IT'S TIME FOR SERIOUS PENSION PROTECTION

    When we address insolvency legislation and argue that super-priority status should be extended to unfunded pension liabilities, we get quite a different response from, often, the same sponsors, financial community experts, and bureaucrats. They now argue that pension protection is a huge issue. Protecting pensions would be “disastrous,” cause more companies to collapse, threaten commercial lending in Canada, and significantly constrain growth. In the past, the policymakers, the public, and politicians nodded and agreed with the “experts.”
   In short, the same sponsors, financial community experts, and bureaucrats say the problem is so small it’s not worth addressing as an insolvency funding issue; and yet say that if addressed in insolvency it will cause companies to collapse and threaten all commercial lending in Canada. So which is it?
    Sears has opened the eyes of the public and politicians to high-level fundamental moral issues of balance and fairness in current Canadian insolvency legislation. They are now also looking at and challenging these past “truths.”