N.S. fishers, foresters will suffer from EI changes: deputy premier
Posted May 25, 2012 04:56:31 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Maritime politicians and labour leaders say fishing and forestry industries will face major obstacles under the federal government’s newly announced changes to employment insurance.
The federal government is tightening EI eligibility with new rules on what kind of work jobless Canadians will need to accept in order to receive benefits.
The government said it will put strict definitions on what constitutes “suitable employment” and what the unemployed must do to find a job in order to get off EI.
“Seasonal and cyclical workers, I see, are going to take the biggest hit on this,” Rick Clarke, president of the Nova Scotia Federation of Labour told the Rick Howe Show Thursday. “
Under the new law, claimants will have six weeks to find a new job in their field and at their same rate of pay. After six weeks they must take any job within an hour’s commute, at 70 per cent of their previous wage.
“Then you’re looking at industries that depend on having that availability of those people to be able to respond when there is work available and it’s going to be undermined,” said Clarke.
The deputy premier of Nova Scotia also raised concerns that the changes could exacerbate the already problematic outmigration of Nova Scotians searching for work.
“If the federal government makes it harder for people to stay in areas, especially in rural Nova Scotia, it’s a concern around depopulation because it’s hard to get them back on the proverbial farm,” said Frank Corbett.
The same concerns are being raised in New Brunswick.
“We’ll see further migration, further erosion of our skilled labour force to Fort (McMurray), Alberta,” said Daniel Legere, vice-president of CUPE New Brunswick.
Legere said the changes may have been meant to address a shortage of skilled workers, but missed the mark..
“There’s no incentives,” he said. “There’s no help for workers who, through no fault of their own, have lost their jobs, to get new skills or get market skills that are required in the job market.”
The changes means Canadians will be treated differently depending on how often they have collected EI benefits in the past, or how long they are currently receiving benefits.
