would-be pension recipients. I do not want to labour at length on this, but the whole discussion of the Canada Pension Plan in this House offers what I believe to be very helpful suggestions for underpinning my faith in the procedure upon which I am not engaged.
The resolution introducing the Canada Pension Plan reads in part:
-to provide further that all expenditures under the Canada Pension Plan, including costs of administration, shall be financed from contributions by employees, employers and self-employed persons.
Very clearly, the whole operation, administration and otherwise, once the pension plan has been set up as it has been for several years, is dealing with contributions. This is something quite different from the restriction which is placed upon us in this House in reference to taxes and levies of that kind.
I think that there may be some living authorities about us who might want to assist Your Honour on this point.


Mr. J. A. Jerome (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, I confess that I do not have the substantive material before me which I would like to have to assist you, but I simply wanted to comment, before you made your ruling on this, that the test is not simply whether the funds which make up the pension fund itself come entirely from contributions and therefore whether those funds would be used or disbursed in a different way. The test has to go beyond that to see whether or not in the implementation of this legislation further federal expenditures would have to be made by the government. If the result of an increase in benefits paid under the scheme is to cause in any way, directly or indirectly, an increase in federal contributions or federal administrative costs of that scheme or expenses by the government, which of course have to be drawn out of the revenue, then the legislation is repugnant without the proper recommendation from His Excellency.
That is a very general comment, but I confess that I do not have the details of the plan before me at present.


Hon. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):: I recall that there have been discussions with regard to this point in the past and that there have been some rulings. If I may say with the greatest respect, some of them have been at the time rather confusing and, I think, erroneous in that if one examines the Canada Pension Plan there is not one penny's contribution from public funds to the administration. The act is very specific in this regard, that the contributions from individuals and from employers constitute the sole source of the funds plus the earnings on the loans made to provincial governments. These are the sources of revenue for the fund, and there is no provision whereby, if there is an increase in payments to any individual, whether by direct change in the scale of payments, this increase in payments to survivors would be chargeable to the Crown. It will not disturb ways and means one iota. Therefore, I put it to you that hon. members of this House are within their entire competence in putting forward amendments to a public act, such as the Canada Pension Plan Act, whereby the payment of benefits under the act may be varied, and that is all that the bill of my colleague attempts to do.
I invite any of the hon. parliamentary secretaries who may wish to attack this point of view to point out where in the act there is even one split penny that comes from the public purse and that has to be provided by ways and means. Therefore, since there is nothing whereby ways and means is affected, it is fully within the competence of hon. members, whether on this side or on the opposite side, to move an amendment to the act, and it does not require a recommendation from His Excellency nor a bill to be brought into the House by a member of the government.
Therefore, I put it to you, Mr. Speaker, that the point of order taken by the government representatives, challenging the competence of my colleague from Hillsborough in putting forth this bill, is not well founded.
April 20, 1971


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, at the risk of indulging in a bit of repetition- and that has happened before in this place-I would like to emphasize the point that has been made by the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie), and just now by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert), that the financing of the Canada Pension Plan is unique.
There are other propositions that are financed mainly by the contributions of people, for example, the pensions paid under Public Service Superannuation Act, but this one is even more strictly financed by those who contribute to it than any other. For example, in the case of the Public Service Superannuation Act the contributors provide the money out of which the pensions are paid, but the government provides the cost of administration. However, in the case of the Canada Pension Plan all of the administration costs are charged to the Canada Pension Fund.
As a matter of fact, if one will look through the estimates in the big blue book one will see, in the case of almost every department, some item that has to be the subject of a double entry so that every last penny that it costs to administer the Canada Pension Plan-including the salaries of those who work for the plan, including the rental of space, and all the rest of it-is charged to the fund. There is not one cent that is charged to the general revenues of the country.
I rely on my memory for what I am going to say for the next few minutes, and if I am found to be wrong I am sure somebody will draw that to my attention. However, I think my memory is pretty sound on this.
When the Canada Pension Plan legislation was brought in back in 1964-we dealt with it in 1964 and 1965-the government made the point that this was to be financed entirely by the contributors, namely the employers and the employees. Someone, therefore, raised the question as to why there was a Governor General's recommendation. My hon. friend close by says it was Mr. Nasserden, at the time one of the Conservative members from Saskatchewan. So, my memory is confirmed. The answer was that some government money would be needed as a loan initially to get the plan started, and it was only because there was some money needed in that first year that a Governor General's recommendation was required at all. To show how clean its skirts were, the government drove home the point that once the plan got going the government would not be out one red cent, or a cent of any other colour, and that the entire financing of the plan would be paid for by the contributors.
As I say, I am simply repeating what my two hon. friends nearby have said, but I think it applies with particular force in relation to this bill. Therefore, if my hon. friend from Hillsborough is merely proposing that which involves some other use of the funds that are in the Canada Pension Fund, in order to escalate pensions by more than 2 per cent per year, it seems to me he has the right to do that.
If I recall correctly, Sir, you were in the Chair in committee of the whole on March 30 when I moved an amendment having to do with the Public Service Superannuation Act. My amendment sought to establish the
Canada Pension Plan
proposition that certain reductions in the pensions of public servants who retire early should not take place.


Mr. Francis:: I remember that.


Stanley Howard Knowles: My hon. friend from Ottawa West says he remembers it. I would expect him to remember that day. It was argued against my amendment that it was a charge on the treasury. I argued that it was not, that any extra money was to be drawn from an account, and I emphasize that I used the word account, not fund, but that the real test was that to put this amendment into effect would not require an additional vote of any money whatsoever. Your Honour found that amendment to be in order. In all fairness I should say you admitted that the point was not completely clear, but your initial reaction was to rule in favour of it and even after argument-I make the point that it was after argument-you ruled it was in order. It was then put to the committee of the whole. Later on, it was put to a vote. Unfortunately it was voted down, but for procedural purposes it stands as a precedent.
Now, I double back for a moment to make the point that in the case of the Public Service Superannuation Act, although the moneys that are used for the paying of pensions come entirely from the employer and the employees, the administration costs in that case are paid by the government, but in this case they are not-not at all. And I submit, Sir, that if you were right on March 30, as I think you were, in ruling my amendment to Bill C-207 in order, you should follow suit and rule this bill in order today.


Mr. Robert McCleave (Halifax-East Hants):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to join briefly in the arguments that have been presented to Your Honour and to recall some of the wording in the resolution that was presented to the House when the Canada Pension Plan was introduced on October 28, 1964. But before I read portions of the resolution, I agree that up to that point the moneys had been spent by government departments with reference to the setting up of the plan, particularly with reference to the studies that had preceded the setting up of the plan, in that very special sense, involved an expenditure of tax moneys, of Her Majesty's revenues, in relation to that legislation. These moneys had to be spent so that the expertise established for publication of these ideas could be incorporated into the Canada Pension Plan itself.
As the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) has recalled, the then member for Rosthern raised with the prime minister of the day the question of why there should be a resolution when the Canada Pension Plan was to pay its own expenses. There were exchanges between them, and perhaps I should read what the prime minister said then:
The fact is that it will cost some money to get this plan into operation, as my hon. friend must know. Afterwards, when the plan is in operation, the expenses will be borne by the fund.
I therefore suggest, Mr. Speaker, that the resolution that was brought in then was really for the technical
5096

