It is a genuine honour to join the University Pension Plan Ontario (UPP) as its inaugural President and CEO.
The successful launch of the UPP will ensure sustainable defined benefit pensions for today’s plan members and generations of university sector employees to come.
In my decades of working in the pension industry, I have seen that effective pension plans start with putting plan members at the centre of every decision, delivering high quality service, and having a strong financial plan built on a solid foundation.
At the UPP, we have a unique opportunity to build on the strengths and values of the universities’ existing plans as we create a new plan that delivers stable and secure results for you, our plan members.
I am grateful for the sustained hard work of so many to get the UPP to this important milestone.
I am excited to work with the Board of Trustees – an extraordinary team with varied experience and deep expertise – to prepare for July 1, 2021 when, conditional on regulatory approvals, the UPP will become fully operational. This will be a watershed day for Ontario’s university sector as the UPP joins other world-recognized Ontario pension plans that have successfully adopted the jointly sponsored pension plan (JSPP) model.
As a JSPP, UPP’s governance is a shared responsibility between the employer and employee sponsors, giving members a new level of involvement in the governance of their pension plan. Working together, we can ensure smart and agile responses to new and emerging issues – like COVID-19 – and safeguard the long-term sustainability of Ontario university pension plans.