Status of Women committee  In fact it's a bit broader than pensions. It's a research working group on retirement income adequacy. They're looking at a broad range of issues. The goal of this is research work, so it's to come up with a common base of understanding for ministers of finance, and it will be shared with them in December.

Status of Women committee  Again to go back, it's to get a common base of research on the understanding about the facts of retirement income. So it's not actually about specific policy proposals or actions. It's really about providing the best research possible for the ministers to look at and get a good understanding, and hopefully a common understanding, of the system as it stands today and going forward.

Status of Women committee  Sure. In my opening remarks I went through a few issues. I can go back to them, but I think we've made a number of changes on the first pillar of the retirement income system with respect to increasing the amount of employment income that GIS recipients can earn before their GIS is reduced.

Status of Women committee  Okay.

Status of Women committee  In terms of protecting individuals, there are three pillars that I described earlier. The first is Old Age Security and the Canada Pension Plan, which provide a certain amount of protection to all Canadian men and women.

Status of Women committee  I think that this is connected to the announcement made by the minister on October 27 and referred to by Mr. Rudin. This is a series of measures whose purpose is to improve the security of private pension plans.

Status of Women committee  We will undertake another review in three years and another three-year report will be drafted.

Status of Women committee  I was referring to the Canada Pension Plan.

Status of Women committee  It is reviewed every three years.

Status of Women committee  We just completed our three-year review in May. An announcement was made by the federal, provincial and territorial ministers of Finance. Bill C-51 contains the results of that three-year review.

Status of Women committee  Protect them from what?

Status of Women committee  Without commenting on the statistics, I would go back to one of the points in my opening remarks about the third pillar, which is registered pension plans and the RRSPs. The whole point of that combined system is that if you have a registered pension plan or not, your combined ability to save through the registered pension plan and the RRSP is in total the same, whether you are self-employed or holding a registered pension plan.

Status of Women committee  It's 7% of the private plans, yes.

Status of Women committee  You have to have lived in Canada for 10 years or more. Therefore, those who have lived here for less than 10 years are not eligible.

Status of Women committee  Exactly.