Legal Research

OAS Reform Passed

By Shaunna Mireau

We have a new law in Canada, or we will when it received Royal Assent. Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Old Age Security Act, made it through the House of Commons and the Senate.

SUMMARY
This enactment amends the Old Age Security Act to preclude incarcerated persons from receiving benefits under this Act while maintaining entitlement to benefits for, and avoiding a reduction in the amounts payable to, their spouse or common-law partner under this Act.

Thank heavens that our minority government could all agree that Canadians would feel better to know that if you make it to 65 and you are incarcerated for a crime, we won’t send a cheque for old age security to your prison address, even if you apply for one.

The backgrounder to the news release when this bill was introduced in July doesn’t reveal the tally of how much taxpayer funded dollars have been trickling into the bank accounts of elder Canadians convicted of a crime. The Liberal party news release calling on the government to use the savings from this for victims of crime also doesn’t speak to the volume of the problem. The CBC estimated, with the help of Diane Finley that this applies to 400 federal inmates or about $2 million a year.

While I agree that it is absolutely ridiculous that Clifford Olsen has been recieving an OAS cheque, my question is this: Is it just in 2010 that someone noticed that OAS cheques were being sent to Canadians incarcerated in federal penitenaries? As Charlie Brown would say: “Good grief.”

Full post as published by Slaw.ca on December 14, 2010 (boomark / email).