April 20, 1971
Canada Pension Plan
purpose of covering the expenditures borne by the Crown up to that point, to get the plan assembled, to have the expertise available before all these ideas were put into the Canada Pension Plan legislation. Thereafter the plan was on its own, as it were. Indeed, when I read that part of the resolution Your Honour will find that the plan was required to pay back all these expenses that had gone into the formulation of it.
With that as a rather long preamble, here is the resolution that was presented to the House on October 28, 1964. I shall not read it all, but I shall read the pertinent parts. It begins:
That it is expedient to introduce a measure, to be known as the Canada Pension Plan, to establish in Canada a comprehensive program of retirement pensions payable to contributors;
Then, there is reference to supplementary benefits, widows, orphans, the disabled, co-ordination under the Old Age Security Act with benefits payable under the Canada Pension Plan, and then these words:
-to provide for the adjustment of pensions and other benefits in line with increases in earnings and the cost of living;
You will note there is no reference to any ceiling there, Mr. Speaker. Reading further, and I think this is important:
-and to provide further that all expenditures under the Canada Pension Plan, including cost of administration, shall be financed from contributions by employees and employers and from contributions by persons in respect of self-employed earnings.
I simply reinforce the statement of purpose mentioned to Your Honour by my colleagues this afternoon. Perhaps before I sit down, however, I should make this further point: the legislation having been altered by the very sensible amendment of the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie), when at any stage could the trustees of the Canada Pension Plan come back to this Parliament and demand money for the operation of the plan? When could there be any requirement whatsoever that so much as one red, black or blue cent of public money be put into its operation? I suggest you could look from one end of the plan to the other, whether in its present form or, hopefully, as amended by the hon. member for Hillsborough, and not find any such obligation.
I would respectfully suggest to your Honour that it would work a hardship on the backbench members of Parliament if a very narrow construction were placed on the rule about the introduction of measures calling for expenditures. I think, first, the rule would have to be pretty severely twisted to cover the circumstances that arise in the bill of the hon. member for Hillsborough, but in any event it would be a most narrow and unfortunate construction if the Chair were to say that this bill was outside the competence of a private member.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I should like to thank hon. members for their assistance on this procedural point. As has been pointed out, it is one that is not without much difficulty. Certainly, as the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) has pointed out, the acceptance a few weeks ago of an amendment with respect to the superannuation fund legislation might be parallelled
to the bill we have before us. At that time I indicated I had some very serious doubt as to the acceptability of that particular amendment. There is a difference however, and if hon. members want to make supplementary arguments I would be pleased to hear them at the risk of taking the time of the House. I have a further problem with the bill now being considered by the House and that is with respect to clause 3 of Bill C-34 which refers specifically to expenditures as follows:
Expenditures under this act shall be provided under section 104 of the British North America Acts, 1867 to 1970.
My main confusion in this respect arises from the use of the words "expenditures under this act".
Having indicated this very serious further concern that I have, 1 will not base my ruling on it. It seems to me that the whole problem revolves around the question of whether the contribution, voluntarily or involuntarily, constitutes an impost as understood by the provisions of our financial practice or by the terms of our Standing Order 62. All hon. members will agree that we must start from the position that financial expenditures are to be provided as described in the words of Standing Order 62 (1). The Standing Order reads as follows, in part:
... for the appropriation of any part of the public revenue, or of any tax or impost, to any purpose that has not been first recommended to the House by a message from the Governor General in the session in which such vote, resolution, address or bill is proposed.
The provisions of Standing Order 62 refer specifically to imposts without defining, in particular, what should be considered as an impost.
It seems to me that Bill C-34 must be construed to be a measure to appropriate a part of the revenue obtained by way of an impost. It would be imprudent, I suggest, to contend that such contributions are voluntarily and generously proffered by all working Canadians. In other words, contributions to the Canada Pension Plan are indeed an impost or levy, required to be paid under the provisions of the plan.
In conclusion, it might be helpful were the Chair to read the provisions of citation 8 of Beauchesne's Fourth Edition which read as follows:
8. (1) The proceedings of the Houses (Senate and Commons) are governed by statutes, by rules and orders adopted by themselves, and by those usages which have grown up in the course of time and consequently become a part of their own practice or are derived from the common law of Parliament by which they have consented to be guided in all matters of doubt.
(2)	The usages of Parliament are to be collected from the entries in the Journals, from the history of parliamentary procedure, from the treatises on parliamentary practice that have been published from time to time; and from the observations of experienced members, and the remarks of the speakers in the House of Commons, with relation to the forms and methods of proceedings, as contained in the published debates.
(3)	"In the interpretation of the rules or Standing Orders, the House is generally guided, not so much by the literal construction of the orders themselves as by the consideration of what has been the practice of the House with respect to them."
I suggest to the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie) that the Standing Orders and the financial practice of this House present an insuperable barrier to
[Mr. McCleave.l
April 20, 1971

his proposed bill, and the established practices of this House and the Standing Orders dictates that the Chair must rule that Bill C-34 should not be proceeded with at this time.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Six o'clock.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Is it agreed that it shall be called six o'clock?


Stanley Howard Knowles: We might as well.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
At 5:35 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 8 p.m.


Alfred Dryden Hales: Mr. Speaker, when the House proceeded to private members' business at five o'clock I had just commenced my remarks concerning Bill C-229 respecting unemployment insurance. I had indicated the four areas I hoped to cover and I had dealt with two of them-first, whether this was a welfare scheme or an insurance plan and, second, the question of universality. I should now like to deal with the third point, which concerns the administration of the proposals contained in Bill C-229.
Administration is an area in which there is likely to be considerable trouble. First of all, I can visualize the difficulty administrators will encounter in explaining the need for a two-week waiting period. As you know, Mr. Speaker, under the present plan there is only a one-week waiting period. Even so, each member of this House has had unemployed people contact him to say they have survived the waiting period but were still waiting for a cheque; their money had all been spent and they needed groceries; they were in great need of these cheques, but for some reason which was not apparent to them the cheque had been held up.
One can readily understand what hardship the proposed two weeks' waiting period is likely to impose. People are likely to say: We paid into this plan and therefore we expect payment immediately. They were satisfied to wait one week, but they are not likely to take kindly to the idea of waiting two weeks. Perhaps the committee will give further thought to this feature of the legislation.
Then there is the question of the way in which earnings are to be defined. This is a far-ranging issue and a considerable problem has arisen in this area under the
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 terms of the present act. I have in mind the situation likely to be encountered by a man who is a part-time farmer, working in a factory-perhaps he has a farm of 50 or 100 acres-who is laid off at the factory at a time when he has agricultural products for sale. The valuation of these products, as income for purposes of the act, has always caused a great deal of difficulty, and for this reason I hope the definition of "earnings" will be spelled out in the regulations in a fair and equitable way.
Also, I wonder how this legislation will apply to people who have completed an adult retraining program of 25 weeks or so, who have passed the course and are ready for a job. If there is no job available in which they can use their improved skills, will they be eligible for unemployment insurance benefit? Situations of this kind have caused difficulty under the provisions of the existing act.
Administrative confusion is likely to be caused by provision for variation depending upon the national unemployment level. If the national level of unemployment stood at 4 per cent or lower, ten weeks' benefit would be available to insured persons; if the national rate were between 4 and 5 per cent, workers would be entitled to 14 weeks' benefit, and if the rate rose above 5 per cent they would be eligible for 18 weeks' benefit.
Can hon. members visualize administering this bill under those provisions? Suppose the Dominion Bureau of Statistics said today that the unemployment rate was 4 per cent: the fellow who put in his application for unemployment insurance yesterday would be eligible for 10 weeks benefit, but those who apply tomorrow would be able to draw 14 weeks' benefit. This illustrates the difficulty which arises when one establishes a dividing line. We have experienced this difficulty in connection with other legislation. In this case I can visualize chaos within the Unemployment Insurance Commission offices under the new provisions which rely on the percentage of unemployment to determine the number of weeks for which a worker is entitled to benefit. This is a nightmare that the administrators will have to wrestle with unless the committee decides to make a change to this part of the bill.
I should like to say a word or two about why these two departments should be one department, as they were previously. I refer, of course, to the Department of Labour and the Department of Manpower and Immigration. The Unemployment Insurance Commission used to be in charge of the national employment service. People who were unemployed went to one of the NES offices to register. In the same office the decision was made whether they were eligible for unemployment insurance benefits. There was close liaison between the two branches. After all, what could be more closely related than a man out of work and a man seeking employment or unemployment benefits?
There is an Unemployment Insurance Commission office in the centre of Waterloo, near where I live, and this office covers a radius of about 100 miles. The staff is responsible for seeing that people in this area who are unemployed are paid benefits. The Manpower offices in
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April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 other centres try to find them a job. The staff of the Manpower office may send a worker to a job similar to what he had before, but if he is not accepted or if he turns down the job, the Manpower counsellor has authority to decide whether or not this person should continue to receive benefits. He makes out a form and sends it to the Unemployment Insurance Commission, which thereupon rules on eligibility for benefits.
In many cases this is not being done. I had a case where a man was on unemployment insurance benefits for ten months, no effort being made either to find a job or to ascertain whether he should still receive benefits. There are many cases of people being sent out to take jobs which they refuse to take and their benefits continue to be paid. In some cases the counsellor in the Manpower office-who of course is extremely busy because of the high unemployment rate-takes a week to fill out the form, and the Unemployment Insurance Commission office, which likewise is busy, takes another week to process the form. This means that the man in question receives two weeks' benefit to which he may not be entitled.
This matter was brought to the attention of the House by the Auditor General, who on April 6 appeared before the Public Accounts Committee which at that time was examining the affairs of the Department of Manpower and Immigration. As reported in the minutes of the Public Accounts Committee for that date, the Auditor General said that in 1969 he had sufficient staff and time to audit the books of only 14 out of 254 Manpower offices. Last year, 1970, his staff had the opportunity to audit only 33 offices out of 338.
What did the Auditor General find as a result of these audits, Mr. Speaker? He found that as a result of lack of communication between Manpower and Unemployment Insurance Commission offices $3 million in benefits was paid out to people who should not have received that money. And this after auditing only 33 out of 338 offices! Had the books of all the offices been audited, I wonder what the final figure would have been. Reading through the minutes one sees what a great old American game of pass the buck has been going on between the Unemployment Insurance Commission staff and the staff of the Manpower offices. There is not the liaison between these two offices that there should be. In view of the new bill that the minister has introduced, I am sure he will realize that sooner or later these two offices must be joined together. This is all the more important in view of the projected national unemployment rate as a basis for determining the number of weeks eligibility for benefit.
I should also like to ask the committee that will study this bill to examine the counselling provisions. As I understand it, the Unemployment Insurance Commission will hire many counsellors to interview people who are unemployed for a certain time in order to ascertain why they have been unable to find employment. The counsellors will probably tell these people to go to the Manpower offices. This is another reason why the two departments should work hand in hand. Perhaps they will tell unemployed people to see a welfare officer because this is
in the nature of a social assistance plan. However, I can see the staff of the Unemployment Insurance Commission increasing markedly with the employment of hundreds of counsellors. This is added expense and the administration of this new plan will get out of hand.
Before concluding my remarks I should underline the fact that this new bill makes no provision to deal with the following situation: I have always thought that there was something radically wrong in principle with the unemployment insurance plan. To explain what I mean, let me give an example. Suppose a carpenter becomes unemployed and applies for unemployment insurance. According to the act as I understand it, an unemployed worker must be referred to similar work and pay. In the case of a carpenter, in other words, he must take a carpenter's job. If no such job is available to him but there is a job available pumping gas, the carpenter has the right to refuse that job and to take instead the $100 a week that we are now proposing to pay. I contend that the principle that a physically able workman should take any job available, providing the pay is reasonable, rather than collect unemployment insurance, is a sound one.
I hope that this new Unemployment Insurance Act will bring a new approach to unemployment insurance. I hope that fraudulent practices will become a thing of the past. I hope greater efforts will be made to apprehend those who receive benefits to which they are not entitled, and that they will be dealt with accordingly. As I say, I hope the new act will introduce a new concept of unemployment insurance. I am glad the minister has taken care of one point that I am sure every member of the House has had brought to his attention.
People have said to me, and I am sure to many other members, that they have paid into the unemployment insurance fund all their lives and should be entitled to something. This has been one of the greatest areas of criticism and objection to the system. In order to get something from the fund, some of these people avail themselves of various means. The minister has now said, as laid out in this bill, that when a person reaches age 65 and is receiving the Canada pension he will be given a three-week lump sum. This could be a maximum of $300 or graduated down according to the individual's income. This is a wonderful thing, because those who have paid into the fund will get something out of it.
I close by saying that the bill has some very good and some very poor points. I will find it very difficult to support it in its present form. I hope the committee will amend the bill to change some of the areas which involve welfare rather than insurance. If that is the case, I will be happy to support the measure.


