Doug Macpherson

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Doug Macpherson is a contributor to rabble's Retiree Matters column. Doug joined the United Steelworkers Union (USW) in 1968 at Stelco and retired 3 years ago after a 25-year career with the USW, where he held a variety of staff positions including Assistant to the Director of District 6, and Assistant to the National Director for Canada. He continues to volunteer as the National Coordinator for the Steelworkers Organization of Active Retirees (SOAR) and is a vice-president of the Congress of Union Retirees of Canada (CURC).
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Liberals' pension reforms fall woefully short for Canadian workers

While changes to the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) recently adopted by the current federal Liberal government offer some improvement, they do not go far enough.

The legislation includes an increase to the annual payout from 25 per cent to 33 per cent of pre-retirement earnings. In addition, the maximum amount of income covered by the CPP increases from $54,900 to about $82,700 -- once it is fully phased in. However, because the changes do not fully come into effect until 2025, most workers will not have saved enough or contributed a sufficient amount to the CPP and therefore many will be retiring in poverty.

For a government that claims its legislation is fact-based, it has clearly misread the facts.

The facts are:

Tags:
canadian poverty cpp Pension Reform retiree matters precarious labour retirement savings plan Canadian pensions Trudeau government

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Seniors Vote mobilizes for change at the ballot box

Canada has a growing and aging population. In 2014 there were more than 6 million Canadians aged 65 or older, representing 15.6 per cent of the population. By 2030, seniors will number more than 9 million and make up about 25 per cent of the population. At a time when Canada needs a national strategy and leadership on health and aging, we find the government moving away from funding our cherished universal health-care system, which was based solely on need and not how much money one had. At one time the envy of the world, Canada's health-care system is slowly being eroded and privatized.

Tags:
seniors public health care pharmacare economic inequality canadian poverty home care voting intentions 2015 federal election retiree matters seniors vote

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Canadian workers' rights: It's a question of fairness

In late March, I spent a few days with some other retirees at a political action conference in Toronto. We were among close to 1,500 labour activists and leaders from across Canada who spent the weekend talking about the attacks on working families in Canada and what we can do about them. Why, you ask, would retirees be interested in this? Well, when we were young our parents did not have many of the rights and benefits Canadian workers enjoy today. And during our working lives, we fought hard and long with our unions for the wages and benefits workers enjoy today, a fair share of the richness of Canada. Wages and benefits that allowed us to buy a house, take an occasional vacation, put our kids through college and university, and set aside something for retirement.

Tags:
labour unions Harper government anti-union tim hudak retiree matters Bill C-377

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