As we face unprecedented skills shortages across the country, it will be critical that we work to help Canadians find available jobs and keep them.
And it’s equally important that the Employment Insurance program works effectively forCanada—and Canadians.
In short, we want to help Canadians who want to work, get back to work.
Today, I am pleased to announce improvements to Employment Insurance to make it work better for Canadians.
Let’s look at the big picture.
Our country’s economic performance continues to be strong in 2012. In fact, between July 2009 and March 2012, more than 750,000 new jobs were created, resulting in the strongest employment growth—by far—among G-7 countries.
Our economic prosperity, however, depends on our ability to meet emerging and growing labour-market challenges.
It depends on our competitiveness—and it depends on our agility.
Chief among these challenges are skills shortages, which will be intensified by our aging population, and strong competition for skilled workers at the international level.
Some of these challenges are very much present now and are hindering our ability to prosper as a country.
According to Statistics Canada, in the fall of last year, there were 250 000 job vacancies across the country.
We know Canadians want to work, but they often face challenges finding work.
Now, the reasons for this are many: some individuals may not know where or how to find available jobs, while others may not be aware that their skills match needs in another industries or occupations.
So what are we going to do to help unemployed workers find jobs?
As announced in Economic Action Plan 2012, over the next two years, our government will invest $21 million to connect unemployed Canadians with available jobs.
Today, I am pleased to provide details on our plan. One way we would do this is by making it easier for Canadians who are out of work to identify new opportunities in their communities.
This includes simple but effective methods such as sending Job Alerts to Canadians receiving EI benefits.
Currently, Canadians receiving EI benefits are only sent three job alerts every two weeks. These alerts come from the Job Bank which has only about 20% of the jobs available.
We believe this must change. As I said, we must help Canadians who want to work, get back to work.
As part of our announcement, we will be sending Job Alerts twice per day to Canadians receiving EI.
And, the Job Alerts will come from many different sources, including the Job Bank but also including private sector providers.
The Job Alerts will provide Canadians receiving EI information about job opportunities within their local area that are within their occupation and related occupations.
The second part of our plan is to link the Temporary Foreign Worker program with the EI program to connect unemployed Canadians with available jobs.
The Government is developing approaches to notify Canadians receiving EI benefits through the Job Alert system when employers are looking for workers, and to ensure that employers consider Canadians prior to hiring foreign workers.
The last part of our plan is defining what is meant by suitable employment, and what constitutes a reasonable job search.
This will ensure impartiality and strengthen requirements for Canadians receiving EI benefits to actively look for and accept all suitable work.
Folks, let me be crystal clear about something. These changes are not about forcing people to accept work outside their own area, or taking jobs for which they are not suited.
In fact, we are clarifying how we define “suitable employment”.
We propose that the definition be based on several criteria including personal circumstances, working conditions, hours of work and commuting time, which would apply as long as benefits are received.
For example, if someone on EI has a health problem that prevents them from taking an available job, then that job will not be deemed to be suitable employment. That is, they will not be required to accept that job.
As another example, if there is work available but someone on EI is not physically capable of performing the work, then it would not be deemed suitable employment.
Two other criteria - type of work and hourly wages - would vary depending on an individual’s EI history and the duration of their claim.
As indicated in the Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act, the revised regulations would take into consideration categories of EI claimants in defining suitable employment.
We intend to have three EI claimant categories:
Long-tenured workers would be those who have paid into the EI system for seven of the past 10 years and collected EI regular or fishing benefits for less than 35 weeks in the past five years.
Frequent claimants would be those who have had three or more regular or fishing claims and collected benefits for a total of more than 60 weeks in the past five years.
Occasional claimants would be all other claimants.
Frequent users of EI would be required to expand the scope of their job search much sooner than other EI claimants.
The changes we are proposing to EI are not about forcing people to move across Canada or take work that does not match their skill set.
We want to help a recently laid off engineer who has never collected EI benefits get the information she needs to find a similar job quickly.
We want to help a heavy-equipment operator that used to work in the oil and gas industry find employment as a heavy-equipment operator in the oil and gas sector or another similar sector such as the construction sector, where his skills will be used.
And we want to help a roofer who goes on EI each winter, apply his skills with a residential construction company until he can return to his preferred occupation once the local roofing season begins again.
By taking temporary employment, he will benefit by maintaining his attachment to the workforce, enhancing his skills set, and earning more than he would have received in EI benefits.
This is an important point.
The improvements we are announcing today will mean that Canadians receiving EI benefits will ALWAYS benefit financially from accepting available work.
Canadians on EI who will be required to accept available work will always earn more money working than collecting EI.
How does this work? Under EI, Canadians receive 55% of their average weekly earnings.
Under our improvements, Canadians will never have to accept work that pays less than 70% of their previous income.
These changes are about empowering unemployed workers, helping them get back into the workforce, and focusing resources where they are needed most.
These improvements are part of our efforts to help Canadians who want to work, get back to work — and help ensure employers consider Canadians before hiring temporary foreign workers.
As you know, our government’s top priorities are job creation, economic growth and long-term prosperity.
And connecting Canadians to available jobs in their local area is vital to supporting our long-term economic growth and productivity, as well as the quality of life for all Canadians.
EI is an important program here in Canada—and will continue to be. These improvements will introduce new, needed, common-sense efforts to help Canadians get back to work faster.
That’s good for government, that’s good for the economy, that’s good for employers—and that’s good for Canadians and their families.
Thank you.
