Mr. Chair, let me congratulate my colleague on the issue. I would like to ask him a couple of questions.
Clearly, in the white paper that I recently issued, and I believe his party has a copy of it, with the 28 recommendations, we talk about the supplementary Canada pension plan. We also talk about how we support the expansion of the Canada pension plan. We also support the whole issue of people having a longer period of time to be able to collect their Canada pension plan if they are late collecting it.
Is the member aware that there is a group of people on long-term disability who are appearing before the Senate on Bill S-216? These people are former Nortel workers. Since Nortel has gone bankrupt, there is nobody left to pay their monthly disability benefit premiums to continue their long-term disability benefits. It is a very serious issue in Canada that I believe has been raised as a result of the unfortunate incident with Nortel.
I would like to hear what the member thinks of this. Of course this bill must be passed before the House rises in order to have any effect and help these poor disabled people. When the bill was at committee last week and ready to go to clause by clause, the Conservative senators adjourned the meeting and left these people high and dry there, trying to get a bill passed that could help them by paying their premiums as a result of the Nortel incident.
I wonder what the member thinks about those particular actions and about how the Conservative senators have just abandoned these people.