Canada’s oldest company is dead. Hudson’s Bay, an iconic department store chain whose first location opened in 1881, has closed its retail shops and laid off its remaining employees — over 8,300 of them. The closures bring an end to a story that stretches back to the seventeenth century and the early days of the colonial project of British North America, the fur trade, and what would later become the country of Canada.
Today workers and former executives of the Bay are struggling to get a share of what they’re owed by the company, including, in some cases, their pensions. The company had recently sought creditor protection, hoping to limp along and perhaps recover. Soon after, it announced it was closing for good, owing roughly CAD$1 billion to creditors.
In April, the Bay told former senior executives that their pensions under its supplementary executive retirement plan would be cut. As the Globe and Mail reports, the supplementary executive pension fund wasn’t fully pre-funded and, under Canadian law, receives less protection than a standard, registered pension fund. As of 2022, the fund was short $84.5 million.
At the same time, the newspaper noted that the larger employee fund — the one covering 20,000 workers, the bulk of the Bay’s employees — was actually in a surplus position, covering a mix of defined benefit and defined contribution schemes. The Bay’s then chief financial officer, Jennifer Bewley, wrote in a March affidavit that the bigger pension fund “is sufficiently funded and is able to satisfy its liabilities.” The…
Auteur: David Moscrop
