Bill C-25 (Historical)

Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act

An Act relating to pooled registered pension plans and making related amendments to other Acts

This enactment provides a legal framework for the establishment and administration of pooled registered pension plans that will be accessible to employees and self-employed persons and that will pool the funds in members’ accounts to achieve lower costs in relation to investment management and plan administration.

Financial Statement of Minister of Finance

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

As the Canadian Association of Retired Persons has said, and the hon. member for Dartmouth—Cole Harbour has repeated very eloquently: we are punishing future generations in an effort to spend tens of billions of dollars on an over cost fiasco. We are saying Canadian families deserve better than that.

That was the F-35s. I am now going to address the issue of prisons, which are the second part of what we are discussing today, because these are the government's two priorities.

We already know that there are going to be budget cuts, cuts to old age security. We have already seen how this government is attacking ordinary families across the country. Middle-class families and the poorest Canadians are being affected by cuts to services. In this budget, the government claims that the bills it is proposing, for example, the crime bill, will not cost any money.

First, I must point out that, right now, there is a low crime rate. The number of crimes being committed in Canada is decreasing. At the same time, the government made major cuts to programs to prevent and combat crime across the country. We know full well that every penny or dollar spent on a crime prevention program will save us six times that amount—6¢ or $6—down the road in other parts of the judicial system, whether it be costs related to police, criminal courts or, of course, prisons. However, this government has cut funding for programs to prevent and combat crime.

Then, instead of presenting an agenda that we could agree with, the government presented its prison agenda. In the budget, the government says that this will not cost anything. Frankly, we do not believe it. In the studies that were conducted, the government never divulged the real cost of its programs and bills. It never made any estimates or calculations. As a former financial administrator, I am wondering how anyone could go ahead with a bill without doing any calculations at all to determine how much it will cost.

In this case, the government has not done any calculations or made any estimates. It has no idea of the cost. Even in the budget, the government clearly stated that we do not need prisons. Provinces all over the country know full well that the hodgepodge bills that the government has been introducing one after another will cost taxpayers a lot of money. The provinces will have to build prisons, and we also know how much that will cost us.

The Institut de recherche et d'informations socio-économiques did a study that took all these factors into account. It is too bad that the government did not try to do the same. I know that the Parliamentary Budget Officer provided a good estimate of some aspects of the programs, but the only valid estimate, the only valid and complete calculation of the cost of these programs comes from the Institut de recherche et d'informations socio-économiques, which said:

Don Head, the Commissioner of Correctional Services Canada [he did his own calculations], later said that he estimated that federal prisoner numbers would increase by 3,400, requiring 2,700 new spaces, at a cost of $2 billion to support that increase.

The increase will result from the bills this government has introduced without calculating the costs associated with them. This will also have an impact on the provinces.

The study also states:

Although passed by the federal government, many of the bills introduced will have a significant impact on the provinces and their public finances. According to some estimates...for Bill C-25, the provinces will be forced to bear most of the cost of funding the new prison system. The PBO predicts that, for the Truth in Sentencing Act alone, which came into effect on February 22, 2012, provincial and territorial responsibility for funding the prison system will increase from 49% to 56% compared to the federal level. The provinces will have to bear 78% of the cost of building these new cells, that is, $12.655 billion. Quebec's share alone will be $2.6702 billion. There is nothing to indicate that future legislation will reverse this trend.

As for all of the construction-related calculations, not to mention the annual costs associated with these bills, the eminent researchers with the Institut de recherche et d’informations socio-économiques, very reputable people, reported the following:

This socio-economic report has demonstrated the misleading nature of the Canadian government's statements regarding its crime-fighting policies. The changes made by Bill C-25 and Bill C-10 are very unlikely to have any impact on Canada's crime rate. As recent experience has shown, an approach that focuses more on offender reintegration and rehabilitation is more likely to effectively reduce the number of crimes committed. What this report adds to the file is that not only are the government's measures likely to be ineffective, but they will also be very costly for taxpayers.

This is a very important point.

They will require investments of at least $18.802 billion in prison infrastructure and engender ongoing costs of $1.616 billion for the federal government and $2.222 billion for the provinces. In addition to the federal investment, the changes will force Quebec to invest $3.057 billion in its own infrastructure. Bill C-25 will also cost the province an extra $407 million per year, and Bill C-10 will cost an extra $82 million per year. The government of Quebec allocated $379 million for prison operations in 2011-12. These additional annual costs will increase that budget by 129%.

