The Ontario government Wednesday appointed human resources consultant Bill Morneau to lead public consultations on its plans to consolidate the investment management of smaller public sector pension plans.
Morneau is charged with engaging with stakeholders on approaches to investment pooling, reviewing actions taken in other places, and considering academic research in the area. Final recommendations to the provincial minister of finance, Dwight Duncan, are due by early fall.
In its recent budget, the government announced plans to introduce a legislative framework this fall that would pool the investment management functions of smaller public pensions. With a relatively small amount of assets and members, but maintaining their own investment management functions, this duplicates costs and prevents economies of scale, it notes.
A move to pool these functions could be achieved either through a new investment management entity, or by building on existing large public-sector pension plans, the budget notes.
Morneau is executive chairman of human resource consulting and outsourcing firm, Morneau Shepell. Among other things, he’s also chairman of the C.D. Howe Institute and sits on the boards of AGF Management Ltd. and AGF Trust Co.