Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to rise today to speak to Motion No. 45, brought forward by my colleague from Etobicoke North. The motion asks for the following:
That:
(a) the House recognize that (i) seniors deserve a dignified retirement free from financial worry, (ii) many seniors are worried about their retirement savings running out, (iii) many seniors are concerned about being able to live independently in their own homes; and
(b) in the opinion of the House, the government should undertake a study examining population aging, longevity, interest rates, and registered retirement income funds, and report its findings and recommendations to the House within 12 months of the adoption of this motion.
My riding of Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley in Manitoba is home to many seniors. Seniors helped build this country and our communities. I have always said that they need to be treated with the respect they are due for building our communities while raising their families. We all stand on their shoulders in this place.
I stay in touch with many seniors I represent, because I value their experience and their wisdom. Not a day goes by that I do not receive an important email or phone call from seniors I represent who are concerned about their finances. Many are on fixed incomes from their retirement pensions. They are worried about rampant inflation, which has been directly caused by the massive, out-of-control quantitative easing program instituted by the Bank of Canada.
Even the Bank of Canada governor, Tiff Macklem, acknowledged that he and his lieutenants misjudged the strength of inflation at the start of the year, and pledged to act “as forcefully as needed” to make up for the mistake. During testimony at the Senate banking committee on April 27, he said that we are coming “out of the deepest recession we've ever had, but...we got a lot of things right and we got some things wrong, and we are adjusting.” Inflation eats away at pension income because price inflation makes everything more expensive. It erodes the basic fixed income of every senior. The bank's main responsibility was to keep inflation at 2%, but now inflation is at almost 7% because of the bank's mismanagement of this issue, as admitted by the governor.
I note that the motion is also concerned about interest rates. As a result of the bank's mismanagement of inflation, it has been forced to raise interest rates. The bank now uses higher interest rates as a tool to curb inflation. Higher interest rates are great if people have savings, but if they are still paying a mortgage or a car loan, which many seniors do, this just compounds the problem. Any discussion of this matter should in fact include a discussion of how to protect seniors against inflation eroding their incomes. In my view, this motion is very timely. Seniors on fixed incomes have been hurt by the bank's mistakes and now have to make difficult decisions around what foods they can afford, or whether they can afford to visit their grandchildren or buy them presents.
On top of this, to add insult to injury, instead of providing an adequate income for Canadian seniors, by any identifiable metric the government has done just the opposite. It promised to help seniors and Canadians suffering during the deadliest pandemic the globe has seen in a century. In order to facilitate this, the government implemented COVID-related financial relief. Despite warnings from its own ministerial officials, the government sat on its laurels and allowed this benefit, which was taxable, to decimate tens of thousands of vulnerable, low-income seniors this past year by clawing back their GIS. Only after months of advocacy by my Conservative colleagues did the Minister of Seniors finally take action to fix her government's mistake by introducing Bill C-12 and issuing a one-time payment to affected seniors. Better late than never, as they say.
While I am happy to support the motion, I just cannot help but feel that this will be just another study collecting dust on the shelf in the minister's office. The fact of the matter is that these issues have already been studied many times. Seniors do not want or need another study. They want action now, not a year from now or after yet another study. Seniors want action right now, not 12 months from now or three or four years from now. We have a number of studies that are either done or in the process of being done, and recommendations to follow up on. The HUMA committee is currently studying the effects of COVID-19 on seniors. This study covers much of the same ground as what this motion calls for. There will be a large overlap between the information the committee has already gathered and what the member's motion hopes to achieve.
Also, back in 2018, a motion moved by the member for Nickel Belt, Motion No. 106, seconded by many House caucus colleagues, asked the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities to study and report back to the House on important issues such as increasing income security for vulnerable seniors and ensuring quality of life and equality for all seniors via the development of a national seniors strategy, among other things. Seniors are still waiting for that national strategy four years later.
The result of the committee's work was a 142-page report entitled “Advancing Inclusion and Quality of Life for Seniors”, which made 29 recommendations. Many of these recommendations speak directly to the motion we are debating here today, and the government has unsurprisingly failed to act on many of them.
There is not time to review every recommendation in the 10 minutes I am allotted, but one of the areas my hon. friend mentioned in her motion is interest rates and registered retirement income funds. As I said, we on this side agree that affordability for seniors was an issue before COVID and before the recent record increase in inflation and the cost of living under the government's watch. This was caused largely by the mistakes of the Bank of Canada, which it has admitted to.
The very first recommendation of the 2018 report reads, “That Employment and Social Development Canada work with Finance Canada and the Canada Revenue Agency to review and strengthen existing federal income support programs for vulnerable seniors to ensure they provide adequate income.” Four long and difficult years later, seniors know that this recommendation, along with the national strategy, has been ignored.
In addition to the GIS clawback I mentioned earlier in July of last year, the then minister of seniors announced a one-time payment of $500 to seniors aged 75 and over, stating, “Canadian seniors can always count on us to listen, understand their needs and work hard to deliver for them.” However, apparently, the government was unaware that one particularly important need for seniors, especially those on benefits, is to receive timely and accurate tax information.
Once again, the government's incompetence resulted in over 90,000 Canadian seniors receiving the wrong tax information, jeopardizing their ability to file their taxes on time. They now run the risk of once again having their benefits cut off through no fault of their own. That is why our party advocated for the government to extend the deadline for seniors filing their taxes so there would remain zero risk of vulnerable seniors having their benefits taken from them by the government once again.
When it comes to seniors, the government is all talk but little action. Seniors cannot afford to be an afterthought when it is implementing policies and programs designed to help them. We must work together as a House to deliver results. That is why I will be voting in favour of my hon. colleague's motion. I look forward to seeing the findings implemented efficiently, effectively, speedily, and most importantly, not another four years down the road.