Since the justice minister...promised that, “This is just the beginning of our efforts in this regard. We'll introduce other legislation as well," we feel it is important to point out other solutions. Focusing on reintegration and rehabilitation, which are proven solutions, would enable the government to spend much less on prisons, giving it more flexibility to invest in social policy.

This is extremely important. We are talking about two programs. One would probably cost about $40 billion and the other $19 billion, with additional annual costs of $1 billion to $2 billion.

We find all these priorities to be unbelievable. The government has no credibility since it is telling us that there are cuts coming for seniors and ordinary families, but then it is willing to spend whatever it takes on its pet projects.

We are saying that Canadian families deserve better.

I can honestly say that the NDP caucus, which is made up of dynamic and energetic individuals, is really the best in the world.

One would never imagine that we came from a convention over the weekend during which nobody slept and right into the budget deliberations. We have our new leader in place, the member for Outremont. Everybody in the NDP is still full of vim, vigour and energy. It is a wonderful thing to see. What a fantastic, amazing group. One can just imagine how much more energy we are going to have on October 20, 2015, when the first NDP government is formed.

It will not be a government that is going to spend $40 billion on a fighter jet whose costs have simply exploded. We are going to be tightly monitoring budgets so that kind of thing does not happen. If a project goes off the rails, we will cancel it. We are not going to spend $19 billion on prisons when the crime rate is actually going down. We think we should be investing in crime prevention programs. We think we should be investing in bringing the crime rate down even further. We should be investing in addiction programs.

We will be doing something for our police officers and firefighters as well. It is important to mention this. Five years ago the Conservatives voted for the NDP motion to establish a public safety officer compensation fund to ensure that when firefighters and police officers pass away in the line of duty, their families are taken care of. We have been waiting and firefighters and police officers have been waiting now for six years for the Conservative government to bring that in and the Conservatives have not done it. They have left those police officers and firefighters out in the cold. When an NDP government is elected, one of the first things we are going to bring in is a public safety officer compensation fund.

Ultimately, that is what we are all about in the NDP. We take care of Canadian families. We take care of Canadians. We are folks who work very hard. NDP MPs have the reputation of being very strong constituency advocates. We work very hard. We can see the energy people have been putting in, even over the course of the last hour, which is remarkable, given the last few weeks with everybody working double and triple shifts every day of the week.

We do that because our energy comes from Canadian families. We represent them because we truly believe that our place in the House of Commons is to stand up for those Canadian families, to represent them, to be their voice in the House of Commons.

The many emails and faxes, the postings we are getting on Facebook and the tweets that are coming in on Twitter all attest to the fact that the majority of Canadians out there are concerned about the direction this country is taking. They are concerned about the kind of country we are seeing increasingly, with a small minority of people who seem to have most of the pie and where families are increasingly left out in the cold. They are concerned about the fact that they see families struggling more and more to make ends meet as their wages go gradually, but on an ongoing basis, lower and lower. They are concerned about seeing families in their neighbourhoods lose a breadwinner because of plant closures. I prefaced my remarks this morning by talking about the dozens of plants and factories that have closed in this country only in the last few months. They are concerned about what they see as a meanspirited government, a government that does not respect democracy, a government that does not respect input, a government that says seniors and future seniors have to pay the price for its misguided priorities of prisons and fighter jets before future seniors and services that Canadian families depend on.

That is what is happening with more and more Canadian families. The majority of Canadian families are very concerned.

The Conservative government was elected on May 2 on the promise to maintain health care funding, on the promise to maintain retirement security, on the promise to maintain services for Canadian families.

This budget is a betrayal. It is a betrayal of those promises that were solemnly made by the Prime Minister. He looked Canadians right in the eye, shook their hands and said, “I will not touch health care transfers. I will not touch retirement security. I will not touch the services your family depends upon.” This is a betrayal--

Finance

[James Rajotte, Conservative, Edmonton—Leduc, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the sixth report of the Standing Committee on Finance in relation to Bill C-25, An Act relating to pooled registered pension plans and making related amendments to other Acts.

The committee has studied the bill and has decided to report the bill back to the House without amendments.

Report Stage

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to debate Bill C-19.

Once again, the Conservatives are showing their narrow ideology in trying to eliminate the Canadian firearms registry. This registry is strongly defended by our police forces and by the majority of Canadians, but this government is choosing once again to ignore reality. It continues to reject all the recommendations by the opposition parties and the provinces, showing utter contempt.