Mr. Jim McNulty (St. Catharines):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak in support of a bill that I consider to be one of the most significant pieces of social legislation in our country's history. It ranks with similar measures which have been introduced by Liberal governments- measures designed with one purpose in mind, to improve the situation of the individual Canadian.

April 20, 1971

With the introduction of this new legislation, affecting as it does the lives of millions of Canadians, a new philosophy has become evident in the policies governing unemployment insurance. It is a philosophy of meeting the realities of life in Canada with far reaching and flexible programs designed to meet the individual needs of the men and women who make up the work force. One of the more forward-looking features of this new plan for unemployment insurance in Canada is the introduction of the claimant assistance program. Its aims are simple, easily expressed and understood, yet of such far reaching importance that its role cannot be underestimated.
Others in this debate have brought our attention to the fact that a temporary interruption of earnings can occur in almost any work situation. In short, seniority, good work performance and the nature of your profession are no longer adequate insurance against this contingency. In addition, you have been made aware of the meaningful steps taken to increase the benefits to expand the ease of access to the plan and the provisions for extended benefits in the face of adverse economic conditions. All these things represent tremendous improvements in the legislation.
I should like to say a few words, however, on a feature of the plan that represents not simply more of the same but, rather, a fundamental addition to the services available to individual Canadians through the unemployment insurance device. I am referring, of course, to the claimant assistance program or interview system. Through this procedure every claimant, who has been unemployed for more than eight weeks will be asked to participate in at least two interviews designed to motivate and inform him in respect of his personal search for employment.
In essence, the primary objective of the claimant assistance program is to provide information and assistance to claimants in order to help them find employment. With almost 97 per cent of all Canadian workers being included in this new unemployment insurance plan, it is well suited to assist claimants since an unemployed individual's first contact with government at any level is invariably through the Unemployment Insurance Commission.
The claimant assistance program can aid a claimant to develop and carry through an effective job search plan. It can also direct him to the wide range of Canada Manpower programs which are now available and, in many instances, toward other social development programs which are designed to meet specific individual needs. In order to meet this considerable responsibility, the new claimant assistance program will provide a much needed liaison between the Unemployment Insurance Commission and other government departments, agencies and programs. This will provide better and more efficient working relationships and co-ordination of effort to provide the claimant with the assistance he needs in the form of job search techniques, labour market requirements, retraining programs and social development services which may apply to his situation.
Research projects which have been conducted in several communities have indicated the worth of a service dedicated to examining the root causes of a man's unem-
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 ployment problem and providing concrete, helpful answers. For instance, in one case a mechanic found himself out of work: in an interview with a claimant assistance guidance officer, he disclosed the fact that while he had been offered employment, he was unable to accept it because his tool-kit had been stolen. The guidance officer was able to put him in touch immediately with an agency which could assist him by providing the required tools. That man went back to work happy.
In another instance a claimant, driven to distraction by financial worries, pointed out that even if he got a job he was faced with other problems. His family was due to be evicted that day. A telephone call from the guidance officer to a most understanding and co-operative landlord soon removed that worry. The man went back to work. While these are isolated, personal problems afflicting just two people, the record is full of instances where material assistance offered by trained and competent people has materially assisted a man's or woman's return to employment far more quickly than in the past.
The claimant is invited to a personal interview, to review his case, with a guidance officer of the Unemployment Insurance Commission. During that interview every effort is made to develop the claimant's interest in solving his employment problem. The claimant's skills and experience are explored and steps are taken to sort out reasons which may have contributed to his unemployment. If the claimant is in fact available for work-and as hon. members know, some of them are not-a job search plan is developed to meet his specific needs. In addition, referrals are made to job training and placement agencies such as Canada Manpower centres and other social development agencies where requirements for this type of assistance are identified.
If the unemployment continues, the claimant is requested to return for a second interview. At this time the claimant and the guidance officer jointly review both the information and guidance provided to the claimant during the first interview, how well he had used the information given him and whether he had taken advantage of the different services to which he was referred. A search is carried out to discover causes for his unemployment, which may not be readily apparent, and to develop a new job search plan tailored to the claimant's needs. It is hoped this new service will materially reduce the length of time a claimant is jobless by promoting a far quicker return to full-time work. From research studies, there are strong indications that this can be accomplished by a more personal and direct approach than has been used in the past.
May I emphasize and underscore the fact that this is not some sort of a critical, carping police action designed to keep people in line. The Minister of Labour (Mr. Mackasey) has made it quite plain that what occurs between the guidance officer and the claimant is privileged and every claimant interviewed will be assured of this fact. If in the course of an interview an irregularity is discovered in his claim, his attention will be drawn to that point and he will be advised that it is his responsibility to make the facts known. The officer conducting the interview cannot assume the individual's responsibili-

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 ty: what the claimant does is up to him and his conscience. Such a program geared to modern day conditions represents, I believe, one of the more forward steps taken by any government in dealing with human problems on a human level.


