Cornwall ON – Federal NDP candidate Darlene Jalbert looks like she’s doing her rendition of Pee Wee Herman dancing to “Tequila”! A good time was had in Lamoureux Park Labour Day Monday. You can tell it’s election time as politicians from the usual NDP labour supporters were joined by Mayor Bob Kilger, and city councilors Bernadette Clement, Mark MacDonald who’s also running for mayor, and Syd Gardiner.
MP Guy Lauzon runs away after request for better Pensions for Canadians
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQQH0y3rTAw
Over 500 people visited, and had a super time. There was entertainment, kite flying, and the coolest little train circling the park for kids of all ages! It shows that people do really care about having better jobs in the community, and the community spirit in general in the park was electric.
Mayorality candidate Nicole Spahich also was present along with Gary Samler, Maurice Dupelle, and Jason Setnyk, all running for council.
Excerpts of speeches from Mayor Bob Kilger, Elaine MacDonald, and Darlene Jalbert
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHzwlmf0TTM
It was a perfect autumn is coming day in the park with tons of music, merriment, free munchies, and lots of good chatting.
Today’s Cornwall Labour Day celebrations at the park was great! I had the opportunity to shake hands with over 200 Cornwall residents and talked a bit about municipal politics. I met with union reps, firefighters, school teachers, health care workers, and factory workers; families, working class, and seniors. It was a productive day and I learned a lot. I enjoyed the live music, entertainment, and the BBQ. I marched proudly in solidarity with the workers of Cornwall Ontario. It was a fantastic day, and kudos to everyone who helped organize it! Well done!
The day was very well organized and everyone was having a really good time. Congrats ! to all who helped organize this great day.
Did anyone ask Darlene about the pensions??
I hope this helps smee.
Letter to the Editor by Darlene Jalbert – A Stronger Canada Pension Plan
A Stronger Canada Pension Plan
For your entire career you work hard and build a good life for your family. Every Pay cheque, your deductions include a small amount that is tucked away in your public pension plan.
When retirement comes, you expect to be able to live in dignity with some measure of financial security. Yet this recession has shown that things might not be as secure as you have been led to believe. Your RRSP has been decimated by the global financial crisis.
And if you had been counting on your company pension plan, you might be in for an even greater surprise. Over the past year more than 5,700 companies have filed for bankruptcy. In many of those cases, the pension plans were underfunded and workers stand to lose out to other creditors.
For most of us, then, the most secure retirement savings we have are in the Canada/Quebec Pension Plans (CPP/QPP), to which the vast majority of Canadians and their employers contribute. But at present, the maximum benefit it offers is $11,000 a year.
Yet the CPP/QPP remains the single most effective solution to ensure retirement security. It’s portable, sustainable, risk free and publicly (and cheaply) administered. It pays predictable benefits that don’t fall if markets collapse.
You contribute to it with each paycheque you take home. It’s safer than many company plans because the risk is shared with the 93 per cent of Canadians who are members. And it is protected by legislation. That means that if even if your employer is declared bankrupt, your retirement savings are secure – unlike workers at Nortel, for example.
It also pays benefits progressively, so if you pay in more while working, you receive higher benefits when you retire. Its only drawback is the limit on the contributions you and your employer can make.
New Democrats want to raise that limit so that you can contribute more now and receive better benefits later.
Currently, the maximum CPP/QPP available benefit is $908.75 a month for an individual retiree. By allowing you and your employer to contribute an additional 2.5 per cent, the maximum benefit would gradually rise to $1,817.50 per month.
To put that 2.5 per cent contribution increase in perspective, most RRSPs charge that in administration fees. In fact, RRSP holders paid $25 billion in fees and commissions to mutual funds in 2007 alone. In exchange, they watched their retirement savings shrivel as many RRSPs lost up to 50 per cent of their value in the last year.
Instead of pumping more money into mutual funds and other investment vehicles that investment advisors tend to recommend, we believe that you and your employer should be allowed to contribute more money to CPP/QPP so you receive a far better benefit when you retire. Risk free.
The retirement-savings reform package New Democrats have put forward – from expanding CPP/QPP to protecting company pensions when bankruptcies occur – are the most effective and well-developed now under discussion in Ottawa. With the Conservatives tinkering at the edges and the Liberals only just beginning to talk about what needs to be done, there is no question that our party is in the lead on this issue.
We urge all parties in Ottawa to recognise that the national crisis in retirement savings requires national solutions and national leadership. Implement our plans. Ensure retirement security for Canadians. There’s no more time to waste.
Darlene Jalbert
Federal NDP Candidate
Stormont, Dundas & South Glengarry
I read about that willie
The concerns here are where we are going to get the money to increase the CPP/QPP, when people seem to have enough problems just buying groceries.. And why do we differentiate from CPP and QPP?
If we look at the more lucrative pension plans and yea let’s look at the politicians, the pay or sorry we pay I think %10 of their earnings.
Teachers pension plans have teachers paying if memory serves 18% plus 1.5% indexing and people of Ontario contribute the rest to a cost exceeding 800 million, at that rate 1 billion sounds more accurate after all costs entailed are taken into account.
Why then willie do we as Canadians or the general populous of Canadians need to worry about the chicken feed we receive from government investments in our pension. What do they invest the monies in?