The arguments in favour of this bill are not very convincing, while there are many arguments against the bill that are backed by data and by groups that work in protecting Canadians. The Conservatives' three main arguments—that the registry is expensive and ineffective and it violates the rights of hunters—do not hold water.

Yes, the initial cost of the registry was exorbitant, but it has already been paid for by Canadian taxpayers. Abolishing the registry will not bring back the money that has already been spent. In addition, today, the government is refusing to even give the provinces the data when they are the ones that paid for it. The provinces will therefore have to once again spend taxpayers' money to recreate a registry that already existed. In short, the Conservatives are once again making the provinces pay, just as they are doing with Bill C-10 and Bill C-25 and just as we saw recently with the proposed changes to increase the age of eligibility for old age security benefits.

Also, according to the RCMP, abolishing the registry would result in direct savings of only $1 million to $3.6 million. That is what the lives of the thousands of people saved by this registry are worth to the Conservatives. This government claims to want to destroy the registry to save money. To the government, then, a life is worth nothing.This so-called savings is nothing compared to the increased cost of police investigations that will inevitably result from abolishing this registry.

In other words, the Conservatives' main argument for wanting to abolish the registry is simply a ridiculous lie. The annual cost of the registry is negligible and the government could easily cover this low cost if it stopped wasting taxpayers' money on exorbitantly priced military aircraft and the ridiculous promotion of royalty.

The other argument frequently used by the Conservatives to justify destroying the registry is that it is supposedly ineffective. This argument is no more convincing than the others. Police forces consult the registry more than 17,000 times a day and want the registry to be maintained. It allows police officers to plan their operations better when they have to intervene with individuals, which contributes to the safety of our police forces. The registry also helps reduce the cost of police investigations. When a long gun is used in a crime, police officers can easily track the firearm and its user.

The registry has also helped save many lives. Even though the majority of murders are committed with handguns, long guns are used in the majority of spousal murders and suicides in which firearms are involved. Various women's advocacy associations want the registry to be maintained. Year after year, long guns are used in two out of every three murders involving firearms. The registry has helped greatly diminish the number of spousal murders. For example, only a third as many spousal murders were committed with long guns in 2007 as in 1996, despite population growth, which shows the usefulness of the registry.

These long guns wreak even more havoc on Canadian society when we consider suicide. Year after year, close to 60% of firearms suicides are committed with long guns. The registry makes it possible to quickly determine if, for example, a depressed person owns a firearm, which allows authorities to save many lives. The number of firearms suicides dropped from 569 in 2001 to 475 in 2004, proving once again that the registry works.

Since we know that most homicides committed with firearms are suicides, it is of the utmost importance for the government to take action. However, this government is irresponsible and would rather ignore the facts and introduce a bill that will lead to the death of hundreds of Canadians.

The survivors of the various massacres that have occurred in Canada also want the registry to be maintained. The Conservatives say that they are on the side of victims of crime, but they ignore and turn their backs on those victims when they take a stand that does not match the Conservative ideology. These same Conservatives accuse the opposition parties of being against victims.

If, as they claim, the Conservatives are on the side of victims, why are they not listening to them? Why are they making their retrograde Conservative ideology a priority rather than addressing the concerns of victims? This government is illogical: it says that it wants to make our streets safer by imposing repressive bills, but it wants to allow the free circulation of firearms. This clearly shows that there is something fundamentally wrong with the Conservative ideology.

In addition, one of the main reasons that there are problems with the registry is that the Conservatives did not enforce the legislation. Instead of fining or, depending on the seriousness of the case, prosecuting those who did not register their guns, the Conservatives gave offenders amnesty. Since 2006, this government has been sending the message that the laws pertaining to the registry are not important and that the Conservative government supports offenders. As a result, millions of firearms are still not registered. What credibility does this irresponsible government have when it states that the registry is ineffective, given that it is directly responsible for the problems with the registry? The Conservatives have done nothing but sabotage the registry since 2006. This government claims to want to enforce the laws but, instead, it is sending the message that only the laws that are consistent with the Conservative ideology have to be respected.

Another argument put forward by the Conservatives to justify destroying this registry is that it violates the freedom of firearms users by imposing red tape. That does not stand up either. Only 2 million people have to deal with the registry's red tape out of a total population of almost 35 million Canadians. Why destroy this registry and sacrifice the majority of Canadians to save a very small minority from the administrative irritants of the registry? Should we stop registering vehicles? Now there is a question. Yet there are far more users of vehicles than of firearms. Obviously, vehicle registration does not go against the Conservative ideology, which is modelled on the mentality in the United States.

