TORONTO - Ontario has no plans to bail out General Motors pensioners by topping up the province's inadequate safety net and will instead seek a broader solution to help all retirees caught in the pension crisis, Premier Dalton McGuinty said Wednesday.
The premier, who drew the ire of autoworkers last week when he said the pension guarantee fund isn't even close to large enough to cover autoworkers if GM goes under, is now signalling workers will be on their own if the company fails.
"We need to be fair to all Ontario seniors, and if we look to those without pensions to restore the vitality to those pensions ... I don't think that's fair," McGuinty said.
"We need to find a way to do more to help seniors who don't benefit from pensions and we need to find a way to see what we can do to help pensioners who have seen their pension funds depleted."
The key to helping GM pensioners, McGuinty reiterated, is to find a way to keep the company afloat.
"It's certainly not our intention to put more money into the (fund)," he said. "It was never meant to be the kind of fund that was supported by the government."
Ontario's Pension Benefits Guarantee Fund provides pensioners with up to $1,000 a month in the event a pension plan fails to provide its full benefit, or any at all. It is funded by corporate contributions, and the government has no legal obligation to top it up.
The fund currently holds about $100 million, while pension experts estimate GM's pension shortfall could top $6 billion.
In the past, the provincial government has found ways to support the fund when it has been insufficient to meet demand, including when both farm-equipment maker Massey Ferguson and Algoma Steel filed for bankruptcy during previous recessions.
"We need a major national rethink of our pensions and the benefits that are there, or are not there, for the older generations, because we parlayed ourselves into a period of pension crisis," McGuinty said.
"There are some broader issues when it comes to pension liabilities and they extend beyond Ontario."
One of the big issues, he said, is that baby boomers can no longer count on a growing workforce to help them through their retirement years.
Canadian Auto Workers union president Ken Lewenza called McGuinty's comments disappointing and said all pensioners should be worried by what he sees as a lack of commitment to seniors.
"This isn't just about the guaranteed pension plan," Lewenza said. "He is sending out innuendoes out there that pensions in general could be at risk because young workers won't want to pay for, as he indicated, baby boomers," Lewenza said.
"This is a real challenge for all Canadians."
The thousands of CAW workers expected to rally at the legislature Thursday to demand pension protection want both levels of governments to understand they can't pick and choose what retirees to support, Lewenza added.
"Long-term, one must question if they can get away with this because of the global financial crisis, is our Canada Pension Plan in jeopardy, is our old-age security plan in jeopardy?"
NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said McGuinty's comments were worrisome and argued the premier needs to come up with an Ontario pension plan instead of trying to make the problem federal.
"If I was a worker at any one of the Big Three, I would be very concerned by the premier's comments this morning," Horwath said.
"These workers put their money into the pension plan ... now they're about to retire and they're being told that that money's not there for them and that (the government is) walking away."
