The Pension Surplus Trial Adjourned
The first phase of the trial regarding the $30.2-billion surplus taken from the Canadian Forces (CF), the Public Service (PS), and the RCMP pension accounts ended on Friday 18 November.
During the first four days of the trial that had started on Tuesday November 15, government lawyers asked the judge not to admit as evidence the 128 government documents the plaintiffs are submitting to the court, even though they concede to the authenticity of these documents. Instead, the government lawyers would like the plaintiffs’ lawyers to call the authors of all the 128 documents as witnesses during the trial.
The lawyers defending FSNA and the other plaintiffs argued against the points made by the Crown lawyers. The Judge adjourned the trial to examine the documents and promised he would soon announce whether he would admit the documents immediately or whether he would take a few months to determine which ones were admissible.
No one can predict how long it will take for this case to be settled, or even how it will end. The plaintiffs’ position was however summed up as follows by one of their lawyers, James Cameron, as he was being interviewed on CBC’s “The House” last Saturday. “Really at the heart of this case, what we are contending, is that the deductions from pay checks that were made over all those years, and the contributions that were made by employees and the employer, and the interest thereon was and is intended to be used for pension purposes. And so what – to be very clear about this, what we’re seeking is a return of those funds to those pension accounts. We’re not seeking a pay-out to any individual.”