It is pathetic that this irresponsible government is again trying to destroy the registry. Once again, this government is lying to Canadians in order to justify its actions. Once again, this government is allowing the United States—in this case the powerful gun lobbies—to dictate our country's policies. It is time that this government started to listen to reason and the facts: abolishing this registry will lead to more suicides and spousal murders. Abolishing the registry will complicate the work of our police officers and make it more dangerous.

I could go on for hours, but I know that the Conservatives do not listen to anyone. They refuse to listen to the recommendations put forward by the opposition parties and the provinces. They do not have enough respect for the loved ones of those who take their own lives, the victims of killings and abused women to consider, at a bare minimum, providing the provinces with the data from the registry.

They do not even have enough respect for our police forces to listen to them when they say that they need the registry. In short, these Conservatives, who always claim that they are tough on crime, are promoting crime by allowing weapons to circulate freely. They are completely forsaking victims by ignoring them. This bill clearly demonstrates the extent of the Conservative's contempt for our constituents. I will continue to stand up for all those Canadians who have been abandoned by this Conservative government.

Opposition Motion--Old Age Security

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville for sharing her time with me and for an excellent speech. There were good points, it was well argued and it was an important message from our new generation of NDP MPs.

It is useful, as we enter into a debate on the old age security regime in this country, to pause and reflect on some of the steps that got us to the position we are in. I am very proud, as an NDP member of Parliament, to take up the cause of defending the integrity of our old age security system, as has been our function and role throughout much of the last century.

I represent the riding of Winnipeg Centre, which is home to two of the greatest champions of social justice, I might say, that this country has ever known. In 1921, the Government of Canada wanted to send J.S. Woodsworth to prison for his role as the leader of the 1919 general strike but the good people of Winnipeg Centre sent him to Parliament in Ottawa instead and he stayed there until his untimely death in 1942.

I raise that subject because, only three years after J.S. Woodsworth arrived in Parliament, the prime minister of the day, William Lyon Mackenzie King, was in trouble. He was going to lose his government and needed the coalition support of what J.S. Woodsworth called the ginger group at the time, the Independent Labour Party. Woodsworth negotiated with Mackenzie King a deal, a condition, a compact, a coalition so to speak. The very art of politics is forming compacts, coalitions and agreements. Woodsworth went to Mackenzie King and said, “If you agree to introduce an old age security regime, I will support your government”. That was the birth of the Canadian old age security system. We have that letter on file at NDP headquarters. It took Mackenzie King a long time to live up to his promise but he indeed did introduce old age security.

When J.S. Woodsworth passed away, he was replaced by the man who is known as the father of the Canadian pension plan, Stanley Knowles. Stanley Knowles represented my riding from 1942 until his stroke in 1984 made it impossible for him to continue. He served continuously, except for the Diefenbaker sweep of 1957. During that time, he was not only the undisputed champion of the Canadian pension plan but he fought and fought to introduce it and the old age security system. There are famous speeches on record that people published in their entirety and circulated across the country as this movement gained momentum. He did not stop fighting until he managed to have the old age security pension indexed to inflation as a secondary objective. This took his entire career but it was his proudest achievement and perhaps one of the most proud achievements of the NDP.

It always seems to fall to us to defend the integrity of the pension system, which has been under continuous assault by successive Conservative governments that do not fundamentally believe in this type of universality of old age security systems.

We can trace what is going on today with the terrible notion that the Prime Minister of Canada would announce fundamental social policy changes in a speech in a foreign country. We can trace it back, or I do at least, to the musings of the unofficial prime minister of Canada at the time, Thomas d'Aquino, the chief executive officer of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives. Mr. d'Aquino had a checklist of things he thought Canada needed to do that consisted of 10 or 15 items. One by one he was checking them all off and one of them was, which he announced quite publicly, that Canada had to get out from under the crippling legacy costs.

Nobody really paid too much attention because the term “legacy costs” did not ring any bells. What he meant was pensions. Sure enough, the right wing think tanks started to fall in line and also blame pensions for all of our economic woes. There was no mention of the fact that corporate tax cuts had taken over $100 billion worth of fiscal capacity in the two last governments, the Martin regime and this one.

Even when General Motors and the big auto companies ran into trouble, nobody said that maybe people were not buying their cars because they were making models nobody wanted. Immediately they said that the reason they could not function was because their legacy costs were too great, that they had to get out from under their pensions.

