Mr. Speaker, I thank everyone who spoke for and against my seniors' bill of rights, and in particular, my two colleagues who spoke so very well.
Both my colleagues who spoke understand the challenges of being a senior today. Because of their closeness with them, they understand when seniors say that they have to eat macaroni and cheese for several days in the last week of the month because they do not have adequate pension funds.
The work I did in my previous critic role is hence the reason I tried to establish a basic bill of rights for seniors in Canada.
I am sure there are many on this side of the House and possibly some on the government side who understand what a bill of rights sets out to do, which is to establish parameters. It does not say to put money into it anywhere, because that is not a private member's bill anyway, but it is to set down the quality of life we want our seniors to have.
In the few minutes I have, I will try to reiterate a few points. Too often it is financial illiteracy that gets people into problems. They do not understand the awful lot of red tape that is involved when one invests in a bank. It sounds like a good investment so an individual might put their money there. An awful lot of people do not take the time to understand how complicated some of that is.
Often there is a conflict of interest with the person promoting a particular investment because they get a higher management fee on it. Many people do not know these things. They do not know enough to ask those questions. They are busy trying to make the money to put away.
Every once in a while we hear about a group of people who lost their life savings in investments. Over and above issues such as Nortel and companies that go bankrupt, which is another issue altogether, people have the perception that if they put money away, it will be perfectly safe. People need to get up to date on what they need to know, the questions they need to ask and they need to become much more aware of what happens to their pension money if they are able to put any away.
Often it is inadequate opportunity and economic instability. An individual has a job, which they lose, then they draw out their savings, not thinking about what will happen 20 years later because it is today that they need that money. That instability strips away the hard-earned savings of our seniors, and that is what we are trying to stop.
Bill C-513 is the first bill of its kind ever proposed to better protect our seniors and their nest eggs. I was hopeful that all of my colleagues in the House would support that. However, I have heard the message from the government side and it does not surprise me as the Conservatives move forward to promote the things they think are best, in their viewpoint, to help those who have.
When we look at the aging demographics and the population, there will be an awful lot of people who will have to rely on the province for more than the current GIS and OAS.
The intent of part of the bill of rights is to put in parameters that would ensure that people get spoken to in plain English when they talk about retirement, so that they start to learn about financial literacy early on, understand the issues better and will not find themselves at the time of retirement with inadequate funds, if any at all, because they have used them for various reasons.
The bill is about building people up, not tearing people down. It is about helping Canadians better prepare for tomorrow. That is a responsibility we all have in the House.
We been talking about enhanced CPP. We have been talking about the Liberals' supplementary CPP. We need to get this issue on the agenda to talk about just how we would create the vehicles, the instruments, to help Canadians understand the reason they have to prepare for their retirements, and also provide the vehicles necessary for them to do that.
I thank all hon. members for their participation and for the opportunity to present the bill.