" Help is coming "Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau promised, after the House of Commons on Wednesday, March 25, adopted in a restricted formation, an economic intervention plan worth $ 82 billion Canadian. Emergency aid to help stabilize the economy, of which nearly 40 billion will be distributed in the form of direct aid to workers in financial difficulty due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
As of April 6, Canadians who do not have access to employment insurance, because of their status (liberal profession, self-employed worker, seasonal worker) or too few hours worked, will be able to request on an online portal that Canadian emergency benefit, or $ 2,000 per month for up to four months, provided they have earned at least $ 5,000 in the past twelve months.
System bottleneck
Are affected by this exceptional aid those who have lost their jobs due to the epidemic or that their company can no longer pay for lack of activity, even if it has not dismissed them, those who are affected by the virus or in quarantine and those who stay at home to help their children or the elderly. "It will take ten days for the money to get through, clarified the Prime Minister. But Canadians shouldn't have to worry about whether they can pay their rent, mortgage, or do their grocery shopping because of the Covid-19 crisis. ", he added.
According to the latest statistics available, 87% of Canadians had access in 2018 to the employment insurance service, a strictly federal jurisdiction, which compensates the unemployed for 55% of their average earnings for a maximum duration of forty-five weeks. . But the shutdown of the economy since the start of the epidemic caused the system to overwhelm in a few days.
Last December, 448,000 job seekers received benefits; in the last 7 days, one million additional workers have applied for registration. Unheard of in this country, which boasted an unemployment rate of 5.6% just a few weeks ago. This new emergency benefit will therefore also benefit these new registrants whom the Employment Insurance Fund fails to compensate within a reasonable time, due to the lack of sufficient officials to respond to requests and due to a computer system. which was not designed to handle such a mass of requests.