With this notion of never let a good crisis go to waste, they started to segue from the real root cause of their industrial woes and blamed it on this notion that we deserved to retire in some dignity and that we could take seniors out of poverty.

We have three pillars to our old age security system. One is personal savings, whatever one can save and invest during one's working life. Second, hopefully one has a pension through one's workplace, although that is becoming a rarity because of this full frontal assault by the right on the very notion that workplace pensions are possible. Third, is a robust universal government-sponsored pension plan.

The government would have us believe that there is something luxurious and comfortable about the pension system as we know it, the OAS and GIS. In actual fact, when compared with other countries, the replacement of earnings in retirement does not come anywhere close to a lot of western developed nations. It is really quite a modest system.

We have seen this assault on pensions and on the notion of pensions gaining validators and momentum, or currency. In fact, some experts in the field challenge whether it is an emergency at all. Yes, there is a demographic blip, but we would have had the fiscal capacity to provide were it not for the choices made by successive Liberal and Conservative governments to hollow out that fiscal capacity. However, we seem to be able to find money to spend in corporate tax cuts. Let us not kid ourselves. When $6 billion in corporate tax cuts is granted, that is spending money. We argue that is wasteful spending of money, and we believe that has been validated.

The logic was that if we gave those tax cuts to corporations, they would spend that money in the economy, create more jobs and a virtuous cycle would begin. In actual fact, they have been hoarding that money away. Our worst fears are realized. They are stacking it up and stockpiling it like Scrooge McDuck in the comic books, rolling around in their piles of dough but they are not reinvesting. There is no empirical evidence to prove it.

Not a single study in the world has ever proven that a tax cut equals more jobs. The only predictable and verifiable outcome of a tax cut given to companies is that they will have more money and greater profits. That is what was done. It was a transfer of wealth.

In the richest and most powerful civilization in the history of the world, the government cannot tell me that we cannot afford to lift every senior citizen out of poverty.

Our former leader, Jack Layton, costed this out and we ran on that as a platform. Instead of the $6 billion for corporate tax cuts, we could spend $1 billion of that and all 250,000 seniors, who are currently below the poverty line, would at least get to the poverty line. They would not be wealthy, rich or even comfortable. They would still be poor, but out of the depths of abject poverty. That is the cost and it is achievable, yet we go in the opposite direction.

Again, in the spirit of never let a good crisis go to waste, the Conservatives are cutting, hacking and slashing upon ideological lines just as we predicted they would. They are coming up with these dummy saving accounts to offset it. Bill C-25, the bill we were forced to vote on yesterday, is nothing but a 401(k). The only ones who will get rich on that are the stock brokers who will charge a commission every time that money is moved around. It is a 401(k), the Americanization of our pension regime.

We are here to defend the integrity of the old age security in the spirit of Woodsworth and Stanley Knowles. The NDP is proud to present this motion today to flush out the enemies of the public pension system, to denounce them and hold them to account so they will not get away with this. There will be a blue rinse revolution in this land if they proceed in this way.

Business of the House

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, today is February 2. It is fitting that it is Groundhog Day, as I rise again to ask when the government will once again bring in measures to shut down debate in the House.

Just this past Monday we witnessed the deplorable spectacle of the Conservative government for the 13th time using the guillotine to shut down democratic debate in the House. It is like a nightmare: it happens again and again and again. That is right; this week, after less than one single day of debate on a brand new bill the government had just introduced, the government House leader moved tyranny of their majority on Canada's elected representatives by moving to shut down debate.

It has become routine for this government, which apparently knows no limits, to shut down debate. This is a blatant attack on House of Commons tradition and an attempt to gag Canada's elected representatives, and it is unacceptable. I am not just talking about opposition members. Conservative backbenchers, too, should insist that their political boss give them the right to speak on behalf of the citizens they represent.

On the schedule for this place going forward, I note that the government seems to be wrapping up what I would call attacking seniors and their retirement security week after passing second reading of Bill C-25, a bill that will clearly undermine the public pension regime on which all Canadians rely in order to retire with dignity.

Next week I wonder, will it be failing artists and users in favour of corporate rights holders week with Bill C-11, the wrong-headed copyright bill, or will the government perhaps be tabling the 2012 version of its undermining Canadians to further enrich banks and oil companies executive budget plan? Which one will it be? I ask the government House leader to let us know.

Opposition Motion—Old Age Security

[Joe Daniel, Conservative, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with my honoured colleague from Mississauga—Streetsville.

