Mark Fuller: Sharing responsibility for creating a sustainable retirement system in Canada

On December 10, 2015, President & CEO Mark Fuller spoke to the Actuarial Standards Oversight Council about the challenges the Canadian retirement system is facing, and the shared responsibility all organizations in the system have to ensure their decisions are helping create a healthy retirement system for generations to come.

Mark stressed that ensuring we’re providing Canadians with a system that enables them to retire with adequate income should be guiding the decisions of all organizations within our retirement system. For example, as a pension plan administrator, OPB has a fiduciary duty to ensure its ability to pay all accrued benefits as promised. However, Mark explained that OPB defines its fiduciary duty more broadly. We believe our mission includes not just paying the promised pension benefit, but protecting the plan for the future – meaning keeping it open, affordable and with a benefits package designed to build adequate income for our members in retirement. Standard setters, he continued, can play an important role by carefully considering how a proposed standard change could impact the health of our retirement system and factoring any impacts into their decision.

In his closing remarks, Mark noted that our retirement system needs champions. He urged all players to focus beyond their individual mandates and to take an active role in ensuring the continued health of the Canadian retirement system.