Madam Speaker, today I am very proud to sponsor and debate private members' motion M-53 which supports the cause of British pensioners living in Canada. As I will outline in my remarks today, these people have been unfairly treated and deserve our support in every way we can provide it.
This is certainly not a new issue. It has been around for a long time and I am pleased to say that, informally, the Government of Canada has been supportive of British pensioners living in Canada. It is time that the government became a little more formal in its requests of the British government and that is the reason for my motion today.
When I say that we have been supportive informally, let me quote from a recent letter that I received signed by Canada's former Minister of Human Resources Development, the present Minister of National Defence.
The minister said: "The Government of Canada has been very active for many years in trying to persuade the United Kingdom to conclude a social security agreement that would provide for the indexing of British pensions.
"Prime Minister Chrétien has raised the issue of frozen British pensions on several occasions with Prime Minister John Major.
"These included his visits to London in June, 1994, for the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of D-Day and his visit marking the 50th anniversary of V-E Day.
"These occasions were especially appropriate, given that so many of the British pensioners in Canada are either themselves veterans of the second world war, or the widows of veterans.
"Canada's High Commissioner to the United Kingdom has also been very active on the issue of frozen British pensions.
"The high commissioner and his staff have had numerous meetings with United Kingdom cabinet ministers and with both government and opposition members of Parliament.
"It is clear from these meetings that the U.K. is not about to consider unfreezing its pensions in Canada. However, I can assure you that the Government of Canada will continue to do everything we can to try to persuade the British government to change its position".
That was a letter that I recently received from the former Minister of Human Resources Development. Obviously, the government is committed to the substance contained in the motion in front of us today.
I have also been told that the current minister, the hon. member for Papineau-Saint-Michel, was in London in mid-January, just a short five weeks ago. At that time he raised the frozen pension issue again with his counterpart.
The government is on side with this motion. I hope it will say so again today in this debate. Support in the House of Commons, in public debate, is worth so much more than comments made in private meetings. The word of the minister is one thing, but the voice of Parliament is another. By supporting the motion today, members of the House can help to add the voice of Parliament to the voice of the minister in support of these very deserving people.
For the members of the House who do not yet know why this is important, let me take a minute to outline the issue.
Pensions for elderly British expatriates resident in Canada are frozen at the level paid on the first date of payment or at the date when the individual took up residence in Canada. The same situation exists for almost 425,000 elderly expatriate residents in 137 other countries throughout the world. Yet, at the same time, some 325,000 British expatriate pensioners residing in some 37 other countries enjoy the same annual upgrading enjoyed by the equivalent pensioner beneficiaries living in the United Kingdom.
All of these pensioners, regardless of where they live, accrued their credits toward a state pension on the same basis. During their working life in the United Kingdom, they all paid into the fund in
the same way and reasonably assumed that they would all benefit on an equal basis when it came time to draw their pensions.
Successive British governments have failed to correct this completely unfair and discriminatory situation. The British old age security pension is indexed, in part, to the British retail price index and is subject to being upgraded in April of each year. Since 1965 the value of the pension for pensioners residing in Britain and the 37 other non-frozen countries has increased over 15 times its 1965 value.
The Canadian Alliance of British Pensioners gives this example of how unfair the pension plan is. A 65-year-old man living in Britain who became eligible for a full British pension in 1974 is now receiving a pension of £61.15 per week. If that same individual, on retirement, had elected to move to Canada to be close to his children or other members of his family or for any other reason, he would still be eligible for a pension, but only for the same level of pension paid to him when he left the country, possibly around £10 per week. The amount of the pension would never have changed over the period from 1974 to today. That is clearly discriminatory.
The matter has hit the floor of the House of Commons in Britain and numerous MPs there want to see changes brought about. In July 1994, for example, Winston S. Churchill, MP, said with regard to a particular case being debated:
That lady and others like her are being cheated-there is no other word for it-by the government of £53.60 per week of the pension to which she contributed.
If we were talking about a private personal pension or a life insurance policy, and the directors of the company tried to restrict the territorial area of payment, I am sure that my hon. friend, the minister, would have a shrewd idea of where those directors would be languishing now.
They would be in jail, and rightly so.
