Labour Speaks Out to Save MTS Pensions

At a rally held on Monday, September 17, numerous people spoke out in support of MTS Allstream workers who are in a fight to protect their pension plan. In negotiations now in progress, management at MTS Allstream wants to erase the economic security and the dignity that workers can expect from their defined benefits plan in favour of a more precarious and expensive defined contribution model.

Among the speakers who denounced this attack on the right of workers to have a financially safe and secure retirement was MFL President Darlene Dziewit (left).

"The Manitoba Federation of Labour and its affiliates, with a combined membership of more than 96,000 working men and women, support the workers at Manitoba Telecom Services who belong to three different unions," Dziewit told people who attended the rally. "Today, we demonstrate in support of the members of TEAM, but the members of the other two unions - the Communications Energy and Paperworkers Union and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers - are equally at risk.

"Some, including the employer, argue that moving new employees to a Defined Contribution Pension Plan will not affect any of the current members of TEAM. They are dead wrong. By creating an ever diminishing pool of Defined Benefit Plan members, the proponents of the DC type of plan will ensure that improvements to the DB plan can never occur. The plan will whither on the vine.

"If the MTS bargaining team thinks that the Manitoba Labour Movement will stand by while it attacks the pensions of our members, then it had better think again. We know the effectiveness of solidarity and collective action."

Barbara Byers, executive vice-president of the Canadian Labour Congress also addressed the workers.

"Eighty four percent of workers who have a pension, have 'Defined benefit pension plans' (often called DB Plans) because they are good for employers and employees," she said.

Employers see DB plans as a valuable source of employee retention. Employees see their defined benefit pension plans as a pool of deferred wages that will deliver dignity, certainty and economic security when they retire. Registration, clear regulations, inspections, public reporting and decades of experience have made DB plans reliable and safe.

Management at MTS Allstream want to erase all these advantages in favour of a more precarious and expensive defined contribution model. Defined contribution plans carry more risks than many RRSPs and suffer from the same higher management costs that equal 30 to 40 percent of the contributions over an average work life.

"Bay Street and money managers obviously prefer these plans. But they are not good for working families," Byers says. "MTS Allstream is getting bad advice. The company is putting its employees' retirement prospects in jeopardy to chase apparent short-term savings. Experience elsewhere has shown that this strategy only leads to higher expenses, litigations and difficulty hiring and retaining employees.

"The Canadian Labour Congress is on the side of MTS Allstream employees to say 'No to uncertainty! No to poverty!' We are calling on MTS Allstream to stop attacking and undermining its employees' DB pension plan. Pensions are deferred wages and a highly-profitable company like MTS Allstream should make sure that its workers have the best possible retirement prospects.

"Only Bay Street high rollers, money managers and pension administrators really profit from the defined contribution pension plans they are pushing. That is why the Canadian Labour Congress advocates to protect and multiply the more reliable defined benefit pension plans and promote dignity, certainty and economic security for workers' retirement years."