Greetings,

As most of you know, on July 17, 2020 the Federal government announced that the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS) program would be extended until December 19, 2020, with new rules being proposed for the remaining program periods (Periods 5 through 10).

The new rules drastically change both the eligibility requirements and benefit levels, and will have significant ramifications for most of our members whose wages are currently being subsidized by the CEWS.

The new program rules are highly complex and confusing to understand, given the wide range of possible values for the CEWS benefit and the calculations needed to determine what that value is for any particular organization.

In the vast majority of cases, eligible recipients of the CEWS will see a significant reduction in their wage subsidies starting with Period 7 (August 30 – September 26).

The program also significantly impacts furloughed workers by stipulating that any worker on paid leave will only receive subsidies equal to what they would otherwise receive under the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) and/or Employment Insurance (EI).

Unifor’s Education department will be holding an online webinar on the new CEWS rules next week, on Wednesday, September 16 at 2 p.m. ET.

Those interested can register here: https://onlineeducation.unifor.org/cews_0826_20200916

In solidarity,
Jerry Dias
President