Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to finally have the opportunity to rise and speak to this most important issue. I thank the member for Thunder Bay—Rainy River who has taken up this bill. In 2008 the NDP started looking at the problems with pensions. Over the period of late 2008, early 2009, we had two consultative meetings and one of the things that began to surface were the stories around the serious situation of Nortel.
In 2009 I introduced a bill very similar to the member's, Bill C-476. It was the hope of the NDP, me and the people at Nortel that the bill would have been dealt with. We hoped that by February of this year we could have had it through all stages in the House, to committee and back to the House. It would have allowed for action that would have helped the situation of the Nortel workers in particular. Unfortunately, the government took the decision to prorogue and as a result there was a delay.
My Bill C-476 would not make it here except with the unanimous consent of the House. I raised it in this place and both sides of the House said no. Therefore, it put us in the position of having the good member for Thunder Bay—Rainy River using his order of precedence to put this bill forward, and that is important. A private member only has so many opportunities to move a bill and he set aside his own critic area in order to do the right thing for the workers of AbitibiBowater, Fraser Papers and others.
As we went forward in the debate, the Liberal Party spoke about 1963 and The Gazette, referring to the opposition. I will remind this place that it was Stanley Knowles who first proposed CPP and under a minority government of the Liberals, it was put forward.
Last fall, on the steps of our Parliament, speaker after speaker addressed the 4,000 Nortel workers about what we would try to do for them. In a subsequent throne speech, the government of the day said very clearly that it would look at the situation of bankruptcy, insolvency and pensions.
However, we have to change the debate. When we listen to the business community and certain people in the House, they talk about payroll taxes. When we think of pensions and the assets of them, those are deferred wages. Had the employees of those companies decided they wanted to invest on their own, they would not have negotiated with their companies to have a pension plan in the first place.
Imagine the horror when they wake up to a newspaper headline like the workers at Nortel did. Nortel had $2.4 billion in cash assets and $4 billion in other assets. It said that it would not cover the shortfall in the Nortel pension. Today, because of the delay of prorogation, because this matter did not get to the House, Nortel workers face a pension of 69%.
About two weeks ago, a couple that had retired from Nortel just before the 1990s visited my office in Hamilton East—Stoney Creek. Their pension to begin with was small because it had not had the growth period of the big money. They were going to lose 30% of their pension and their benefits. Along the line before of Bill C-476, I also put in Bill C-487 to address the long-term disability problems faced by workers at Nortel. In December some 400 of these good folks will lose all their LTD benefits. These workers are not re-employable and to be quite frank it is a tragedy because they will wind up on welfare.
Last week I stood with a Bloc member as the Bloc put forward a bill to address the guaranteed income supplement. In the House last June, we had an opposition day motion from the NDP. The first part of that motion was to address an immediate increase to the GIS. We also talked about doubling CPP, a national pension insurance plan. I was proud of members of the House because the motion passed unanimously.
Over the summer, I went to 19 different communities across the country. I listened to seniors talk about their fears on their pensions. One of the things that surfaced repeatedly was how low the GIS was and how it did not rise with the rate of inflation. This varied across the country. People who had retired from major corporations and thought their company had no chance of failure now faced problems.
We have heard about AbitibiBowater in the House many times from me, from the member for Thunder Bay—Rainy River and other members, particularly from Quebec and Northern Ontario. I ran into workers in B.C. who lost their pensions because the forestry industry had been wiped out. They clearly did not know what they were going to do.
In the House today is my good friend from Outremont, who at my request moved a motion at finance committee to have it look at pensions. Eighty-eight witnesses came before that committee and gave testimony about the situation faced by Canadians and Canadian pensions.
I have noticed, with concern, that the speaking notes of government members have changed. In committee, they were saying that they would look at this, that they were consulting. They were referring to the parliamentary secretary who was traveling the country, as was I. They made reference to those consultations. Now they are starting to talk about the opposition coming up with answers too quickly. I am afraid I have to disagree with that.
The NDP started on this file in 2008. We consulted with people during 2009. I went to 19 communities, now up to 26. We have listened to people.
We have listened to such people as Joel Harding, the CLC pension expert, Monica Townson, from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Bob Baldwin, a pension expert, Don Drummond, an economist with TD Canada Trust and a gentleman whose name is used in the House quite frequently, Mike McCracken from Infometrica, Glen Hodgson, the senior vice-president and chief economist from the Conference Board of Canada, and others.
Members on all sides of the House have to really pause for a second when we look at Bill C-501. We need to understand the change in language of deferred wages.
Deferred wages means, very simply, it should be considered the property of the pensioners who will use that money for their retirement. Deferred wages are not a gift that the company has decided to set aside for them on their retirement. This is a sharing in a process that put aside moneys to give them dignity in their retirement.
Members of the government have talked to me about seeing their constituents leave their office and then going into food banks. We have heard the stories of Canadian veterans moving to food banks. Our seniors deserve much more than that.
In the opposition day motion about which I talked, the NDP proposed an immediate increase to the GIS, similar to what the Bloc and others have spoke about. We also talked about doubling the Canada pension plan.
Some people in the provinces and in the Liberal Party have talked about a supplementary voluntary CPP. In Canada 63% of working Canadians have no savings and no pension. It is very clear that the only way they will have a pension in 40 years is if we invest. If we grow the core assets in the CPP, and we do not have to add administration, then we can go forward. However, it must be mandatory to ensure that in 35 to 40 years Canadians will have a pension to rely on, a foundation for a pension plan.
Again, I thank the member for Thunder Bay—Rainy River for moving Bill C-501. I look forward to the support of the entire House when the bill comes to committee.
