Thank you.

Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Benoit Cadieux. I'm the director for employment insurance special benefits policy at Employment and Social Development Canada.

Today, I'm joined by my colleague Mona Nandy, who is the director general of employment insurance policy at ESDC.

As you may be aware, in June 2021, Parliament approved, through the Budget Implementation Act, 2021 No. 1, an extension of employment insurance sickness benefits.

This extension increases from 15 to 26 the maximum number of weeks of EI sickness benefits payable to workers, including the self-employed who are registered, when they are unable to work due to illness, injury or quarantine. The target date for this extension to come into effect is the end of 2022. The exact date will be announced later this fall.

The EI program is a labour market program designed to provide short-term income support to workers during temporary absences from work. A key objective of the EI program is to support labour market reintegration, and it is designed with the expectation that claimants will return to work after interruptions resulting from life events or job loss.

In this context, EI sickness benefits are designed to complement other supports available to workers in cases of longer-term illnesses, such as employer-provided benefits and longer-term disability supports.

Roughly one-third of EI claimants use all 15 weeks currently available under EI sickness benefits. Out of this number, close to half do not return to work following their sickness leave. Most of those who do return to work do so within 10 weeks after exhausting their benefits.

Bill C‑215, as introduced, would amend the Employment Insurance Act to extend to 52 weeks the maximum number of weeks of sickness benefits that may be paid to a worker or self-employed person when they are unable to work because of illness, injury or quarantine.

This bill also contains coordinating amendments to ensure that if this bill should receive royal assent before or on the same day as the extension to 26 weeks comes into force, this bill would repeal the provisions related to the extension to 26 weeks so they don't come into force afterwards.

Finally, this bill does not specify any date of entry into force. It is therefore implicit that it will come into force on the day it receives royal assent.

Thank you.

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