In my constituency there is a Dr. Derek and his wife Kathy Brown who now live near Big River, Saskatchewan. On their retirement they came to Canada to get away from the crowds of Britain and were told when they left that their pension would be payable worldwide. Derek Brown was a doctor in Britain for most of his working life and his pension was a full one when he claimed it 10 years ago. Now, because he lives in Canada and because his pension is not indexed, his £42.50 per week is nearly £20 a week less than he would get if he were to move back to Britain.
Dr. Brown says:
The thing that annoys us is that they say they cannot afford to do it for us.
But they index the pensions paid in the United States, but not for us in Canada.
It is this discrimination that we are so fed up with.
Dr. Brown has also written to me to say that he thinks the motion before us today should be somewhat amended to replaced the word indexed with the word prorated since the pensions in Britain are not exactly indexed to the cost of living. This would be quite acceptable and I would propose this change be made should the motion be sent to committee.
During the past few weeks since the motion was drawn for debate I have received many letters from British pensioners in support of the motion. I will quote one letter in particular written by Miss Elaine Dawn of Vancouver, British Columbia. She writes:
I am writing to request that you please support the current plight of British pensioners who live in Canada who, due to no fault of their own have, had their pensions frozen at the rate at which they first entered this country.
I am sure you will agree that this is very unfair considering just south of the border in the United States, British pensioners can enjoy the same indexing of pensions as if they had continued to live in England.
It certainly seems very unfair to me that certain countries support British pensioners while others, like Australia and Canada, have frozen the pensions of British subjects at the same level at which they entered their country.
I am sure you will agree that this has meant a great deal of hardship to many people.
Miss Dawn's letter says what many others said to me in similar letters received during the past four or five weeks.
While I was preparing for this debate today, Mr. Doug Ross, president of the Canadian Alliance of British Pensioners, wrote to me to let me know that in Britain the House of Commons select committee for social security had tabled its report on pension benefits for expatriates living in countries like Canada.
He told me that hearings had been held in London during December 1996, following which the committee issued a report that admitted the design of the current policies of pensions to expatriates was a mess. It also acknowledged that Britain was alone among OECD countries in failing to pay up ratings, as they call them, equally to all the beneficiaries of state contributory pension plans regardless of where they live.
However the committee disappointed many. It fell short of accepting the requests of the pensioner groups which asked them to recommend to the government that it should end the discriminatory practice of using country of residence as a factor in the determination of pension benefits. Instead the committee simply turned the problem over to the government by taking the unusual stand for a committee in Britain of recommending a free vote in the British Parliament to allow members of the British House to express their opinions.
Britain is about due for an election. There is no opportunity or time for this vote to be called. If an election is held and a new house is created with new members of Parliament, the report of the committee will no longer be valid. The next government will not be
required, as the motion puts it, to present any motion to the house for members to vote on. Therefore this pass on of responsibility is a great disappointment to those who appeared before the committee.
Mr. Ross and the Canadian Alliance of British Pensioners in particular have informed me of how disappointed they are the issue is not yet resolved. They have told me they appreciate the efforts of the Canadian government in support of their campaign to end pension discrimination, but at the same time they feel strongly Canada and other Commonwealth countries must take a much more aggressive stance in their bilateral dealings to step up the pressure on Westminster to end the disgraceful practice of freezing the pensions of some expatriates.
Mr. Ross writes that there are 718,000 British expatriates resident in Canada. Some 137,000 of them have some level of current frozen U.K. state pensions earned during the period they lived, worked and served in the United Kingdom. An end to pension freezing by Britain would ease the plight of thousands of cash strapped pensioners living in Canada and would directly inject $150 million in the first year into the Canadian economy.
It is time our Parliament supported the cause of the British expatriate pensioners. This motion which costs the government nothing serves to enhance the position already taken by the government in bilateral international discussions. It adds the voice of Parliament to the voice of the government to the voice of the minister speaking in Britain.
I expect to receive unanimous support of the members speaking in this debate. Therefore I serve notice that it is my intention to rise at the end of the debate to request unanimous consent to move the appropriate motion which would allow us to send the matter to committee for further action. I look forward to the support and comments of other members of the Chamber.