Madam Speaker, I notice members opposite making fun of the tie which I happen to be wearing. The tie is for the benefit of members opposite. It is what is commonly referred to by many of my constituents as the piggy plan, not the pension plan.
At the outset I inform the House that I will be splitting my time with one of my colleagues.
Why is the Liberal government changing the MP pension plan? We would think it would be doing it for reasons of integrity. The Liberal government is only addressing MP pensions to try to deflect public criticism. It knew Canadians wanted real changes so it made red book promises. However the promises were minimal and the government is doing the absolute minimum to barely meet those promises.
What were the promises? They were to end double dipping and to change the minimum age for collecting an MP pension, two of the many things that have outraged Canadians. The bill includes provisions to change those two things, which I commend, but the plan needs a major overhaul. This is just a start.
When questioned about the continuing generosity of the MP pension plan most Liberals throw up smoke screens and whine about how underpaid politicians are. They do not understand that the salaries of working MPs are unrelated to how much retired MPs should be making.
Over the past decade whenever the public has called for MP accountability and questioned the unsustainable and bloated pension package, the government has protected the plan and met the criticism by freezing MP salaries in major PR campaigns. It seemed to work before but not any more. Canadians are looking at the pension plans. Let us stick with the issue and not talk about low MPs salaries to defend high MP pensions.
Today the Liberals are pointing to studies that say MPs are underpaid while they are working. They respond by retaining this overinflated pension plan. Next year or the year after they will point to the same studies and say: "Gosh, look, we are underpaid. The studies prove it". They will pull out the sob stories and gain public support for salary increases. Just as they have refused to discuss the real issues on MP pensions now, they will refuse to discuss the MP pension plan then. That is because it is indefensible.
The government members go to great lengths to talk about anything but why they should be entitled to a two-tier pension plan. However some members of the government do not deny that the plan is generous. Just last Friday the hon. parliamentary secretary to the leader admitted:
The pension plan was generous. It is generous, and remains generous. However, the members of Parliament who entered the lists for the election in 1988 and in all previous elections did so on the basis that at the end of their term of office they would be compensated in some way that was generous but was designed to make up for the loss of income they suffered in being elected to Parliament in the first place.
He continued:
Most people enter a career looking at the remuneration package and seeing what it is like.
I think I speak for my colleagues on this side of the House when I say that Reformers did not switch careers and enter politics for the remuneration package. We came to Ottawa to represent our constituents and to make some long overdue changes. Altering the platinum plated MP pension plan is just one such change.
It saddens me to think that the main reason some of my hon. colleagues across the way entered politics was for the promised pension reward following their retirement from public service, and this is by their own admission. I would like to believe my colleagues opposite are honourable so I return to my first question. Is the Liberal government committed to making significant and necessary changes to the MP pension plan? Will those changes bring it into line with other Canadian pension plans?