Mr. Roland Godin (Portneuf):: Mr. Speaker, at a time when unemployment has reached appalling levels, everyone must rejoice at any improvement in the plight of the unemployed. That is why the system put forward by Bill C-229 seems to be effective, at first sight, particularly because the unemployed will be able to receive increased benefits more in keeping with their needs.
But finally, it is realized that the proposed system can only work over a short period, in view of the federal government's present policy. Should the government persist in the belief that inflation can only be curbed through unemployment, the unemployment insurance system will become inadequate, because the number of unemployed will be too great.
It can be seen that the unemployment insurance plan works fairly well when it is a matter of seasonal unemployment or of unemployment of short duration, or when the number of unemployed is not high. However, when the unemployment rate reaches a high level, as it does today, the plan becomes deficient and inadequate. In spite of that, the government has decided to deal with the problem from the standpoint of benefits, that is in a superficial manner.
By increasing the benefits and extending the benefit period, the government believes that it has solved the problem. The government could be right, if there was a decrease in the unemployment rate, but, on February 23 last, the President of the Canadian Labour Congress, Mr. Donald Macdonald, stated that, because of the government's present policy, unemployment would last for several more years.
In the newspaper La Presse of Monday February 15, it is reported that Mr. William A. Dyson, president of the Canadian Welfare Council and member of the Caston-guay Commission stated that the rise of unemployment could become a permanent phenomenon in our society. He added and I quote:
Apparently, the level of unemployment Is not as important as it used to be, since production is increasingly dependent on industries, businesses and services using machines and computers.
Consequently, the means of production and wealth derived therefrom make the producing mechanism less and less dependent on workers, managers and experts.
There is no doubt that we are now witnessing a deep economic alteration. The machine is now liberating the man of tomorrow from an incredible number of menial tasks. However, while being liberated, he becomes unemployed. We know that problems are appearing much more quickly than legislation is improving.
Consequently, the thriving community must ask itself how it should provide for the needs of those who are no longer useful in the productivity process.
The hon. Minister of Regional Economic Expansion (Mr. Marchand) stated recently that the high unemploy-
IMr. McNulty.]
ment rate was no cause for alarm, that it was normal. This means that the services and recreation are and will be more important than ever. But instead of tackling the whole problem, the government divides it into various areas: unemployment insurance, family allowances and heaps of other things so that it is impossible to find either a challenge to work or any improvement of recreation which would normally tend to increase the quality of life. So the government offers a solution to an immediate problem rather than an adequate solution that would encompass the future.
As neither the present government nor any traditional political party seem willing to accept valuable solutions in matters of unemployment, namely monetary solutions, it follows that the present system which is split in layers only takes care of particular cases and disregards general needs. For this reason, the various plans and programs, that is, family allowances, unemployment insurance, old age security pension, are far from being integrated and what we have been suggesting for years is to integrate all these plans into one aimed at providing a vital minimum, which would help solve all the problems at the same time. This is a plan which was accepted in principle at the Liberal conference of last fall, but which the federal government has not deemed proper to translate into a policy.
Following the rejection of such a policy, this government has kept on introducing white papers and legislations which do not deal with the basic problem but which somehow are more or less popular because they improve conditions in a particular field.
Since we must consider a specific bill and since this is not a comprehensive policy, as it should be, I should like to pass on to the analysis of this legislation. It would appear, in this great legislation, that contributions are required even from those who, apparently, enjoy security of employment, that is teachers, federal public servants, etc. This means that benefits higher than those of the present system and extended benefits will be paid for by the contributions of those who will never need them, so that 96.3 per cent of the Canadian labour force will participate in the unemployment insurance plan. Such a scheme seems far from the original principles according to which nobody was supposed to contribute among those who were not likely to be out of work, and benefits were indeed paid for by contributions of the unemployed themselves, the government and employers. Thus the new system would become a welfare scheme, something which was consciously avoided at the beginning.
Suppose we agree that those who have job security must participate in the unemployment insurance. How come then federal public servants are included under clause 3, on a mandatory basis, while provincial civil servants are not necessarily covered? If the principle applies to one of the categories, there is no reason to make a difference between them.
Besides, if almost universal contributions are required, why impose a ceiling on contributions, so that those who earn but a low income should maintain the system while those who are better off pay only a small portion of their income?
April 20, 1971

Still, even if the unemployment insurance plan becomes a welfare scheme, the benefits still depend on the contributions of the taxpayers; they do not effect those who have not contributed long enough, that is, those who are seeking employment for the first time and cannot find any, which is the case for most young people. Those unemployed must turn to welfare, whatever form it now assumes.
It is easy to see how abuses are perpetuated by the system. For instance, the Toronto Globe and Mail dated March 16 criticized the government for having used the individual as a basis instead of the family: the income of the individual is taken into account, and not that of the whole family. To my mind, if the system is to be fair, the realities of life-and the family is one of them, should be considered.
I therefore think it timely to mention, although I am not particularly expert in that field, that clause 44 of the bill seems to me most unfair because it tends to benefit the employer. Clause 44 deals with a stoppage of work during which a claimant is entitled to benefits.
That clause applies also in the case of strikes or lock outs. Although I recognize that no parties should be subsidized in a labour dispute, I cannot imagine how the two situations are similar.
In the case of a strike, workers go on strike knowing that they will get no income during that strike; it is their choice. But when it comes to a lock out, the situation is altogether different. Employees would be deprived of their benefits in spite of the fact that it is the employer who is the actual cause of the work stoppage. They would really be unemployed, but not receiving benefits, although they have paid their contributions. This does not seem fair at all, as the employer would enjoy a considerable advantage in an industrial conflict created by himself.
Accordingly, I wish to suggest that the application of clause 44 be restricted and not extend to cases of lock out.
In my opinion, a lock out is tantamount to a lay off. The employee takes no part in the employer's decision, which deprives him of his income for the duration of the lock out. In such a situation, an employer would have nothing to do for his employees to agree with his requests. He could use the unemployment insurance system in a negative way.
So, I suggest that application of clause 44 be restricted to a strike as defined in the Industrial Relations and Disputes Investigation Act.
Another important point, in my opinion, to suggest to the minister who sponsors this bill, has to do with regulations. The act is one thing: it is a step towards legislation, and regulations are another. To qualify or, as we say, to be entitled to benefits, present regulations provide that the most recent period, that is the last 24 months elapsed before the filing of a claim has to be the qualifying period for regular or seasonal benefit, whatever the case may be.
Now, with respect to workers or persons that already have paid in their contributions to the Unemployment
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 Insurance Fund, there are exceptions but I will indicate only two of them. The two-year period may be extended, for instance, in the case of a person having been selfemployed and, secondly, in the case of a Canadian who has been imprisoned. I have nothing to say against the people who devised those regulations but in my opinion, it is not normal that some people should be so readily deprived of their rights. Among these people, I might mention our soldiers' wives who have to accompany their husbands to every corner of the earth.
Since the military camp of Valcartier is situated in the electoral district of Portneuf, I met some of the wives who were really dissatisfied with this system. In fact, after having contributed to the development of our economic life through regular work in a Canadian industry, or office or elsewhere, these people who often paid their contributions to the Unemployment Insurance Fund during three, four, five or even seven years accompanied their husband to Germany or elsewhere; on their return to Canada at the end of two years or more, several of them able to return to work are forced to remain idle because their employers have replaced them, or else because Canada has few opportunities to offer at the present time. Therefore, they go to Canada Manpower Centres where they are made to understand that they have lost their rights since a period of two years has elapsed between the time they paid their contributions and the filing of a claim.
Therefore, I would ask the minister to kindly reconsider this point in order to bring the necessary changes so that the views of military men may be eligible for the same benefits that some Canadians have accrued while they were in prison. It is not a privileged treatment but, in my view, the wives of military men deserve as much consideration as the former inmates of a prison.
Also, under this bill, the government proposes to make more flexible the insurance periods that would entitle the unemployed to benefits. And this period would be based on the unemployment rate. I am seriously concerned by this procedure, and so should be those who are going to be victimized by its implementation. In my view, the legislation should specify the areas and the rates of unemployment concerned. The bill is not clear enough in this respect as it stands now.
Since several of the Commission's offices have been transferred over the years from rural areas to urban centres, it might happen at a given time that some areas with a high number of unemployed should cease to be considered as separate entities since they would be confused with urban areas where the economic situation is somewhat better.
The small offices have been closed down under the pretence that centralized service allowed for higher quality. But since this kind of operation has been launched, the many complaints I have received from some of my constituents clearly evidence the fact that the results have not lived up to the promises. Various points should be taken into account, such as the length of the qualify-

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
ing period. So far, that is under the present act, the waiting period was of one week only and it is now proposed to extend it to two weeks. This is sheer nonsense if you consider the increase in the cost of living and the immediate needs of all Canadian families.
As to disqualification notices-another point I wish to deal with-the Commission should spell in bold type that the claimant may appeal the decision and submit his case to the arbitration board, and this at no cost to him.
Unfortunately, under the old legislation, the invitation to excluded unemployed people to put their case before the board of referees did not appear most of the time on the forms. In other cases, it was on the back of the form but in very small print.
To me, the Unemployment Insurance Commission in this regard could unfortunately be compared to bad insurance companies whose contracts are drafted in such a way that they can pay as little compensation as possible.
We know that in many fields the government was remiss about its responsibilities. Since many workers are unemployed at the present time and former employers are not there anymore we must more than ever reconsider the eligibility to benefits for certain employers in adverse circumstances following the failure of their concern. Those people were once considered as employers since they were employing workers and on account of special circumstances their firm became unprofitable. After having contributed to the Unemployment Insurance Fund as employers, they cannot get any benefits.
We know some of those former employers who contributed largely to the Unemployment Insurance Fund since its foundation and who are now facing serious problems.
Since all members are eligible to a pension after a few years in Parliament, even after defeat, it would be logical to afford real protection to all those who helped to build this country as we know it today.
I should like to deal also with the problem of many workers who are not eligible to unemployment insurance benefits because they worked for several employers. Among those people we find carpenters, labourers, painters and craftsmen of all skills who, at different times, have participated in various kinds of works. In my opinion, we must find a means whereby those people can prove that they have worked over three, four or six months.
In our upside-down system, the Canadian people and mainly the unemployment lack everything because there is too much of everything. Those who went through the recession period of 1929 to 1939 are still convinced that our system is absurd. The fact that the planners and researchers hired by the government over the last 30 years have not yet found the causes of unemployment nor permanent remedies is enough, I think, to incite the young people to proceed to a true personal analysis of the present situation and of the solutions put forward by the members of the Ralliement creditiste.
It is true that this bill makes a lot of publicity for the government since it provides for the possible payment of
$100 in weekly benefits but we know quite well that the number of unemployment that will get this amount will be quite limited.
Also about this new legislation on which new regulations will be based, I only wish one thing: That all the unemployed be included. In fact, their problems are complicated enough already without their having to suffer from the ill effects that usually accompany the initial implementation period of any new legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I will conclude my remarks while reserving the right to make further comments and possibly propose amendments at another stage of this debate.


