Pensions and Employee Benefits Law Blog 

On December 31, 2022 amendments to B.C.’s Pensions Benefits Standards Regulation came into force. While these amendments primarily address PfAD reform for target benefit plans, they also updated the information that target benefit plans are required to provide to active and retired members in their annual statements.

In particular, the annual statements for active ...

The Pension Benefits Standards Act requires B.C. registered pension plans to conduct triennial plan assessments which assess the administration of a pension plan with respect to compliance with the Act, governance, funding, investment, and the performance of trustees and administrators.

For most pension plans (those with a fiscal year of January to December), the next ...

As part of the Budget Implementation Act, 2021, the federal government announced on November 25, 2022 that Employment Insurance (EI) sickness benefits will be extended from 15 weeks to 26 weeks, effective December 18, 2022.

Employees who qualify and establish a new EI claim on or after December 18 will be eligible for up to 26 weeks of EI sickness benefits and will receive ...

As noted previously on this blog, pension regulators have been working towards increasing guidance for pension plan administrators in relation to protecting pension plan information and records. The BC Financial Services Authority (FSA) issued drafts of its Information Security Guideline and its Outsourcing Guideline, invited consultation, and in October 2021 ...

In the 2018 budget, the Government of Canada announced its initiative to discontinue CRA policies regarding health and welfare trusts (HWTs) and require conversion of HWTs to employee life and health trusts (ELHTs). The amendments to the Income Tax Act required to implement this initiative came into force on June 29, 2021. The deadline for conversion remains January 1 ...

On February 4, 2022, the federal government released a set of draft legislative proposals relating to the Income Tax Act (Canada) for public comment. Many of these proposals implement changes previously announced or confirmed in Budget 2021: A Recovery Plan for Jobs, Growth, and Resilience.

This article discusses the draft proposals that are of interest to ...

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic. As financial markets became turbulent and many plan sponsors were forced to alter their businesses due to COVID-19 precautions, pension regulators across Canada responded by announcing special measures to help protect the interests of pension plan members, assist pension plan ...

In response to industry feedback after its initial release of the Information Security Guideline, BC Financial Services Authority (BC FSA) has issued:

1. A revised version of the Information Security Guideline and
2. The new Outsourcing Guideline.

BC FSA advised in its Advisory 21-015 that accompanied the revised Information Security Guideline that the revisions reflect ...

In May 2021, the Canadian Association of Pension Supervisory Authorities (CAPSA) released updated Guideline No. 7, Pension Plan Funding Policy Guideline. CAPSA was engaged in a consultation process in the fall of 2020 and the updated Guideline is the result of that consultation process.

The updated Guideline No. 7 maintains the useful and clear guidance on pension plan ...

On April 30, 2021, Bill C-30, the most recent federal budget implementation bill, underwent first reading in the House of Commons. Bill C-30 contains the amendments to the Income Tax Act that are required to effect the health and welfare trust to employee life and health trust (ELHT) conversion initiative that was first announced by the government of Canada in the 2018 ...