I appreciate being invited to participate in the debate regarding the old age security program, or the OAS, as it is commonly known. This discussion provides the perfect context to clear up some of the confusion, the miscommunication and misinformation that surrounds the issue of seniors' poverty.

I would like to start by assuring everybody that the Government of Canada recognizes financial security as a factor that has an obvious impact on our seniors' quality of life. As the Prime Minister has said, any seniors currently receiving benefits as well as those nearing retirement will not be affected.

Our government is vigilant on this issue and we truly appreciate the contribution seniors have made and continue to make in building our communities in Canada.

A key priority for the Government of Canada is to help Canadians prepare for and achieve financial security in their later years. We know that seniors are concerned about the economy and maintaining their standard of living in retirement. That is understood. This is an issue that has come into even greater focus in light of the demographic shift that we are experiencing.

It is no secret the Canadian population is aging. Events around the world and our aging population make it clear that the government needs to make responsible decisions to ensure that social programs are sustainable.

In 2011 the first baby boomers reached the milestone of turning 65. At the same time, Canadians are living much longer than ever before. Canadians can enjoy one of the longest life expectancies in the world at close to 81 years old. Taken together, these phenomena are profoundly affecting our country. The result is that the age structure of the population is changing so that there is a higher proportion of senior citizens.

There is a demographic projection we will hear quoted many times today that in less than two decades, close to one in four Canadians will be over age 65. To put it into some context, the proportion of seniors in Canada currently stands at one in seven.

There are obvious financial implications to living longer, as more seniors begin to rely on retirement income for longer periods. As a government we have done a great deal to ensure that Canadians have financial security in their later years. As I stated before, it is one of our key priorities.

The most important financial support we provide to seniors is through the public pension system. This system is highly regarded internationally, and for good reason. It has played a very significant role in reducing lower income rates among seniors. In fact, the incidence of poverty among seniors in Canada has dropped from a rate of 21% in 1980 to 5.2% in 2009. This is one of the lowest rates in the world.

We describe Canada's retirement income system as being made up of three pillars. The first pillar is one that dominates our discussion today, the OAS. The Canada pension plan, CPP, is the second pillar. The third pillar consists of personal savings, including employee pensions, registered retirement savings plans, tax-free savings accounts, as well as other savings and investments.

As members are likely aware, the government is seeking to build on the third pillar. To do this we recently introduced Bill C-25 to create the legislative framework for the establishment of pooled registered pension plans, PRPPs. PRPPs would provide the majority of Canadians who do not have workplace pensions with access to well-registered, low-cost, private sector pension coverage.

Let me revisit the first two pillars, OAS and CPP. Together these two public pillars are designed to provide a modest base upon which to build additional retirement income. This year Canadians will receive close to $72 billion in benefits through the Canada pension plan, old age security and the guaranteed income supplement, GIS.

It is true that these benefits do not come automatically. All Canadians have to apply for them. That is why we have taken steps to inform Canadians about their eligibility for these benefits and to help them through the application process.

Through HRSDC and Service Canada, our government is using direct mail, information campaigns, partnerships and community organizations to reach seniors who may be eligible for OAS and GIS.

Some of these efforts are aimed at seniors who are particularly hard to reach, such as those who are homeless, those who live in remote communities, immigrant seniors, aboriginal seniors, seniors with disabilities and those who do not speak either English or French.

We issue more than 600,000 application forms to Canadian seniors who are not yet receiving their CPP or OAS to encourage them to apply. Every year, we mail out thousands of pre-filled applications to people we think may qualify for GIS and the target group changes every year. Most GIS recipients now only need to apply once in their lifetime and have their benefits automatically renewed simply by filling out their annual tax return. As members can see, we are making great efforts to reach out to low-income seniors and to inform them about their benefits.

Speaking of benefits, I will speak a little more on the GIS.

As I said, the GIS provides extra support for seniors with little to no income and has a great success in reducing poverty among seniors. Our efforts to combat senior poverty does not stop there. In our last Speech from the Throne, we pledged that the government's low tax plan would permanently enhance benefits for Canada's most vulnerable seniors. We honoured that pledge last year by providing the largest GIS increase in 25 years. This measure will help Canada's lowest income seniors out of poverty. More than 680,000 low-income seniors are benefiting from this increase. These seniors are now receiving additional GIS of up to $600 for a single senior and up to $840 for couples.

In 2008 we increased the GIS exemption from $500 to $3,500. The earnings exemption allows low-income working seniors to keep more of their hard-earned money. This year we are providing more tax relief for seniors and pensioners, saving them $2.3 billion.

