EI is the most important income security program for workers faced with unemployment, but current eligibility criteria allow only 40% of male workers to qualify for benefits in the face of unemployment. This number decreases to 32% for unemployed women.
Having access to EI ensures that families can avoid falling into poverty while they seek employment that matches their skills or have the opportunity to receive valuable training which will improve their employment opportunities.
It is time for the federal government to use the accumulated surplus in the EI fund which reaches over $50 billion on the workers who need it the most, particularly as we head into a period of economic insecurity.
Eligibility requirements should be restored to 360 hours, with benefit levels based on the best 12 weeks of earnings at 60% of earnings as a minimum.
Campaign 2000 and its partners will be releasing our annual Report Card on Child and Family Poverty on Nov. 24th, 2009 in cities across Canada, including the annual national Report Card in Ottawa, and 7 provincial Report Cards in Vancouver, Calgary, Regina, Winnipeg, Toronto, Halifax and Saint John. You can download a copy of all our report cards as of Nov. 24th this year, so stay tuned.
To mark this special shameful day, there will be a series of community events being planned from coast to coast to draw attention to the situation and to call on our elected politicians and the public to take action.
Here’s a list of what’s happening across the country:
Apart from the release of provincial Report Cards, there are other events being planned and organized by our partners in Newfoundland and Labrador, New Brunswick, Northwest Territories, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. Contact Liyu Guo at liyugu@familyservicetoronto.org for further info and updates.
As well, in commemorating the 20th year of the all-party resolution to end child poverty, the National Film Board is working with a number of organizations and agencies, including Campaign 2000, in a series of film screenings and community forums of Four Feet Up (http://films.nfb.ca/four-feet-up/?mid=9601) in the evening of Nov. 24, 2009 in up to 12 cities, including Vancouver, Regina (??), Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Wolfville (N.S.) and Fredericton. Please contact Amy Stewart Gallant at: a.stewart@nfb.ca for more info on this event.
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