EI Working Group letter to Minister Champagne
Employment Insurance (EI) is an essential security net for individuals impacted by job loss and economic downturns. MCLS supports EI reform, including increasing benefit rates and improving access to benefits.
Please see the backgrounder for more info here.
September 15, 2025
Attention: Ian Foucher
Office of the Minister, Minister of Finance and National Revenue
The Honourable Francois-Philippe Champagne
Minister of Finance and National Revenue
House of Commons
Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6
Dear Minister Champagne:
RE: Permanent Employment Insurance (EI) reform is critical to economic growth and stability
We write to you on behalf of the Ontario Community Legal Clinics Employment Insurance Working Group. The EI Working Group consists of caseworkers from over 70 legal clinics across Ontario who help non-unionized, low-wage and precarious workers access EI. The undersigned community legal clinics also endorse this letter.
As your government prepares the Fall Budget, we wish to highlight the concerns of the workers we represent. Our EI system is broken. As of May 2025, only 33% of the unemployed in Canada were accessing EI, with the numbers likely even lower for low-wage workers. This rate, part of a long-term historical trend, is abysmally low and is in stark contrast to numbers before the 1990s, when more than 70% of the unemployed were covered by unemployment insurance.
An effective EI system is essential because economic challenges are here to stay. EI plays a critical role as an automatic economic stabilizer by helping workers weather economic storms, be they tariffs, climate emergencies, or shutdowns of major businesses. It provides income replacement so that families can keep food on the table and a roof over their heads. It gives workers time to look for gainful employment rather than the next survival job.
This means that EI maintains purchasing power, which in turn sustains economic activity and supports communities affected by downturns. Research consistently shows that low-income households spend, rather than save, a larger share of income than higher income households. Making EI reforms that will help all workers, including low-income earners, ensures that the money provided recirculates locally, supporting small businesses and communities by boosting immediate spending on essentials.
The time for permanent, bold and effective EI reform is now. You can achieve this in three ways:
- 1. Make EI sustainable by increasing the Maximum Insurable Earnings (MIE)
Currently, claimants with earnings above the $65,700 MIE receive less than 55 per cent of their normal earnings in EI benefits. The EI Actuarial Report forecasts half of all claimants (48.1 per cent) will have earnings above the MIE in 2026. Your government recognized a similar problem in the context of CPP and effectively addressed it in 2024 by adding a second earnings ceiling.
Increasing the MIE significantly will not only make EI a meaningful support for average and above-average income-earners, but the additional premiums will also provide a net revenue gain for the EI Account, which could fund other needed improvements, such as the two we highlight below. - 2. Improve access by implementing a universal eligibility threshold of 360 hours (or 12 weeks of work) to access EI
Millions of people in Canada who work and pay into the EI program cannot access the benefit because they have not worked enough hours to qualify. This is due in large part to high eligibility thresholds that are a barrier in today’s labour market, which has seen a dramatic increase in part-time, contract, and precarious jobs. The high barriers to accessing EI disproportionately hurt women (who tend to take on part-time work because of caregiving responsibilities), racialized and Indigenous people, and people with disabilities. Low-wage workers’ frequent ineligibility for EI is particularly unfair given that they contribute a higher proportion of their income to the EI program.
A common, cross-Canada qualifying rule for regular and special benefits will improve access and better reflect the realities of today’s workforce. - 3. Ensure adequacy by increasing the income replacement rate to 70% and implementing a benefit floor of $600
Even if workers do qualify, the benefit rate (55% of earnings up to a maximum of $695 per week) is so low that workers cannot support themselves and are pushed into (or deeper into) poverty. The current 55% replacement rate is a historical low. A part-time, minimum-wage worker can barely survive on their full wages. Surviving on 55% of those wages is impossible.
A benefit floor, like the one introduced during the pandemic, will ensure EI helps the working poor, which disproportionately includes women, racialized and Indigenous people, and people with disabilities. For low income workers, EI may be all that keeps them from homelessness during a period of unemployment.
People who have paid into the EI system should be able to access it to adequately support themselves during periods of unemployment. Piecemeal pilot programs are insufficient and often miss the mark. A sustainable and effective EI system requires permanent, universal reforms. We urge your government to seize the moment and make this happen. A strong EI system will support economic recovery and stability as challenges continue to arise in the future.
Thank you for your attention in this matter. We trust that you will take our recommendations seriously and act to implement them in the forthcoming Fall Budget.
Sincerely,
Nabila F. Qureshi & Robin Nobleman
Staff Lawyers
Income Security Advocacy Centre
E: nabila.qureshi@isac.clcj.ca
robin.nobleman@isac.clcj.ca
Regini David
Paralegal
West Scarborough Community Legal Services
E: regini.david@wscar.clcj.ca
Co-Chairs, Ontario Community Legal Clinic EI Working Group