The measures I have just outlined demonstrate that the Government of Canada is taking concrete steps for seniors. We are actively helping Canadians prepare for and achieve financial security in their latter years. This is an ongoing effort for us because it is a key priority.

Parliament of Canada Act

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Madam Speaker, as I was saying, I wish to echo the sentiments of my colleague from Louis-Saint-Laurent. She said it was an honour to speak to this bill, knowing that over the past few months, those of us who are new here have had the opportunity to understand the honour and the significance of such a responsibility. I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate the hon. member for Pontiac on the work he has done on this file and his bill. I would also like to congratulate the hon. member for Sackville—Eastern Shore who carried this torch for many years.

I would like to come back to the comments made earlier by one of my colleagues from the other opposition party. He said that this would jeopardize members' ability to follow their conscience and to speak out when their party heads in a direction that goes against the wishes of their constituents.

When considering such a comment, it is important to remember one nuance in the bill. After deciding to leave a political party, a member may sit as an independent. That is very important because sitting as an independent provides an opportunity to say that the choices made by his or her political party no longer correspond to the choices of the electorate. The member would not have to join a party with ideas that are contrary to those of his or her voters.

There are a number of examples. Some of our provincial colleagues, in Quebec for example, acted this way. Without commenting on debates that are not within our purview, the fact remains that, in their case, they said they left their party because they believed it was no longer the party their voters voted for.

It is understandable that by joining another party they give the opposite impression. Recent events are a perfect example. There was a glaring example this evening, during a vote on a bill. Bill C-25 deals extensively with retirement and pensions. One of our colleagues has left one party and joined another, and she voted against the NDP. I have a great deal of difficulty believing that the voters of Saint-Maurice—Champlain would have agreed with her decision, in light of the fact that they chose a certain political platform on May 2.

Choosing a political platform is very important. I will again reiterate the comments of the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent. All members work very hard to represent the voters in their ridings as best they can. In spite of the individual work of a member, he or she cannot be everywhere at the same time. That is when a party's platform is very important. When people choose a political party, it obviously plays an important role because the name of the political party is on the ballot. The most hard-working member must have people in the riding who will identify with the name of the political party that appears beside their name on the ballot. Every member works to transcend the existence of his or her party. The member must do such a good job that we forget their political affiliation and we really think about what they do. We are at least associated with this work.

I can speak from personal experience and I am certain that many of my colleagues would agree with me. When a person decides to enter politics and to represent a political party, he is very aware of the principles of that party, as are the voters. That is probably the reason—at least I hope it is—that the person chose to become involved in that particular party in the first place. I find it very hard to believe that someone would be prepared to put his name on a ballot and, if he wins the election, fulfill the responsibilities of a member of Parliament for a political party whose values do not completely correspond to his own.

I find it very hard to understand that situation. I would also like to come back to an example given by the hon. member for Vancouver Kingsway—the case of David Emerson. At that time, I was in the middle of my political science degree. When this event occurred, I was sitting in a class of political science students. These are informed people who understand our country's parliamentary system and electoral realities. No one in the room was prepared to say that he made the right decision and no one could begin to understand why a member of Parliament was prepared to go against the wishes and will of the voters so soon after an election—whether it be two weeks, as in 2006, or seven months, as was the case recently.

I have a personal example to illustrate this point. One morning in my riding, Chambly—Borduas, I was having coffee with a resident of Saint-Basile-le-Grand, where I live. She made a very interesting comment about the work of my predecessor, whom I respect very much. She said that, despite the fact that he had done so much for our region and our riding, it was time for change; there were things that needed changing. Among other things, she mentioned my predecessor's stance on various issues as a member of a particular political party with particular ideas. In the end, she said that she had nothing against the person in question, who was a hard-working guy like the other MPs here, but that he was bound by certain ideas and had to make decisions based on his political party.

One could easily argue that if ever that MP had stopped believing in those ideas, he could have switched parties. That may be true, but the fact remains, as I said at the outset, that he was elected under a banner, and the fact that he could choose to join a party whose ideas stood in stark opposition to the platform on which he was elected is utterly incomprehensible. Just consider some of the examples given. I gave one recently. Take Mr. Emerson and Ms. Stronach. I would bet that no Liberal or Conservative would be prepared to say that they have anything in common. Yet individuals elected as members of one political party were prepared to switch to another. Would my colleagues say that their ideas are similar? Not at all. People in the ridings voted for certain ideas, which the MP no longer espouses. I think that is what we have to keep in mind as we talk about this bill.

