Madam Speaker, I have toured the country and talked to many seniors and listened to their frustration about struggling to live on $11,000 a year. I ask anyone who is watching if they have ever thought how they would live on $11,000 a year. Some of them live on even less. We know that, in spite of everything that has been done, we still have more than 200,000 seniors who are living below the poverty line. We should ask ourselves, never mind $11,000, how we would live on $9,000 or $8,000 a year. How would we possibly manage to do that? It is very difficult. We hear about seniors struggling and going to food banks. This is Canada. That is not the way things are supposed to be.
There has been very little from the government as far as increases toward pensions are concerned; $1.42 I believe was the cost of living increase that many seniors across Canada received. There is no sense waiting. It must cost far more than $1.42 just to implement that increase. We need to seriously look at what else we can do to ensure seniors have a good quality of life.
Today, though, it is going to have start with planning for young people like our pages. We need to put more vehicles to be able to save money and make sure there is a financial literacy program out there so that people understand that when they get to age 65, they cannot expect that their old age security and Canada pension plan will be sufficient. They need to have a retirement savings plan, which is why we are suggesting the supplementary Canada pension plan would be a great vehicle to help with that.