Mr. Norman A. Cafik (Ontario):: Mr. Speaker, since the publication of the white paper on unemployment insurance I have received a great deal of correspondence and communication from the people in my riding expressing their concern with the contents of the white paper. I must say that the vast majority of conversation I have had with my constituents supports the general principles outlined in that document.
I would like to review some of the issues that have been discussed in respect to Bill C-229. Many have expressed concern that the proposed plan would remove the concept of mutual insurance under the present plan in which there is an entitlement of one week's benefit for every two weeks attachment to the labour force, to a maximum of 52 weeks of benefit. This concern would appear to be based on the mistaken assumption that insurance principles require benefits to be related more to the number of contributions made than to the loss against which they are insured. In fact, I suggest that the opposite is the case, since the first premium normally provides complete and immediate protection.
With this philosophy, neither fire, life nor automobile insurance is true insurance. In this context, the proposed plan adheres more to insurance principles than the present act. Duration of benefits will be determined by the time needed, based on statistical probabilities, to become re-employed, and not to the previous number of contributions which is not relevant to the earnings loss being experienced. Of course there will be some people with only eight weeks of contributions who will draw up to 44 weeks of benefits, just as there are those who after one or two premium payments will collect for a fire loss or a damaged automobile. This is a normal insurance situation.
Others have criticized the proposed plan as moving away from insurance and closer to welfare. I think the opposite is closer to being true. Benefits are still related to previous earnings and not to need, as with welfare, and in the case of welfare there is normally a means test. In this case there is none whatsoever. Further, the present act includes several welfare aspects which will now be eliminated. These were added since 1940 and ignored the basic insurance principle that only a small percentage in any group of contributors will in fact become beneficiaries. They include the payment of benefits to those in

April 20, 1971

seasonal industries, and special coverage for selfemployed fishermen. These two groups invariably collect benefits in the off-season. For example, self-employed fishermen collect benefits equal to about nine times the premiums contributed. This situation is rectified in the proposed plan by eliminating seasonal benefits and by eventually replacing coverage for self-employed fishermen with a plan designed specifically for them.
Furthermore, where an extended duration of benefits is required because of local or national conditions of unemployment, it is recognized that this cannot be insured in the normal way and that the cost should be borne out of ordinary tax revenues. Economists generally agree that in times of high unemployment this injection of capital through the spending of individuals is the best way to stimulate the economy and that it is logical that such cost should be met from general revenues.
Then there is the argument, on the basis of an apparent misinterpretation of the white paper, against the proposed change in the number of employment weeks needed to qualify. Under the present act a worker must have been employed for at least 30 per cent of the time over the past two years to receive any benefits. Under the proposed program a worker must have been employed for at least 40 per cent of the time in the previous year to qualify for the full range of benefits, which is 20 weeks in the past 52 weeks. This is an increase in the qualifying requirements and not a decrease, as has been suggested.
However, it should be mentioned that for some people with an attachment to the labour force of eight to 19 weeks, or employed for 15 per cent to 38 per cent of the time in the previous year, the new plan would provide less than the full range of benefits except in very extreme circumstances of high national or regional unemployment. It is here that the plan recognizes the government's responsibility for the unemployed worker when these extreme circumstances exist.
In passing, it may be well to correct the erroneous comparison of maximum entitlement in the present and the proposed plan for a worker earning $100 a week. Many have implied that an employee earning $100 a week for eight weeks would be eligible to receive benefits of $100 a week for 51 weeks. This is not the case. In fact, this worker would receive only 66| per cent of his insurable earnings, or $67 a week, and not for the full 51 weeks. His maximum benefit duration would vary from 18 weeks to 44 weeks, depending on the unemployment rate. It is also important to note that this benefit will be taxable.
It has also been stated that a worker, under the present plan, may contribute only $42 and is then eligible to draw $2,756 in benefits, compared with $15.80 in contributions and $5,100 in benefits under the proposed plan. First, Mr. Speaker, these calculations are incorrect. For a 30-week attachment to the labour force, the present plan provides for $42 in contributions and eligibility for 15 weeks at $58 per week, for a total benefit of $870, untaxed, compared with $23.70 in contributions and from $2,144 to $3,417 in benefits under the proposed plan, which would be taxed. Second, it is clear that the contri-
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 bution in both cases is insignificant in relation to benefits, as it should be if the insurance principle of being covered from the first premium is accepted.
Others have referred to the large group of people who are constantly floating in and out of the labour force. However, as with the present act, those who are in fact defined as being out of the labour force are not eligible for benefits. The substance of this is in the definition of the words "out of the labour force." In the proposed plan, as in the present act, unemployed workers must be capable, available and actively searching for work to be considered eligible for unemployment insurance benefits. Furthermore, every claimant is subject to a well defined and efficient benefit control system. This system has been developed over the years and resulted in some 83,000 claimants being disqualified in the fiscal year 1969-70. Recently in the Public Accounts Committee we heard of disqualifications for refusal to accept work dropping from 21,229 to 2,024 since the separation in 1966 of the National Employment Service from the Unemployment Insurance Commission and the creation of Canada Manpower centres. This tells only part of the story because it does not take into account the benefit control procedure which has been revised to detect ineligible claimants independently of Canada Manpower centres.
When people refer to the possible misuse of the lump sum payment of three weeks' benefit by people entitled to it, by having worked 20 weeks or more I think that to some extent these are valid questions. But we have to make a value judgment whether there should be a three weeks' benefit payment or not. Frankly, I am of the view that the payment of three weeks' benefit will be an incentive to the unemployed to get back to work earlier than they would normally. This view was endorsed by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration in their final report on the white paper published on December 16, 1970. It must also be emphasized that the proposed program is based on a two-week waiting period, which is a greater incentive to find work than the present one-week waiting period.
Many are also confused about the effects upon the middle-income group, which includes those with incomes of between $7,800 and $12,000 a year. They mistakenly believe that the 1,200,000 proposed to be covered for the first time are made up of persons solely in the middle-income group. In fact, these new entrants include 700,000 persons earning less than $8,000 per year who work for hospitals, charitable institutions, police forces and federal, provincial and municipal governments. It is proposed to extend coverage to only 500,000 additional middle-income persons, and the repeated implication that all the 1.2 million newly covered employees are in the middle-income group is not valid.
I have heard it stated that the middle-income group will be paying an "added tax" of $62 per year in the form of unemployment insurance with little or no chance of drawing benefits. However, there are 750,000 persons in the middle-income group now covered under the present plan. They would, it is estimated, contribute $33

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
million more than they would, receive in benefits in 1972 it the present plan is retained. Under the proposed plan, this situation is reversed so that the middle-income group, including new entrants, will receive $20 million in benefits in excess of contributions, with the preferential contribution rates given to them in the first few years. When the plan matures, this difference will still be about $8 million. This improved contribution versus benefit comparison can be explained by the reduction in contribution rates, income tax effects, the increase in benefit rate and the provision of sickness and maternity benefits.
I should note that these figures are based on employee contributions only, but even if employer contributions are added into the calculations there is still a considerable improvement over the present plan. The assumption that those in the middle-income group will significantly increase contributions to the fund, without a proportional increase in benefits, is not supported by the facts.
Experience rating of employers has been introduced into the proposed plan because increasingly large subsidies are being paid by workers and employers in certain industries to workers and employers in others. It is considered unreasonable for an employer who may have negligible lay-offs to pay the same contribution rate as another employer who has a high lay-off rate, leading to a disproportionate consumption of unemployment insurance funds. It is, therefore, an objective of the proposed plan-as is the case with most insurance plans-to more equitably allocate the premium cost to where the benefit cost arises. It is appreciated that there will be some cost effect on industries which have benefited from this hidden subsidy, but economists now agree that the price of a product should reflect its true cost or, if subsidies are needed, they should be paid through some other program.
The parliamentary standing committee has endorsed this approach. Further to this, an experience rating system will provide an incentive for employers to stabilize employment patterns in order to take financial advantage of the reduced contribution rates which result. It is noteworthy that the proposed experience rating system will be phased-in over the years 1972 to 1974 with the full application not being implemented until 1976. Hence, all employers will have sufficient time to adjust their employment patterns.
Some constituents have expressed particular disappointment in the proposed program's plan to "get the unemployed back to work". In fact an entirely new proposal, the claimant assistance plan, has been devised for that very purpose. It is intended that this plan will become effective before the first interview. Immediately upon applying for benefits, an information kit will be given to those for whom it is suitable. This will provide details to assist the claimant in a rational job search. The first interview comes later because it has been found that 45 per cent of the claimants find work in the first eight weeks and for them interviews would be redundant.
The reasoning for the second interview at approximately the fourteenth week is much the same and is a recognition that a person out of work that long may have
a special problem. Accordingly, the second interview will be more searching, so that the interviewer will have a better chance of establishing the problems the claimant is encountering in finding work. It is felt that through this system, in conjunction with public and private job placement agencies and social development groups, an unemployed person is likely to return to active employment much sooner. In fact, several pilot studies have established that programs such as the claimant assistance program can help a claimant, on average, to return to work up to one week sooner than otherwise. This is a 10 per cent to 15 per cent improvement.
It must not be assumed that the claimant assistance interviews are mainly to detect abuse. This is not the case. The Unemployment Insurance Commission staff involved in these activities will be kept entirely separate to prevent an unnecessary confusion of roles which could reduce the effectiveness of both programs. In fact, the existing benefit control procedures of the commission are quite adequate to control abuse. In 1969 the program against fraud and illegal benefit claims was applied more widely and new techniques and methods were instituted. These new criteria are now being applied to concentrate investigations in areas and groups which have indicated the greatest incidence of abuse. During the 1969-1970 fiscal year the benefit control procedure resulted in 83,000 disqualifications. All were required to repay the amounts they had wrongfully or improperly obtained. This effective control procedure will continue to operate under the new proposals.
In conclusion, it is well to stress that the proposed plan has been formulated as a result of lengthy and in-depth study. This investigation has extended over a number of years, commencing with the Gill report of 1962 and culminating in the white paper of 1970. Further, the proposed plan has been subjected to intensive study by the parliamentary Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration. During this study many interested groups took the opportunity to present briefs and make recommendations. The results of this investigation endorsed the basis of the proposed program.
I support the philosophy of social insurance on which this plan is based and the objectives of short-term financial assistance for the temporarily unemployed. But even more I endorse the aspects of this bill which will give guidance, direction and help to the unemployed and assist them to more quickly become productive workers in our society.
I am convinced that the unemployed need, and must have, financial help; but such help must never become our prime preoccupation, because their basic need is to be given an opportunity to get back into the work force at the earliest possible time. It is in this area that we, the government of Canada, must extend our greatest efforts.


