I read in the National Post that a Federal EI Program has "fallen flat", and is now being labelled as a failure. There was no fraud or mismanagement, just that the government had expected to take about 50,000 people on this retraining program, but there were only 6,000 "takers". Let me get this straight, we came in dramatically under EI spending projections and this is a failure? The spokespeople over at CAW are decrying the program as too restrictive, such that many unemployed don't qualify. I ask what percentage of currently unemployed people qualify for the retraining grant? If that number is lower than it should be, ease restrictions by 10%-20% to apply to the appropriate number of unemployed and extend the deadline for application. End of story.
The government claims that a substantial number of qualifying applicants did not know about the program. Is then to suggest that the government should have been running television and radio commercials about information about the economic recovery program? Because I can remember watching the Liberals in Parliament demand that the government pull commercials informing people how to claim grants and instead run thousands of ads reminding you to wash your hands before or after you touch anything. I even wrote about this, back before the hysteria over the pig flu was inflated by the CBC. You can view my thread on H1N1.
If more people need to know about the plan, run commercials and inform people who have applied to normal EI that they might be eligible for a retraining program. I certainly pay close attention to the news and had not heard of this grant until this morning when I logged into the post. Remember when the Tories were running commercials on how to claim the home retrofit grant and other information about the economic action plan? The Liberals became outraged that they were running those commercials instead of wash your hands commercials. They were using this as a talking point to prove that the government was responsible for deaths. This was while we had a minority parliament with the opposition threatening to collapse it if demands are not met. The government switches advertising resources, and now are getting hammered for it? That is damned if you do, damned if you don't.
Sometimes I look around and can swear the world has been flipped turned upside down.
We need the complete Liberalization of Employment Insurance immediately.
ReplyDeleteOR!, in reply to marx...
ReplyDeleteYou can do what works in Japan where you can opt-in or opt out of their version of EI. As in, not pay for something you never intend to use but have the option to do so if you desire that sort of security.
Get it?
It's simple and it works.
It should be about choice and living up to ones responsibility while accepting the consequences be they positive or negative, it all should be left up to the individual. Not Government.
By the way... when the vast majority of people remain employed... CAPITALISM STILL WORKS.
Back to the blog post,
I new about the training programs as I pay attention to what goes on through cpac. Too bad the MSM couldn't care to make much mention of it so as to inform everyone without the need of the gov spending anything on ads.
The much of the fault lies with the bureaucrats processing and handing out the EI forms, AND with the media for failing to inform people with useful information but rather focusing on things like "wafergate" and the like.
Else it could be that some of those who received EI "just want their old jobs back" and are un interested in retraining or even getting new jobs or striking it out on their own by starting a business.
Nows the best time to hire since your not scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of skilled workers and so on.
Such is the way of things through any unemployment spike.
Problem is... some idiots don't want to take jobs that are "below them" even when there is nothing else.