ARE THEY AS GOOD AS THEY SAY?
Workers at Bell, Expertech, Projistix, Nexacor, Nexxia, Bell Mobility.
If you think that you have a good pension plan…
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You work for the biggest and richest corporation in Canada. You expect that when you’ve put in your time that you will be able to retire with a decent pension, but…
The Bell Canada pension plan provides for a much lower standard of living than pensions provided by other large Canadian corporations.
Workers at Bell, Expertech, Progistix, Nexacor, Nexxia, Bell Mobility, etc, (all members of the Bell Canada or BCE Pension Plan), must on average, continue working many more years than other workers to qualify for a pension which will allow them to live in dignity.
Actuaries estimate that you will need to save as much as $300,000 in RRSPs in addition to your Bell pension in order to have the recommended 70% income replacement in retirement.
There is something wrong when workers must hope for incentive packages to come along before they can get an adequate pension.
Why is it so?
It’s certainly not because Bell Canada can’t afford to provide good pensions. Bell is tremendously rich and could easily afford to improve the pension plan. Other less wealthy corporations pay millions of dollars every year to fund pensions that are better than Bell’s.
The frustrating part?
The Bell Canada pension plan is not only fully funded, so that Bell hasn’t had to make any contributions for over a decade, but it is over funded by $2.7 Billion. * $2.7 billion was the surplus in Q1 2002 as determined by an independant actuary hired by CEP. This amount will vary.*
$2.7 Billion! That’s one heck of a lot of pension money. This surplus could easily pay for better pensions for all employees and still leave the Company in a position where they would never again have to make a contribution to the pension plan.
It wouldn’t cost Bell Canada single penny to provide good pensions.
What is Bell Canada waiting for?
Even though Bell is prevented by law from using the $2.7 billion surplus for purposes other than pensions, they’d rather keep it in their pockets than share it with the employees who deserve it.
What can we do about it?
All Bell Canada Pension Plan members, whether or not they are in CEP, can push for improvements to the pension plan.
We can highlight the inadequacy of the pension plan on employee surveys.
We can inform our managers that they are in the same poor pension plan and should push for better.
We can talk to workers in other Bell family companies, such as Bell Mobility, and tell them that they should organize themselves to fight for better pensions.
The best opportunity will come during upcoming contract negotiations where CEP will make pension improvements a bargaining priority.
Our Plan, Our Surplus