Cliff Downey: Mr. Speaker, I think all of us in the House, and certainly those who would criticize the bill before us, will admit that the administration of any unemployment insurance act is a difficult job. I think we would have to agree with the basic

April 20, 1971

principle of unemployment insurance in a country with a .climate such as ours where many areas of the work force ;are unable to go about their tasks in the winter months.
The bill before us and the increases therein represent one or two situations either of which has rather severe implications for our country. The near-universality of its application may well indicate that the government has privileged information which forces it to conclude that the long-term outlook for our economy is so bleak that it is essential that workers in hitherto stable occupations as government service, teaching, nursing, the armed services, law enforcement, hospital services and the executive levels of employment must at the earliest date be .afforded the protective benefits of unemployment insurance. If this is not the case, I can only conclude that workers in these occupations are being hopelessly taxed to provide a guaranteed income of as much as $100 a week for what is becoming an alarmingly large segment of long-term unemployed workers in our economy. As I said before, abuses of the act cause the most alarm to the greatest number of people.
Throughout the winter a great many figures have been bandied about in the House. We have had seasonally adjusted and unadjusted figures The fact remains that there is a considerably large group of unemployed. There is today an undesirable and unbearable amount of unemployment in Canada. Somewhere along the line we have to do some soul-searching because we are paying out vast .amounts of unemployment insurance which of course, come from taxes collected.
I picked up a copy of the March 5 edition of the Calgary Herald from a random pile in my office. Before I go into the figures that I arrived at on counting the job opportunities and situations wanted, I wish to draw the attention of hon. members to page 4508 of Hansard for March 23. In answering a question with regard to West Indians being brought into Canada for farm work, the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) said:
Mr. Speaker, I agree with the hon. member on that score. The purpose of the Manpower centres is to send the unemployed ,or the students to take part in this work.
The Prime Minister was referring to the work which West Indians will be doing on the farms of Ontario.
But, once again, facts reveal that there are in Canada some types of work which the unemployed and the students refuse to do; this proves, by the way, that the rate of unemployment is at times somewhat artificial.
The significant part of the answer is that there are some types of work which the unemployed and students refuse to do. I agree that everyone should have a choice. We cannot take away this basic decision. However, this group that refuses to work when there is work is exercising its choice. In many cases the financing on which they depend comes from tax dollars. The taxpayers do not have an opportunity of refusing the right to pay taxes.
We have a great hard-core of unemployed in this country. In some areas of the country this has gone on for generation after generation. I refer to welfare in particu-
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1371
lar. The fact is that they are given the choice whether to work or not. We are obliged to care for them. On the other hand, the taxpayers who provide the money are not given that choice. If they were to apply their rights and privileges to whether they paid taxes or not, their property would be taken away and would become the property of the state. This is a very significant factor. We should take a long look at moving the unemployed to areas where jobs are available.
On going through the March 5 edition of the Calgary Herald I found there were 260 job opportunities and 25 career opportunities. As a balancing factor, there were 36 situations wanted. On that particular day there were 285 job and career opportunities, compared with 36 situations wanted. The job opportunities were not merely at one end of the scale; they covered the whole gamut from the most unskilled to requirements for the most highly educated and highly skilled jobs. There were ads for agents, salesmen, domestic help, female stenos, waitresses, hospital personnel and teachers. This seems unjust when the unemployment insurance pot is being depleted. I suppose what I saw in the Calgary Herald would be indicative of the majority of newspapers in Canada. These employers need people to work for them, yet we pay out vast sums of unemployment insurance and make the pot a little sweeter.
In my opinion the proposed measures in this legislation perpetuate in a dangerous fashion the failure of the government to treat the root causes of our social problem. Canadians need programs and legislation which stimulate a depressed economy by increasing as rapidly as possible the rate at which our unemployed and workers coming into the labour market for the first time can find employment. One of our greatest depressants in the creation of new jobs becoming available to Canadians is the white paper on taxation and the concern it has caused throughout the nation. Tragic as many of the proposals in that white paper were, the time lag in tax change legislation coming forward as a follow-up to the white paper, and the uncertainty it has created in the country for a great length of time, has been one of the major reasons for unemployment reaching and remaining at its present level.
Legislation which merely makes unemployment more bearable and provides for payment of substantial benefits after so short an attachment as eight weeks to the labour force can only create a climate of acceptance on the part of the hardcore unemployed of Canada. They know that the government will look after them. Instead of placing priority on conditional employment insurance benefits, we should be reducing taxation as a means of reactivating our economy. We should be proposing measures which would bring 1J million people into the labour force. We should not be embarking upon more schemes which would drain from the economy unemployment insurance funds amounting to several hundred millions of dollars which are needed to promote expansion of business and industry.
If taxes were lower, if the future were not so uncertain, a great many more people would be hired, a great

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
many more people would be employed. But businessmen and industrialists in this country are afraid to do any more because the government's bite is just too large; the services are getting out of hand. In times of high unemy ployment such as we have experienced in the past year, the premium rates for this insurance scheme will, on the government's admission, be increased to compensate for the large benefit payments envisaged. Thus, at the very time when the economy needs increased purchasing power the necessary increase will be denied in part by the provisions of the bill before us; employees negotiating wage and salary settlements will demand that those settlements reflect the cost of meeting unemployment insurance premiums.
Employers, of course, will be obliged to pass the cost of these new settlements, as well as the cost of their premium payments, to users of their products or services. In considering these proposals to extend the benefits of unemployment insurance we should take account of the considerable number of businessmen in this country who are being forced into bankruptcy. Many businessmen have paid into this scheme, yet when they go bankrupt they find themselves without recourse in terms of unemployment insurance benefits. I suggest to the minister that since he is including so many new categories in his scheme, he might just as well include bankrupt businessmen.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Before they go bankrupt.


Mr. Saltsman:: Welfare for the rich-that's what we need.


Cliff Downey: What possible justification can there be for the inclusion of professional athletes in the new groups of workers compelled to pay into the fund? If there are sound reasons for including professional athletes, surely the same reasons ought to apply to professional musicians and actors, poets and painters, philosophers and magicians, since I would assume their employment prospects could be at least as hazardous as those of policemen or teachers.
Might I say as an aside that in the farming communities of the west, alarm has been caused from time to time by the growth of Hutterite colonies. These people are very good farmers. They farm on a communal basis and do so well that individual family farmers sometimes find it difficult to compete. Clause 4(e) of the bill before us contains a provision which, it appears, would make the existing competitive advantage even greater. I shall read the appropriate words from the bill which would exempt colonies from unemployment insurance:
The employment of a member of a religious order who has taken a vow of poverty and whose remuneration is paid directly, or by him, to the order

And so on. This provision would, I believe, place the individual family farmer in a worse competitive position vis-a-vis the Hutterite colonies. Then, again, what possible justification could there be for the government proposing that a retired worker should receive benefits
for a period as long as 18 months? This could cost as much as $7,800 per person. Further, what justification could there be for providing benefits lasting up to 15 weeks in the case of pregnancy? Surely pregnancy ought to be regarded as a voluntary act by which a woman removes herself from the work force, unless of course the woman is the head of a family in the sense that her husband is unemployed during that period, or since becoming pregnant she has become widowed or divorced. This matter needs looking into again.
I commend to all hon. members the reading of the brief presented to the standing committee on October 22, 1970, by the Canadian Association of Equipment Distributors. In particular I should like to quote one portion of a paragraph from this submission as follows:
We are very much disturbed by the further incentives to idleness and work avoidance which seem to be built into the new proposals. Far from there being indications of any vigorous intention to tighten up against the abuses well known to occur under the present system, it appears that the work-shy are likely to enjoy more generous treatment than ever. We believe that the proposed qualification of eight contribution weeks in a 12-month period is totally inadequate to constitute any form of attachment to the labour force. Since the earning of as little as $25 in seven days can comprise a contribution week, we have the situation that a person who has earned only $200 in a 12-month period (which at some current labour rates can mean as little as 30 hours' work in 12 months) is considered to be a bona fide member of the labour force entitled to enjoy unemployment benefits as an entrant to the system.
I believe that rather than devote enormous resources and funds to providing palliatives for the unemployed, the same resources and energy should be channelled into the more positive role of providing employment. We have to recognize that there are many thousands of citizens in our society who through no fault of their own require assistance in various forms from the state in order to enjoy a proper and decent livelihood, and I would support all measures that are directed toward the welfare of such people. I believe in social reform, but I say there is a distinction between socialism and social reform. They are two very different entities. Socialism increasingly fosters the belief that the state will provide all the essentials of life from the womb to the tomb.