With just a third of its capital, Ontario Teachers’ owns about 1.5% of the $1.17 trillion in shares listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange. It’s among the biggest single shareholders of BCE Inc., Royal Bank of Canada, Maple Leaf Foods, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, and Bank of Montreal, with investments of more than $500 million in each.”
Now why can’t government provide all Canadians? With a security close to what just one civil servant group earns. I think if the pension plan is that secure the 1 billion could bebetter invested else where in Ontario.
Then we have Ruby Dhalla wanting to hand out more of our money to the undeserving to think about as well.
HAHAHAHA!!! Guy ran away during mention of better pensions for Canadians??? what an awesome MP people voted in… and this guy is about to get a golden handshake…
yep grim a golden handshake with a pension to boot
.
There is another thing about pensions, why do we pay for a civil servants like Lauzon or Brownell. If any one of us provided the results for our employers as those two did for their constituents not only would we be out of a pension but a job as well.
I would like to hear Darlene or the Green Party incumbent comment on that concern. Taxation with out representation I think it would be referred to.
Politicians line their pockets first, giving us peasants just a pittance. And we accept it, shrug our shoulders and say, there is nothing I can do about. No use in voting. I hear it often. BTW, Darlene didn’t run away.
willie191 are you a peasant?
nor did she answer willie.
Yeah, Guy has to go… talk about one of the most useless politicians I have ever known…
Have to agree with smee on the Darlene non answer part..
Smee, an incumbent is an elected politician who is holding office. I don’t think the Green Party has ever had an incumbent.
Furtz, you can’t take Smee seriously, because, after all, he’s proved time and again in these posts that he’s only semi-literate, and has a hard time dealing with facts.
As for the Green Party never having had an incumbent, technically, you’re wrong. Unfortunately I can’t remember the gentleman’s name, but the full details are in Elizateth May’s book, Losing Confidence.
I don’t remember if it was in the 2006 or 2008 election, but Harper and Layton were fighting desperately not to include the Green Party leader in the TV candidates’ debate, although the party fully qualified in terms of number of candidates, percentage of vote in the previous election, etc. This Honourable Gentleman crossed the floor to sit as a Green, in order to assure Elizabeth May’s presence at the debate.
It’s amazing how threatened some of the main stream politicos are by The Green Party….
I am aware of what an incumbent is Furtz, The Greens were never elected in our area but they did earn status in the previous election. That is how they were able to attend the debate.
Jamie I doubt the main streams are threatened by the Greens. It is more concern for loosing potential votes to a party with no main idealism or focus for Canada. The Green party takes it’s Ten Key Values based on the United States Green Party. Talk about a party selling out th the US.
Watcher, I am not sure what you are watching but to answer your incorrect posts, no Green Party member has ever been elected into federal politics, however Blair Wilson was elected as a Liberal and crossed to the greens in 2008.
The reason the greens were not invited to debates is due to their lack of representation in the House of commons. That was when Harris was party leader.
The only reason May was in the last debate was a loop created by the Bloc who in the early 90’s earned a seat in the house. That combined with one seat in the house, Wilson the greens too were invited but poorly represented.
Smee, your semi-literacy continues to amaze everyone. Did you actually read my post? But congratulations on getting someone to explain the word incumbent to you.
And no, Smee, the reason the Greens were not invited to the debate is because Harper and Layton felt threatened. Because of their number of candidates, and their previous percentages of the vote, they had every right to be there.
As for the party taking its ten key points from the US Greens, is there something wrong with that, if they happen to be correct and fair? And by the way, most of these points are shared by all the Green Parties, regardless of nationality. Why is this selling out to the US? Please try and explain this point. But keep in mind that you’ve shown again and again that you take your ten key points from George W Bush and the Republican Party. Therefore you’re selling out to the US.
By the way, in case you’re not too sure, George W Bush was the Republican President of the US from 2000 to 2008.
Nope watcher I do not read all your posts. They are usually incorrect and poorly written. They are opinion based and lack facts.
Case in point
“the reason the Greens were not invited to the debate is because Harper and Layton felt threatened. Because of their number of candidates, and their previous percentages of the vote, they had every right to be there”
Once again you let media rule your poor decisions. Remember Chicken Little *lol*
Smee, you don’t have a clue, do you? Why don’t you let someone who actually can read and write explain all these posts to you.
And anyone who writes that the Americans entered WW2 on Sept 11, 1944, in a “supporting role” simply cannot be taken seriously as a historical commentator.
And Smee, everyone knows you can’t read all of my posts. Why don’t you get someone to read them to you, and explain them?
Or perhaps you could enroll yourself in Tri-County Literacy.
SMEE’S REAL IDENTITY!
Yes, I’ve finally figured it out. Judging by the style, the nonsense, the constant denials of reality, and the prohibition of using his real name in dealing with the media SMEE is really GUY LAUZON.
BWAHAHAHAH!!! Unfortunately, even smee has more of a personal opinion than Guy can probably ever put out..
Who is Guy Lauzon? Does he do anything in this area?
Wow watcher three consecutive posts lacking proper grammar and intellectual content.
We can also mention your desire to only quote portions of discussions that suit your purpose. I corrected myself on the date the US entered the war. If you can read that far back I commented on how they became the pawns for the British after landing in Ireland.
But then again I believe you will have issues with that information as it was neither on discovery nor the military channel.