OTTAWA - Human Resources Minister Diane Finley's language was designed to be reassuring and moderate.

Canada is facing "unprecedented skills shortages," she told a Thursday news conference, and the government wants to help the unemployed to "find jobs and keep them."

Employment Insurance (EI) is this country's single largest "labour market program," she emphasized, and the government only wants to make it work better - for those out of work, for employers and, as usual, for "the economy."

Changes to the EI rules announced by the government today are not rooted in any lengthy policy rationale. But Minister Finley and and the media release spoke to the need to "strengthen work incentives." This conjures up images of unemployed workers sitting around and spurning job offers amidst growing labour and skills shortages.

The government's plans for Canadian workers, for Employment Insurance (EI) and for the tens of thousands of migrant workers who come here annually are murky and unclear.

Commenting on changes in EI announced, but not specified, in the Budget Omnibus Bill the Minister of Finance says "any job is a good job."

The Minister of Human Resources has a somewhat different story. She says that unemployed Canadians will only be required to take jobs for which they are qualified and in their own regions.

The Minister of Finance goes to Committee and, with a contemptuous pout, tells his collegaues that we'll all know what the EI rules are when the regulations are published. That will only be after Parliament passes the Budget Bill.

The significant changes to the Employment Insurance (EI) program which are to be quickly implemented through Budget 2012 with very little consultation have not received enough critical attention.

First, a word on what is not in the budget. It is disappointing, to say the least, that the government is failing to respond to the fact that less than 40 per cent of unemployed Canadians are now qualifying for EI, well below the already low pre-recession rate. And, for all of the talk about skills shortages in Canada, it is notable that there is NO increased investment at all in EI-supported training, which would assist unemployed workers to find good jobs.

Instead, the focus is on tightening discipline over those workers who have managed to qualify for a claim.

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May chose the first day back to unveil her "Green Scissors" approach to trimming the federal budget.

She told reporters that her party had submitted fiscal proposals to Finance Minister Flaherty that they believed fit in with Conservative philosophy.

"We didn't bother suggesting a carbon tax," May said, "because we know the Conservatives won't be interested in that. But we think the ideas we put on the table should be acceptable to fiscal conservatives -- and they are also green ideas."

Stop putting tax dollars into tar sands

The Green Party's advice to Jim Flaherty is that, first, he should cut government subsidies to fossil fuels.

Further to my post on the Mowat report on EI, I looked up the most recent rates of unemployment for the 58 EI regions. In the current regionally differentiated system, which Mowat wants to replace with a single national system, these unemployment rates are those which determine the level of hours needed to qualify for benefits, as well as the duration of benefits.

The Mowat Centre final report on Employment Insurance (EI) released today has won a fair bit of media attention, and will serve to deepen the national debate over Canada's most important income security program for working age adults and families.

The federal government has launched consultations on EI premium setting. This provides the opportunity to shift from a very ad hoc system to one that is more fair to workers, and more economically rational.

The current worker premium is $1.78 per $100 of insured earnings and the employer premium is $2.49 per $100, adding to a total premium of $4.27 per $100 of insured earnings. EI premiums are paid on earnings up to an annual maximum of $44,200.

Premiums are, under current rules, set to rise by 24 cents per $100 of insured earnings each year between now and 2015-16. (The increase in the worker premium will be 10 cents; employers pay 1.4 times the worker premium.)