Max Saltsman: Hear, hear!


Cliff Downey: The only thing wrong with that concept is that in the process of bringing it about, our freedoms are destroyed. Someone said that the power to tax was the power to destroy, and this is what we are experiencing. If hon. members think this is an overstatement I suggest they read the representations made on this bill to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration; they will find that the overwhelming majority of those submissions, including those from the unions, were opposed to the bill as it now stands.


Max Saltsman: Mr. Speaker, I intend to say some critical things about the bill before us and the way in which it is set up, but before doing do I should like to say some complimentary things about the minister. I see the minister presenting this bill as conducting a one-man subversion of his own government: in fact, what

April 20, 1971

this should be called is the "Bryce Mackasey fiscal policy." He is making sure that his government, which has been responsible for some of the highest levels of unemployment the country has ever seen, will not be able to get away with it in future without paying a very heavy price. If they create unemployment, they will pay an awfully high price. The proposals that the minister is putting forward provide a kind of built-in stabilizer.
An editorial in the Toronto Star pointed out, I think correctly, the fiscal nature of these proposals. As unemployment decreases, so the fund will build up. The assumption is that unemployment will decrease and that also there will be an increase in inflation. The building up of this fund will sterilize a certain amount of money by withdrawing it from circulation, and this will have an anti-inflationary effect. If unemployment increases above 4 per cent-I quarrel with that figure; I think it should be only 3 per cent-then the government has to put in money, and this will have an expansionary effect. If the government does have a tight monetary policy and a tight fiscal policy, then the "Bryce Mackasey fiscal policy" will come into operation and frustrate the government's intent.
It is to this extent that I congratulate the minister on what he is doing. With the modesty for which the minister is renowned, he said in his opening remarks that he was no economist. May I say to him, through you, Mr. Speaker, that he is probably the best economist on that side of the House, even though he does not want to take credit for it.
All of us agree on the need for an income maintenance policy. I do not think there is any quarrel with the argument that those who are unemployed should receive some kind of assistance, particularly when the overwhelming majority of people who become unemployed do not do so because they want to, but because they have no choice. After all, it is not their decision to be unemployed.
Quite frankly, I think the arguments I have heard from my friends in the Conservative party, such as that the waiting period is too short and the attachment period to the labour force is too short, are spurious. Why worry about the length of time workers are attached to the labour force? If they are unemployed and are members of the labour force, they require some kind of assistance and should receive assistance from the unemployment insurance fund.
Let me also say that no matter what kind of program we ultimately bring in, in terms of social policy there will always be a need for an unemployment insurance program. As I said yesterday on the guaranteed annual income, I see the concept of a guaranteed annual income for those who are not in the labour force, though I cannot see it for those who are in the labour force. I think unemployment insurance will always have relevance to people who are in the labour force.
What is my quarrel, then, with the kind of bill now before the House, with the kind of ideas that have been
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
put forward by the minister? My quarrel is that in fact he is giving us a welfare program and is calling it unemployment insurance, and I resist this kind of phoniness. But perhaps the minister has no choice. His government is not prepared to bring in a comprehensive income maintenance policy. It is not prepared to bring in the kind of social measures that are required in this country. Therefore, the Minister of Labour has to sneak them in as best he can-and he sneaks them in through the unemployment insurance program. My concern is that, well motivated though he may be, by doing this to some extent we discredit the whole concept of unemployment insurance and run into all kinds of problems in terms of acceptability.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: You would throw the bill out.


Max Saltsman: Contain yourself, my friend. I know my friend is a man of infinite curiosity and I shall try and satisfy him later.


Mr. Paproski:: Back to the convention hall!


Max Saltsman: Yes, back to the convention hall. As a matter of fact, I had the pleasure of reading the very good intervention made yesterday by the hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Alexander) and I noted that he took rather strong exception to those who were trying to talk while he had the floor. I would only say to him that I hope he will extend to me the same courtesy he asked of those who were impolite enough to interrupt his remarks.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: I extend my apologies.


Max Saltsman: I have heard my hon. friends in the Conservative party denounce the Unemployment Insurance Act as a kind of "boondoggle" to the workers. They say it is abused, that it is taken apart. You would think, Mr. Speaker, that this fund was designed to provide opportunities for working men to avoid work. What these members fail to appreciate-and I am surprised at this- is that the unemployment insurance fund is really a subsidy to industry. I am very unhappy that industrialists and businessmen in this country keep pointing their finger at the workers.
Let me recount an experience that I had on a plane coming back from Vancouver. Sitting beside me was a very prosperous man-at least so he told me.


Mr. Mackasey:: He must have got on at Calgary.


Max Saltsman: He was a fruit grower from British Columbia. Most of the time he spent with me he was denouncing his lazy workers because they worked only so many weeks of the year and collected unemployment insurance the rest of the time. I asked him why he did not employ them all year round so that they could not collect unemployment insurance-because of course, you can only get insurance if you are laid off. I said to this man, "You say that they quit on their own and that you want to keep them. These workers cannot collect unemployment insurance until they have gone through a waiting period". Then he told me he could not use them all year round. I then asked him who was being subsidized.

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971
That man could not survive without the unemployment insurance fund, and he should not survive. There are too many industries in this country evading their responsibilities and passing the buck to the public. We have seen this with pollution and with unemployment insurance.
I also have serious reservations about a fund of this sort that does not rate industries. I think industries should be rated. In fairness to the bill I should say that there are some weak provisions in regard to a low rating, a high rating and a medium rating; but in my view the gap between them is not wide enough. All industries should be experience rated.
I think that one of the best programs in this country is workmen's compensation. Looking back over the history of workmen's compensation we see it has had an admirable effect on the prevention of accidents in factories. Most of us who have been working for quite a while remember the time when no one cared much about accidents in industry. After all, that was part of the price that you had to pay for the production of goods. But when workmen's compensation boards started to give certain industries a high accident rating, these industries began employing safety officers in their plants. They began to scratch their heads and introduce safety devices, paste up posters in plants and promote educational programs. They did everything they could to ensure that they would not be put into a penalty position as a result of accidents in their factories-and that is the way it should be.
Too many industries have been living off the unemployment insurance fund, and the chief beneficiary of the fund has unfortunately not been the working man but, rather, the inefficient industries of Canada. This is a matter we must examine closely. If we are critical of unemployment insurance, and if there is cause to be critical, let us put the criticism in its proper place.
There are, of course, workers who abuse a fund of this sort. In any society consisting of millions of people you will find individuals doing things with which we do not agree. But my experience, and I think the experience of anyone who wants honestly to examine the behaviour of the working man in our society, is that he does not want to abuse the fund. By and large the labour force plays fair. If workers become unemployed, in most cases it is not their fault. They do not collect from the unemployment insurance fund of their own volition.
We can remember industries that as a matter of habit hired all kinds of people when things were good, and laid them off just as fast. The automobile industry was one of these. When automobiles were selling they would have high employment, but when things slowed down they would throw their workers on unemployment insurance. This continued until the unions stepped in and said they could not operate this way. The unions have made it too costly for the automobile industry to hire and fire on this basis.
These industries used to raise the argument that they could not organize their operations this way because their business was seasonal. They said they had to lay off people, but in fact this turned out not to be the case. When they had to pay these people even though they had laid them off, they stopped doing so and began to use; their head in terms of levelling off the ups and downs of the industry.
I remember the $500 winter works bonus which was paid to the house building industry in respect of each house built during the off-season. Until that time virtually everyone in the house building industry told us there was no way they could build during the Canadian winter. They said it could not be done. The construction industry has been notorious for its lay-off pattern. The industry hired men for a day, a week or a month and then laid, them off. The industry has had no sense of obligation to. these people. There is no long-term attachment in most cases between the employee and the employer. Once there was a bonus involved and the industry knew there was some benefit if it built houses in the winter. Consequently, there was a great deal of construction in the winter.
One of the things we must look for today is a guaranteed annual wage. We must tell industries that they are obliged to treat their blue collar employees the same as the white collar man rather than as parts of a machine which can be shut down and started up again. They do-not treat the office staff this way, so why should they do this to the men in the factories? The argument to the effect that they cannot organize the men in the factory does not hold water, because when they have to do this they do it.
We must emphasize this matter and use the unemployment insurance fund to stimulate this kind of approach. There should be a heavy penalty imposed, by way of the unemployment insurance fund, on employers who traditionally lay off workers at certain times each year, or those who do not exercise responsibility toward their workers. Let me go a little further and say something that may sound harsh. If industries cannot run their businesses in a way which will provide decent employment the year round with only lay-offs which cannot. Ije avoided, they should not be in business. These industries receive fantastic sums from the public purse- and to add insult to injury it is very often the same industries which belabour the working man for abusing the unemployment insurance fund. They do so without taking into account the fantastic subsidies they receive and the abuses of the fund.
This erratic hiring and firing of the labour force locks people into poverty. It prevents their looking for other jobs. They hang on when they should get out. This enables them to attain a marginal existence when in fact there is not much hope for them in that industry. This, practice undermines the retraining and mobility of our people. What we have in many cases is an insurance subsidy paid to industry. It is not any more an insurance program for workers in the real sense of that phrase.
If we are talking about insurance in comparison with welfare, the risk has to be unpredictable. That is what

