Canwest News Service

Prime Minister Stephen Harper described new job-loss figures released Friday as "troubling" and said his government is preparing to take "big and comprehensive" actions to deal with the slowing economy for at least three to five years.

"Obviously the figures today are troubling, every time a Canadian loses his job this is something that really does preoccupy us," Mr. Harper said at a news conference in Montreal following a meeting with business leaders. "What I think is more troubling are the figures in the United States, which really do indicate the period of difficulty we are entering in terms of the global economy."

Mr. Harper said the country is going into unprecedented times and the government doesn't want to underestimate how bad things may become.

"We're going to work on the assumption that this is going to be a tough time, that we should not underestimate the actions we need to take. We'll take big, comprehensive actions. We'll assume that we're probably going to have to look at a period of three to five years of such actions. It may not necessarily be that long, but we're not going to underestimate the situation," said Mr. Harper.

Statistics Canada reported Friday that 71,000 full-time jobs were lost last month, a number that was far worse than economists expected. The losses were only partially offset by a gain of 32,000 part-time positions in December, resulting in a jump in the jobless rate to a three-year high of 6.6% from 6.3% in November.

Earlier in the day, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said there will be "substantial" job losses in 2009 and he warned the country will also bear a "substantial deficit" because of the recession and the measures that will be taken to stimulate the economy.

"We are in for a very difficult year," Mr. Flaherty said Friday in Thornhill, Ont.

Mr. Flaherty has been holding consultations across the country collecting suggestions on what to include in the Jan. 27 budget.

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