![Employers should use Liberals’ win to boost participation in their pension plans](https://www.benefitscanada.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/7/2014/11/Canada_flag_1.jpg)
The Liberal Party of Canada has just won a majority government, which means Canadian workplaces will see more discussions about saving for retirement, industry experts point out.
During the election campaign, the Liberals promised to increase the monthly CPP benefit.
At the same time, the Ontario government recently announced that if the Liberals come to power, it might drop the ORPP, a mandatory retirement plan on top of the CPP that would take effect at the beginning of 2017 and mandate contributions of 1.9% of pay from employers and employees at companies without pension plans.
Read: Businesses scared of ORPP’s economic impact
“If we have a partner in Justin Trudeau to sit down and work out what they’re looking at as an enhancement to CPP, that was always my starting point, that was the solution,” Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne said on Oct. 13, quoted by the Canadian Press.
But after the victory of the Liberals, Wynne said that even though she’s optimistic they’ll enhance the CPP, they can’t do it without other provinces’ support, so for now Ontario will proceed with the ORPP.
No matter what happens next, “employees will be hearing a lot more about retirement planning in the months to come and evaluating what this means to them,” Towers Watson said in a press release this morning.
Read: What you need to know about the ORPP
“This is an opportunity for employers to maximize participation and engagement in their existing retirement programs and consider how to best integrate their workplace pension and savings plans with government programs,” the statement added.