April 20, 1971

insurance is all about. It you know that certain industries lay off people in the same month every year for the same period of time, which many industries are doing, that is not unpredictable. Unpredictability is an element of insurance. You must feel that the reason you are taking out insurance is that you do not know what will happen, but it might happen. Very often we know what will happen, and when that is the case we can no longer call it an insurance program.
When the act was first brought in a limited number of people were covered. With a great deal of accuracy I think it then could be described as an insurance program. In many ways the premium was related to the risk. There was an unknown element in terms of the occurrence of unemployment. Essentially, what we had was a small group of industrial workers covered by the program. As the years went by, a greater number of people became covered under the plan. This occurred for various reasons, some of which were political. The governments of this country did not have the courage or intelligence to decide that we needed some kind of support for those who were displaced or suffered in our economy through no fault of their own. These were the people swept under the cover of the unemployment insurance fund. This was good politics because it usually happened around election time. Every time this happened, the program became something less an insurance program and more a welfare program. This is what the minister has inherited, and he must deal with it.
I note in the bill an attempt to devise a program for fishermen in particular. They are to be kept under the umbrella of the unemployment insurance fund until that is accomplished. This must be done because you simply cannot chuck people out, whatever the arguments happened to be when they were originally included. They require some kind of protection and we cannot rid ourselves of this protection until we create another kind. The Gill report took a very strong stand about the need to find a method of offsetting the unemployment insurance benefits for seasonal workers in Canada. This thinking also applies to fishermen and a host of industrial workers whom we do not think of as seasonal but who fall within a seasonal pattern.
I do not think the provision for maternity leave is good. I do not quarrel with the concept. Many countries have maternity benefits and perhaps we should have them as well-but how does this fit into an insurance scheme? Is maternity an accidental thing? It may be in some cases. Are you going to include maternity cases when a girl says her pregnancy was an accident? What about maternities that are planned? How do you justify putting them in an insurance scheme? On what rationale could you extend maternity benefits under an unemployment insurance scheme? If you are to have this kind of insurance scheme and maternity is not the result of an accident, what about planned maternity? Why should this be restricted to women in the labour force? What about girls who are not in a labour force and who have accidents? What are we to do with them? I am not asking the minister what he would do personally, and I do not intend to repeat what Mackenzie King said when he was asked
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1371
about the Doukhobors, but this provision does not make much sense to me.
The minister suggested that by including a maternity leave provision we could cut down on abuse. I find this difficult to understand. Maternity benefits will be provided for up to 15 weeks. In his opening remarks he said that some people are now receiving benefits for 52 weeks as a result of maternity. What is to prevent their getting 52 weeks under this measure? I suggest they could obtain the same 52 weeks' benefit and that this will not correct any abuse. If these people want to go through the same rigamarole they now go through, they will get their full time. This measure will not change that situation. So I am pointing out through you, Mr. Speaker, to the minister the absence of logic. There may be a lot of humanity in this provision but-


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I wonder, Mr. Speaker, if I might ask a question. I compliment the hon. member for his contribution to the debate in respect of experience rating, but so that I can formulate my thinking for my rebuttal tomorrow I wonder whether the hon. gentleman is agreeing that seasonal workers such as fishermen should eventually be removed from the unemployment insurance scheme.


Max Saltsman: If the minister is asking for my opinion, I believe I would say yes. I think seasonal workers generally- I would not say fishermen in particular-should not be in the unemployment insurance scheme. This is a personal view. I am sure there will be some disagreement by other people in my party. The inclusion of farm help is another move in this direction. The extension of coverage to salaried employees is another move in this direction. The coverage in respect of people taken ill while on insurance, although humanitarian and understandable, is another move away from the principle of unemployment insurance. One of the things Mr. Gill pointed out in his report which is difficult to justify is the inclusion of students from whom unemployment insurance is taken, yet who will never qualify to receive benefits so long as they continue to be students. The bill before us makes some gesture in the direction of relating premium to risk, but it is minimal and I believe it should do far more.
I should like to say a few words about the position of teachers. I have had an opportunity to hold a number of discussions and meetings with teachers. I believe it is unfair to misinterpret the teachers' position as one of wishing to be excluded from unemployment insurance. I think they very clearly stated in their brief that their quarrel is not with being included in the scheme, not with paying a premium but, rather, with the way it is being done and the artificiality of the argument that is being used.
If what we have in this country is a program which started as an unemployment insurance program and which is to be turned into a welfare program or a partial welfare program, it should be paid for in that way and not on a premium basis. A major portion of the cost of the premium should be paid by the public treasury. I want to leave aside for the moment the "Mackasey fiscal

April 20, 1971
Unemployment Insurance Act, 1971 policy," which is a good policy, and simply say we are moving the other way.
The minister said we would save in the order of $80 million from the Canada Assistance Plan by including this program, so the government's contribution is becoming less and less. The government is providing more welfare and is paying less. Even that 20 per cent of 16J per cent which my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) so carefully calculated is being taken out. The government is thrusting the burden on the people coming into the scheme now and is asking them to pay out of proportion to their risk. The minister nods his head. Let me ask him what sort of sleight of hand he has used to justify what he has done. He is now including more people. He is lowering the premium. He is reducing the government's contribution and is paying higher benefits. If the people who are being added are not to be taxed-that is what it is, a tax-out of proportion to the risk they represent, how does the minister work this financial miracle?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: I wonder whether the hon. member would like the answer now, or when I am summing up tomorrow evening. I have an intriguing thought that I can increase the benefits, lower contributions and everything else and do all the things the hon. member has suggested. The point is that I am applying the insurance concept by pooling risks. I know people coming into the plan will be contributing to the total risk, and I am sure the hon. member as a good left-winger would agree with the concept that they should be their brother's keeper and help each other. Basically, this is what we are asking teachers to do.


Max Saltsman: I am not quarrelling with being my brother's keeper. The minister is making a very Tory-like argument. He wants to tax less and pay more. How is this to be done? Admittedly, the minister is increasing the benefits and reducing the premium because he is pooling the risk. There is only one conclusion: the new people coming in will be paying more than they are receiving. Why do we not say it that way? Really, this is
the crux of the teachers' argument. They will incur risks, of course, but we are not being frank about their position. They are being taxed in excess of other people who pay into the unemployment insurance fund. I believe this is so, because I do not know how else the minister can work it out. He has proven his brilliance in economics according to his fiscal policy and I would not wish him to lose that stature by arguing that it is otherwise, that is, that it is not a fact that the new people coming in will pay more than they will receive.
We can argue that a new situation has arisen and many people who were included in the past, who might logically have considered themselves as not prone to some of these risks, are now prone. There is some truth in this argument and I believe even the teachers would admit it. However, I believe if we are to tax the teachers more heavily than other people-because ultimately it becomes a tax-we should at least have the courtesy to be frank and not suggest that they are coming into the program and will receive benefits equal to their contribution.
I have spoken privately to many teachers who have said that if they are to be their brother's keeper and pay a tax, then everybody else should pay the tax. If this program is to have a welfare connotation, part of which is to be paid by premium and another part to be paid out of tax revenue by people according to their ability to pay, then I say we are moving backward. Even the government's contribution is being withdrawn. The whole thing is being thrown back on the payers of the premium and the new people coming in. I suggest that this is unfair.
Mr. Speaker, may I call it ten o'clock?


John Angus MacLean: Mr. Speaker, will the minister confirm that we will continue this debate tomorrow?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I hope we might finish it by tomorrow evening.
At ten o'clock the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.

Wednesday, April 21, 1971