Mr. Chair, again, I would like to thank the member for Kelowna—Lake Country for his steadfast support for seniors and, also, for his strong advocacy, even in our caucus, for supporting the seniors. I know his riding of Kelowna—Lake Country has a large number of them. I know many of them benefit from numerous measures that have been introduced by our government. Not only are we helping to support a comfortable retirement for Canadians, but we are also supporting a safe retirement for Canadians.
There are a number of initiatives we have taken to do that. To protect seniors from mistreatment, in January 2013 we put into force the Protecting Canada's Seniors Act. This legislation rightly amended the Criminal Code of Canada so that age would be considered an aggravating factor for criminal sentencing purposes.
As members know, Canadian seniors can trust our government to take appropriate action to help prevent crime and to be tough on crime. Our government continues to focus on increasing awareness of the signs of elder abuse and providing essential information on available resources and supports. We have taken action to combat social isolation of seniors. We know that seniors are better off with this Conservative government.
One of the things we recognized, as far as the security of seniors in their financial well-being, was the importance of our financial literacy program. Our Minister of State for Seniors, the member for Richmond, has done amazing work with our seniors and helping with financial literacy. We recognized the importance of financial literacy to the degree that our government was the first one to bring forward a financial literacy leader for Canada. She will work with a task force to bring in a national strategy.
One large component of that strategy in financial literacy was to help seniors. We understand that when they have the skills and the knowledge, when they understand the financial terminology, and not just the markets, such as what an annuity or a RRIF is, the regulation changes around RRIFs, when they have the confidence, they feel more secure. That is what we want to accomplish. We want to ensure those seniors can move forward with confidence. Therefore, we are helping them enhance their skill set that way, as we are with all Canadians, certainly, newcomers, first nations and our youth.
Again, the security of our seniors is so important. We have brought forward measures. Canadian seniors understand that they are better off with this Conservative government.