Information regarding CPP is displayed on the Service Canada website in Ottawa.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
Dig in
Re “Make no mistake, there’s an economic war happening, and the West is losing” (Report on Business, May 23): Congratulations to the contributors on their thoughtful assessment of Canada’s flagging competitiveness, particularly in the natural resources sector at a time when investment and advancement are needed most.
For far too long, I have watched governments and the public overwhelmingly favour the well-intended but misguided cries of ardent environmentalists and other activists opposed to resource development. In doing so, officials have blithely allowed a once-mighty sector to stagnate, at best, and otherwise fall into decline.
Meanwhile other countries forge ahead, many of them guided by inferior environmental and social responsibility practices. Canadians should stand up for responsible domestic resource development and put our resources to Canada’s full advantage, including well-paying jobs and greater access to minerals and fuels the world needs – and, sadly, is obtaining from other sources, at Canada’s loss.
Randall Mang Sidney, B.C.
Pension problems
Re “Eighteen years and $46-billion later, the CPP admits it could have earned more just by buying index funds” (May 24): I have been surprised at the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board’s power, annoyed at its lack of accountability to Parliament, furious at some investments and more than disappointed with the management of our pension funds.
I am certainly not impressed with an 8-per-cent gain. Even this senior’s modest portfolio of Canadian equities did better. Then there is the revelation that expenses “exceed $5.5 billion annually.”
The other shocker is that Canadian equities are hardly given a glance. Canada’s share of investment is 12 per cent, mostly bonds, while big bucks are invested in U.S. tech, Italian telecoms, seaports for Australian coal exports, German wind farms, etc.
No doubt the poohbahs of investment will weigh in on the efficacy of worldwide investments. Their view of Canada seems to be that we are unworthy of their time and energy, except to provide money.
I hope our government can change this situation.
Mary Dixon Winnipeg
Performance for public pension funds should not be compared to personal investment portfolios. The objectives are completely different.
National public pension funds and sovereign wealth funds must invest huge sums of money and consider the entire population of financial assets. Besides fixed income and public equities, the range of investments also includes private equity, real estate, hedge funds and infrastructure.
Global SWF’s 2024 annual report shows that the Canada Pension Plan had an annualized return of 10.9 per cent for the 10-year period from 2013 to 2022. This performance was second highest in the world, exceeded only by New Zealand at 12.1 per cent.
For comparison, the 10-year annualized return for the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund was 6.7 per cent. For the S&P 500, it was 10.4 per cent.
J.D. Jobson Edmonton
This error in management seems more interesting than common bureaucratic incompetence, caused in part by people intuitively rejecting the understanding, confirmed by innumerable studies, that no one can beat the index, after fees, in the long run.
I believe the other factor is a large army of investment professionals, whose livelihoods depend on disputing such an inconvenient truth.
Biff Matthews Toronto
Is it any wonder some Albertans do not want to be a part of this?
Mark Taylor Toronto
Proves the point?
Re “Pay rises at Hydro One as Ford government’s restrictions end – but it hasn’t gone up enough” (Report on Business, May 24): It’s ironic that Hydro One made superb profit whilst its CEO and CFO were paid millions less than other executives of similar corporations. Yet the company’s executive compensation framework states they need to be paid more in order to retain the best talent.
Hasn’t Hydro One’s results over the past few years disproved this link once and for all?
Les Harris Former CEO, Canamedia; Clarington, Ont.
Different vision
Re “RCMP alters dress code to add Indigenous ribbon skirts for ceremonial uniforms” (May 24): The RCMP dress-code change recalls Sir John A. Macdonald’s original vision for the Mounties, founded in 1873 as the North-West Mounted Police.
Macdonald had circulated an order in council outlining his plans for a mounted force which would comprise 200 officers, all but 50 recruited from the West and including English and French Métis. In the House of Commons, he described this measure as a “commingling of the races.” Unfortunately, Louis Riel’s “uprising” made the plan impossible to implement.
Richard Gwynn, in his magnificent two-volume biography of Macdonald, comments: ”Had the races commingled successfully in this astoundingly successful police force, the succeeding blighted relationship,” between Europeans and Indigenous peoples in Canada, “might have unfolded differently.”
Larry Muller Trent Lakes, Ont.
Hope springs
Re “In its pain and its hope, Winnipeg is Canada’s most vital laboratory for reconciliation” (May 20): A hopeful account of a city whose sizable Indigenous population puts it at the forefront of reconciliation. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission considered reconciliation made up of acknowledgement of past wrongs, atonement and action to change ongoing behaviours.
Most of us in areas of Canada with little direct Indigenous engagement (where silent groans often meet long, earnest land acknowledgements) can still feel an undeniable, guilty weight of acknowledgement and therefore support atonement (though baffled as to the estimate of scale against centuries of injustice). However, we are distanced from day-to-day change.
The recommendations of the 1991 Royal Commission and 2015 TRC are largely unimplemented. Living conditions on reserves, educational funding, economic disparities, etc., are reminders of chronic government foot-dragging.
Winnipeg suggests that perhaps progress is best achieved by an active Indigenous community holding those proverbial feet to the fire.
Chester Fedoruk Toronto
In name
Re “Special deliveries” (May 21): I thoroughly enjoyed the piece on the history of Letters to the Editor, including the flattering photograph that took years off my face. I thought I would add a name to your highlight of prolific contributors over the years, particularly since he can no longer speak for himself because he is pushing up daisies, as he would no doubt have put it.
C.N.R Stewart was a well-known writer to this page in The Globe, and I suspect a number of readers would be delighted to see his name in print again. And to clarify a question that I am frequently asked, we are not kin, related only in our devotion to Letters to the Editor.
J. D. M. Stewart Toronto
Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Keep letters to 150 words or fewer. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here: letters@globeandmail.com