Mr. Speaker, first, for Canadians watching today, the New Democrats say that OAS is sustainable. There is no crisis in OAS except the one created by the Conservatives. We have all heard repeatedly in this place of the report from the Parliamentary Budget Officer who confirms what economists and pension experts have said, and that is OAS is easily sustainable. In fact, that report indicated that there was room for growth. Therefore, I will keep repeating the same mantra that OAS is secure and it is affordable.
I have gone to 46 town hall meetings across the country since 2009 and 6 in the last few weeks. Everybody is very fearful because of how this has been delivered by the Conservatives. I want to read a recent review of Canada's retirement income system by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development pension team, which has said:
—Canada does not face major challenges of financial sustainability with its public pension schemes....Long-term projections show that public retirement-income provision is financially sustainable.
Earlier we had people from the government side speaking to the cost. We agree that currently it costs 2.4% of GDP to fund OAS. We also agree that it is going to go to 3.16% of GDP. However, one of the things that is missing in the government's assumptions that we keep hearing about, as it talks about the increase in the number of people, the percentage difference, which is less than 1% of GDP that we certainly believe should be invested in our seniors, is the growth projections for that period of time in GDP. Are we not hearing it because the Conservatives do not believe their policy is going to give us growth in GDP? I doubt very much we would ever hear a comment from them on that at all.
During the May election, New Democrats were very clear on pensions. In fact, the very first platform issue we raised, and the member for London—Fanshawe continually speaks about in this place and I thank her for her work on this file, was addressing seniors' poverty by increasing the guaranteed income supplement. However, the Prime Minister did not even mention changing OAS during that election campaign. One would think that if a party was planning to come in to make such a substantial change, which amounts to off-loading a lot of the costs of the federal government onto the provinces and municipalities, that it would at least tell Canadians. Could it be that the Conservatives did not tell Canadians because they might have lost a couple of votes? From the round tables and town halls I have held, about 30% of the people who come into those rooms are former Conservative supporters, and they are the ones using the word “former”. It is very troubling that a party would make these kinds of changes.
Let us talk about the cost for moment. We would take approximately $6,000 a year for each of those two years. For example, in the province of Ontario, if a person is on a disability pension that at 65 is expected to transfer to OAS and GIS, that would not happen for two years. The province of Ontario and other provinces would have to carry the burden of that cost for two years. Also in Ontario, for example, for those 60 years old who have lost their jobs because of plant closures, who are not employable and are on social assistance hoping to get on OAS and GIS by the age of 65, it would be two more years the province would have to raise property taxes in order pay for that. Therefore, part of what is happening is the off-loading of many of the costs for the federal government.
When I went from town hall to town hall, people were talking about being very offended that the Prime Minister made pronouncements about retirement security in Davos, a foreign country. I want to be clear that we are not saying the Prime Minister at that time said 65 to 67, but the PMO notes said it to the media and thus the storm started.
Instead of tearing down our cherished programs, we New Democrats have been working hard for three years putting together a retirement security program. We propose phasing in a doubling of CPP, as we have spoken about endlessly in the House for three years, so that generations to come would have a more secure foundation on which to retire. We will eliminate poverty by significantly increasing the GIS.
New Democrats would also create a national pension insurance plan funded by the plan holders. The premiums would be paid by them.
We also want to change legislation, the BIA and CCAA, so that when companies go under, the pension funds and the pensioners will be part of the group that can access resources in the remainder of a company to furnish their pensions going forward.