Hon. George A. Drew (Leader of the Opposition):

I should like to ask the Prime Minister if he can inform the house whether or not the Prime Minister of Great Britain will be addressing the joint houses of parliament and if so at what time?

Right Hon. L. S. St. Laurent (Prime Minister):

Yes, Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to be able to inform the house that the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom has accepted an invitation to address both houses of parliament here on February 6 at 2.30 in the afternoon.

Hon. Milton F. Gregg (Minister of Labour):

There is a question from the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre which I have not yet answered. It has to do with the qualification of certain claimants for unemployment insurance following upon the application of the provisions of the new act. Other members have referred to this matter in speeches and otherwise and I hope that this statement may serve to clarify the matter for them.

The new act was not long in force when the commission found the rate of disqualification for regular benefits under it exceeded the rate experienced under the old act. A survey was undertaken by the commission and it was found that the interpretation which had been placed on section 119(b) was the cause of the disqualification in a substantial number of cases.

Section 119 (b) reads in part as follows:

119. For the purposes of establishing a benefit period and calculating the rate of benefit . . . under this act . . .

(b) Six days in respect of which contributions were payable and paid under the old act shall be deemed to be a contribution week . . .

The narrow view given to the subsection was that six daily contributions, regardless of whether they were earned in one, two or three weeks, would count for no more than one weekly contribution under the new act, and nothing less than six daily contributions would count as a contribution week.

As a result of the survey the commission reconsidered the subsection and came to the conclusion that the view was too restrictive and was not in accordance with the spirit and intent of the new act.

Here, in a few words, is what the commission proposes to do. The ordinary provisions of the present act concerning the computation of the number of contribution weeks will be applied to all calendar weeks occurring before the act came into effect. In order to do this, the earnings of an insured person during the calendar week must be known; if they were $9 or over, the week would count as a full contribution week under the present act, and if they were less than $9, the week would count as half a contribution week. However, for the calendar week under the old act for which the evidence necessary to establish the earnings as above is not available, the statutory week provided for in section 119 (b) of the present act will be applied. This consists in dividing the total number of daily contributions for a period by six, and counting the result as so many contribution weeks for the purposes of the present act.

I am further informed that the commission is giving instructions to their field offices to expedite the review of the claims on which entitlement was not established, and to ensure prompt readjudication and retroactive payment to those who will be relieved as a result and who have proven, or can now prove, unemployment since the commencement of their claim.

The great majority, if not all, of those who were not qualified for regular benefits during October, November and December, are now in receipt of seasonal benefits which now provide benefits at the same rates as those established for regular benefits.

We all know that the local offices of the commission will be encountering, in a few weeks, their peak load, and I am sure that hon. members will realize that these readjudications and retroactive payments cannot be accomplished in a day. However, they

Inquiries of the Ministry can be assured that everything in the commission's power will be. done to expedite the matter. Since claimants in this category are already registered at their local offices, I can give assurance on behalf of the commission that such claimants will be notified direct by their local offices to call.

I must thank all the hon. members who brought the situation to my attention and that of the commission. This is an expression of our common solicitude for those workers who stand in need of all the protection which last year's revision of the Unemployment Insurance Act was designed to afford.

Mr. Stanley Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):

Mr. Speaker, may I ask a supplementary question. Are we correct in assuming that this reinterpretation that has been made by the commission is not made under the transitional provisions of the act but is rather a permanent reinterpretation?

Mr. Gregg:

It is made under a reinterpretation of section 119.

[Later: ]

Mr. T. S. Barnett (Comox-Alberni):

Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Labour arising out of his earlier statement today. Could the minister explain what relation the reinterpretation of section 119 will have to the application of section 45 (2)?

Mr. Gregg:

Mr. Speaker, I am afraid it would take too much of the time of the house if I attempted to explain it this afternoon. I tried to cover that point in the latter part of my statement. It will apply in a different way to different claimants. Our local offices know who those claimants are and, in the light of the activity in those offices, they will immediately, as from today, call the claimants in, talk to them individually and deal with them as such.

Hon. Milton F. Gregg (Minister of Labour):

Mr. Speaker, I should also like to answer a question from the hon. member for Middlesex East (Mr. White), which he asked some days ago. His question concerned a robbery at Oshawa involving unemployment insurance funds. The replies to his two questions are as follows:

1. The unemployment insurance commission has received a report which is being studied. This shows that two employees of the commission were held up on their way from the bank to the local office and robbed of $6,000.

Investigation by the Oshawa police is proceeding and the commission feels that any further statement at this time might impede the progress of that investigation.

2. Two methods of payment of benefit are used: (1) by warrant; (2) by cash.

Where the volume of claims justifies it, payment is made by cash and this practice is followed at 90 of the 192 places at which local offices are located.

Mrs. Ellen L. Fairclough (Hamilton West):

May I direct another question to the Minister of Labour. Will his department also consider the payment of benefits under the scale in operation under the new act without regard for the type of contributions that were made?

Hon. Milton F. Gregg (Minister of Labour):

I would be glad to take my hon. friend's question as notice. In answering it briefly now, however, it will be remembered that the provisions of this new act have been in effect now for less than four months. As it has gone along* the commission, under the powers granted it for the making of regulations by order in council or by the commission itself, has taken steps consistently each month to achieve those smaller adjustments which have been indicated as essential. As I said the other day, the new act has worked out very well on the whole. Following this interpretation I have given today, I should like the commission to have eight or ten months or a year in which to-observe its further operations, after which they will be in a position to iron out any further difficulties that may remain.

Hon. W. Earl Rowe (Dufferin-Simcoe):

In

view of the statement of the Minister of Agriculture last week in Winnipeg, as reported by the Canadian Press, that there is no surplus of butter-