Stephen Harper’s anti-pension obsession hits Ontarians: Cohn
Stephen Harper’s decision to stab Ontario in the back — and middle-class Ontarians in the front — over the province’s efforts to create a public pension sets a new low.
ST. JOHN’S—People of goodwill can disagree. But why does a prime minister of ill will have to be so wilfully disagreeable, so reflexively destructive, when playing electoral politics?
Stephen Harper’s pettiness in trying to sabotage Ontario’s legitimate efforts to create a public pension for middle-income workers sets a new low in gamesmanship. It will only take money out of the pockets of workers, taxpayers and employers who will be forced to pay higher fees because of the federal intransigence.
Whether or not you agree with it, the Ontario Retirement Pension Plan emanates from a strong electoral mandate won a year ago by a premier who campaigned actively for it. The ORPP is designed to help working people, especially younger, middle-class workers who need to close a looming retirement income gap at a time when decent private pensions are fading as fast as full-time employment.
Harper’s decision this week to stab Ontario in the back — and middle-class Ontarians in the front — may go down as one of the most offensive, retrograde and thoughtless blunders ever committed by a sitting prime minister plotting his re-election on the backs of prospective pensioners.
His Conservative government is toying with the futures of young people who face a lifetime of precarious employment without proper pension coverage. Ontario’s plan is being designed by some of Canada’s foremost pension experts as a cost-effective, low-fee program that parallels the successful Canada Pension Plan — a CPP that Harper stubbornly refused to expand, despite public calls from most provinces and confidential advice from his own former finance minister, the late Jim Flaherty.
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