Gerry Byrne, MP

Byrne asking for feedback on EI changes

January 14, 2012 — (Corner Brook, NL) –The Liberal House of Commons member for Humber-St. Barbe-Baie Verte, Gerry Byrne, is asking constituents who have been recently denied Employment Insurance benefits for supposedly to refusing work outside of their hometowns, to contact his office immediately.

On January 4, 2012, the Harper government imposed new rules on Employment Insurance recipients requiring all beneficiaries to accept work if it were available within a one hour commute of their residence. Failure to do so, according to the new regulations, would result in loss of benefits.

The first reported casualty of the new system in Atlantic Canada went public today.

Marlene Giersdorf, a thirty year old single mother of a nine year old daughter and resident of Lower Montague, PEI, said today, that she was cut off her EI claim because she would not take a job in Charlottetown, a 55 kilometer distance from her home. Ms. Gierdorf said the fact that she didn’t have a car or any way to get to Charlottetown didn’t matter to the Service Canada officials who rigidly applied the new rules to her claim.

“The whole situation surrounding the EI changes is outrageous”, Byrne said. “Throwing a single mother who has no transportation off of EI and leaving her with no income is just plain cruel. It shows that there is little room in the new system to take personal considerations into account. Making matters worse, if Ms. Gierdorf wants to appeal the Harper government’s decision in her case, she has to send her documents and arguments to a single appeal board based in Ottawa which replaced all of the local appeal boards that were previously in place. Making matters worse, she is not allowed to appear in person or have anyone represent her. The appeal is conducted based on her existing file, the same file that caused her to lose her benefits in the first place.”

“I am asking anyone who has received notice that they have been suspended from EI because of their supposed refusal to take work elsewhere, to contact my office with the details. I may not be able to change the Harper government’s decision but I will be able to say to the House of Commons and to the country, “this is the impact of these changes”. We can be reached by calling 1-800-563-9934 or by emailing info@gerrybyrne.ca or faxing us at 709-637-4537.”

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This story appeared in PEI’s daily ‘The Guardian’

http://www.theguardian.pe.ca/News/Local/2013-01-13/article-3155656/Islander-without-transportation-denied-EI-benefits/1

For more information, contact:

Gerry Byrne, MP
709-637-4540

Byrne issues warning to feds on Mi’kmaq enrollment changes

(January 4, 2013) — Corner Brook, NL — The Liberal Commons member for Humber-St. Barb-Baie Verte, Gerry Byrne, is issuing a direct warning to the Harper government over any proposed plans to alter the enrollment criteria or to changing the level of information needed by the remaining applicants to the Qalipu Mi’kmaq First Nation Band for successful enrollment.

“Don’t even consider making this a two tiered process with two sets of rules – one for those already enrolled and one set for those who have yet to be assessed — or face serious legal and political consequences”, Byrne said bluntly.

Controversy has been brewing over the federal government’s decision to shut down the enrollment process for band membership and to replace it with an undisclosed process based out of Ottawa.

Qalipu band chief Brendon Sheppard recently said that the mandate of the existing Enrollment Committee, chaired by Tom Rideout, has ended as per the timing outlined under the band’s original ratification agreement with the federal government back in 2007 despite the fact that there are still tens of thousands applications that were filed within the required time frame that have not been looked at by the committee. The federal government has expressed concern that band membership has accelerated beyond what they originally anticipated. This has created concern that the federal government will attempt to arrest the membership numbers by establishing different criteria for those applicants that have yet to be assessed compared to those who have been previously approved. Byrne said this would be a violation of the inherent right of those seeking membership to be treated in a transparent and consistent way with previous applicants and would be quick and easy grounds for a federal court to order the original enrollment process to resume.

“The duty of the Crown to First Nations is protected under the constitution and the duty of a fair process is required under administrative law”, Byrne said. “If the Harper government was so ill-prepared that they negotiated and agreed to a process for the recognition of First Nation members that they now regret, the burden of their incompetence will not be borne by the aboriginal applicants, I can assure you. Federal government incompetence is not a justifiable defense in a federal court.
“To put it bluntly, the same people that stumbled into this process with their eyes closed to the consequences of their decisions may now be stupid enough to think that they can undo it by some secret, backroom deal to get themselves off some hook. Sorry, Mr. Prime Minister, that’s just not on.”

Byrne said that legal action against the federal government would be a certainty if any substantive change to the membership criteria or to the weight of evidence used during the assessment process is made when compared to the previous process.

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For more information, contact:
Gerry Byrne, MP
709-637-4540

Harper government changes law to allow EI rules to be made in secret

May 4, 2012 – Liberal MP Gerry Byrne said today, that while the federal budget speech may have been light on details concerning the government’s plans for overhauling the Employment Insurance program, the 425 page thick budget implementation bill which followed shed some darker light.

“And what has now become visible to the naked eye is that they are redesigning the way the rules can be written and imposed upon the unemployed in the future”, Byrne said. “That’s how they intend to get where they want to ultimately go; in secret! They are removing the current safeguards and protections for the type of work the unemployed must accept before collecting EI and taking them out of the statute and putting them instead into regulation. What this means is that the government can change the rules concerning EI eligibility and benefits behind closed doors without having to seek parliamentary approval and, therefore, avoiding public disclosure or debate. This shows that they have something very sinister, something very cruel to hide concerning where they intend to take the EI program and why they don’t want people watching them as they do it.”

Under the Employment Insurance Act currently in force, EI recipients have the legal right, under legislation, to turn down work if the job has little to do with the claimant’s usual profession or if it is inconsistent or unrelated to the individual’s training, education or past labour force experience. The Act also provides some relief to recipients if a particular job offer is at a substantially lower pay rate than their past history in the workforce suggests or if the job involves, as the Act states “conditions less favourable than those … recognized by good employers.”

The move from legislation to regulation, Byrne said, “means that means cabinet writes the rules from now on and can do so at any time without scrutiny or oversight and without parliamentary approval.”

“Get ready for the beginning of the largest forced exodus of Newfoundlanders from their ancestral homes since the Irish Potato Famine. Nice to see progress in the world isn’t it”, he said sarcastically.

709-637-4540