Thank you for being here today.
I come from Laval, where there is a very high percentage of seniors. They account for approximately 40,000 people out of a population of 350,000. In that group, 38% are over the age of 75, with some 12,000 women over the age of 75, which is something that does not very often appear in the statistics the way you present them, since all those who are 65 and over are in one group.
So Mr. Lindsay, I am very pleased to see that your statistics were a bit more detailed and made a distinction between women aged 65 to 75, 75 to 85 and 85 and over. That is the reality today and it is important to realize that women over the age of 75 are the poorest group. So it might be helpful, from now on, to avoid putting everyone over the age of 65 in one group in the statistics.
Ms. Townson, in your study entitled: ''Reducing Poverty Among Older Women: The Potential of Retirement Income Policies'', you state the following:
Retirement income policies could serve to reduce poverty in future generations of seniors and guarantee economic security for older women. However, public policy in the area of retirement income needs to take into account the causes of poverty among senior women...
We are all familiar with the various causes of poverty among women. We have talked about some of them, such as part-time work, family responsibilities and lower income.
Do you have any concrete solutions to propose so that elderly women, now and in the future, can be better off at the end of their lives and have better pensions?