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Wednesday, June 3, 2009 Orono Weekly Times - 5 Politically Speaking by Bill Stockwell A British Columbia resident recently wrote the editor of the National Post in response to a number of columns pertaining to the shortfall in the General Motors Pension Plan and the efforts of the C.A.W. to have both the Federal and Ontario Provincial Governments pick up the tab on behalf of their respective taxpayers ( i.e. you and me both times). The negotiations between G.M and the C.A.W. were monitored very closely by both governments. He stated that, " Regardless of how the deal is spun, Canadian taxpayers will be subsidizing G.M. and Chrysler retirees. This is patently wrong". He went on to say that he was a small business man and the only pension he has to look forward to are the funds that he was able to save and invest and now he finds his tax dollars will be used to bail out G.M. and the C.A.W. Now, the present leadership of the C.A.W. makes a point by stating that the Province of Ontario has a, "moral and legal responsibility" to cover the shortfall because when passing a piece of legislation back in 1992 ordering companies to top-up employees pension funds they gave General Motors a pass in participating. This was sometimes referred to as the Too Big To Fail clause. Even as recently as 2008 Buzz Hargrove, the then master of the C.A.W., was quoted in a Toronto Star article saying that a worse-case scenario that would trigger pension reductions was, "so remote a possibility it`s not worth speculating on". Those of you that were around in 1992 remember that Ontario was being governed at the time by an N.D.P. government headed up by Premier Bob Ray, who now sits in Ottawa as a born-again Liberal. 1992 was before Bob Ray had his epiphany on the crashing Ontario economy and introduced his Ray Days Legislation that ticked off most Ontarians, whether they were from the left or right. A few years later, Mike Harris beat him at the polls and inherited a province that was on the brink of bankruptcy. So, it`s difficult to believe that Bob Ray could put through this type of legislation without the C.A.W. being privy to it and even supporting it. After all, the Minister of Labour at the time was Bob MacKenzie, an ex-union organizer, that, in the Legislature, referred to the then head of the C.A.W. (Bob White) as "Brother Bob". The high muckamucks of the C.A.W. were inside players in that government. Having said all of that, it still doesn`t solve the problem at hand. There are a whack of retirees out there that are looking at the possibility of their pensions being slashed. As someone who lives off of a pension, I clearly understand the stress that these people are presently under. However, using taxpayer`s money to bail out private sector companies is certainly going down a slippery slope. What compaSTOCKWELL see page 11