June 21, 1989 (34th Parliament, 2nd Session)

Ms. Black:

Yes, I will. It is difficult for me to observe the Minister's new found commitment to retraining. It does, I suppose, make good headlines and give a capsule of hope to some unemployed Canadians, but let's look beyond the headlines and the catch phrases and look into the reality of these retraining proposals.
Canada does need a strong commitment to retraining. We need to remove women from the pink ghetto jobs. We need to give young people the opportunity to learn a skill, and we should offer hope to those who want to pursue non-traditional occupations. We must prepare ourselves for the changes that are brought about by technological change. Canada must make a commitment to a viable and productive retraining program.
Instead, what has the Government pieced together? It has made a commitment to retraining which is based on a suspect system of funding. It has decided to force the jobless to pay for those who want to upgrade. The Minister will shift $800 million from the UI fund in order to fund retraining. This money should not be coming from the jobless. This is a group which faces many battles already; they have few savings and sometimes have low

June 21, 1989
Unemployment Insurance Act
literacy skills, and we are telling them to fund those who wish to upgrade.