The other important element of this bill is the notion of respect for the electorate. If we look at what happened in 2006 or even more recently, the concerns of Canadians are clear. People made it very clear that they wanted byelections. Thus, we must bear something in mind when making a decision: the people's wishes. We must respect those wishes. And if a member makes a decision knowing that it is in the best interests of his or her constituency, riding or region, I have no problem with that person running in a byelection. If his or her convictions are right, I am 110% convinced that the people would share those convictions. And this would show in the results of the byelection. Being in politics takes courage—the courage to be accountable for what we say and do, especially what we do. This is what would happen if that individual were to run in a byelection. If that person had made the right choice, as I said, the result would reflect the people's wishes. I think that is the basic idea of this bill.

That is why I invite all members of the House, with their parties' convictions and those of the people they represent, to support this bill.

Bill C-25--Time Allocation Motion

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is ironic to listen to the House leader on the government side stand in the chamber and accuse one of my colleagues of not understanding procedure. This debate is about time allocation and closure. It is not about Bill C-25. He should understand that.

With regard to that, he also stands in the House and repeatedly says that this is what Canadians voted for. The Conservatives promised repeatedly, in every single election since they have been both a minority government and in the run up to this majority government, that they would clean up the democratic process in the House. What have we seen? Fourteen times now they have invoked either closure or time allocation. What about those promises? Are they going to honour those or are they going to break those promises to the Canadian people to clean up the democracy in the House?

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

moved:

That, in relation to Bill C-25, An Act relating to pooled registered pension plans and making related amendments to other Acts, not more than two further sitting days shall be allotted to the consideration of the second reading stage of the bill; and

That, 15 minutes before the expiry of the time provided for government orders on the second day allotted to the consideration of the second reading stage of the said bill, any proceedings before the House shall be interrupted, if required for the purpose of this order, and, in turn, every question necessary for the disposal of the said stage of the bill shall be put forthwith and successively, without further debate or amendment.

Business of the House

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to give my last Thursday statement of 2011. The fall has been a productive, hard-working and orderly session. It has been capped by results that we have seen in the House during delivering results month since we returned from the Remembrance Day constituency week.

Of particular note, this fall the House passed Bill C-13, the keeping Canada's economy and jobs growing act; Bill C-20, the fair representation act; Bill C-18, the marketing freedom for grain farmers act; and Bill C-10, the safe streets and communities act.

Other things were also accomplished, from the appointment of two officers of Parliament to the passing at second reading of Bill C-26, the Citizen's Arrest and Self-defence Act. I would like to thank the opposition parties who made these accomplishments possible. Nevertheless, the House has a lot of work to do when it returns in 2012.

The things I am looking forward to in 2012 include, after 48 speeches so far, returning to Bill C-19, the ending the long-gun registry act; after 75 speeches so far, continuing debate on second reading of Bill C-11, the copyright modernization act; after 73 speeches so far, continuing debating the opposition motion to block Bill C-4, the preventing human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system act from proceeding to committee; and, after 47 speeches so far, continuing debate on second reading of Bill C-7, the Senate reform act.

This winter, the government's priority will continue to be economic growth and job creation. We will thus continue to move forward with our economic agenda by debating legislative measures such as Bill C-23 on the implementation of a Canada-Jordan free trade agreement; Bill C-24 on the implementation of a Canada-Panama free trade agreement; Bill C-25, which is designed to give Canadians another way to plan for retirement through pooled registered pension plans; and Bill C-28 on the appointment of a financial literacy leader.

Needless to say, I am looking forward to the 2012 budget, the next phase of Canada's economic recovery, from the Minister of Finance, and I am looking forward to what I am sure it will deliver for the Canadian economy. This will be the cornerstone of the upcoming session.

With respect to the precise business of the House for the week of January 30, 2012, I will advise my counterparts in the usual fashion in advance of the House returning.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, please let me wish you, my fellow house leaders, all hon. members and our table officers and support staff a very merry Christmas.

In particular, I want to thank the pages, many of whom, as we know, spent their first significant amount of time away from home with us this fall. I wish them a pleasant time back home with family over Christmas. Perhaps we have provided some good stories for them to tell around the dinner table.

Merry Christmas, happy new year and all the best for the break. Here is to a productive, orderly and hard-working 2012.

Merry Christmas and happy new year. May the members of the House rest up in preparation for the hard work to come in a productive and orderly 2012.