Share
Federal Finance Minister Joe Oliver recently made a surprise announcement: over the summer the Harper Government will consult on a voluntary supplement to the Canada Pension Plan.
“The announcement is crass political opportunism,” said Unifor National President Jerry Dias. “The Tories see that Canadians support an enhanced CPP, so they want on the bandwagon without doing anything. A consultation prior to an election is meaningless.”
The Harper Government is proposing to allow people to make extra contributions to CPP, even though Canadians already have $885 billion in unused RRSP contribution room and 11 million Canadians do not have a workplace pension. There would be no matching employer contributions, as with current CPP contributions.
Unifor Pensions and Benefits Director Jo-Ann Hannah said the unused savings rate shows that voluntary pension programs don’t work.
Dias pointed out that former federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty rejected the idea of voluntary CPP contributions as unworkable.
“This was rejected unanimously by our partners in the federation when we met and discussed the issue because it would not work and because the CPP would be unable to administer it,” Flaherty told the House of Commons in 2010.
Dias called on the federal government to back the CLC proposal for doubling the CPP with mandatory contributions, saying the current proposal is a ploy by the government to look like it is taking the issue seriously during an election.
Recent polling by Nanos has 88 per cent of Canadians support an enhanced CPP.
“Canadians deserve better than to see their government play cynical political games with their retirement security. They deserve a government that back true CPP reform,” Dias said.
Unifor will continue to work with its partners toward an enhanced CPP for all.
