On December 3, 2013, Québec's National Assembly
adopted Bill 39, entitled the Voluntary Retirement Savings
Plans Act. Beginning on July 1, 2014, the government will
gradually phase in these new plans, called "VRSPs", which
will give more than two million Québec workers access to a
simple, low-cost retirement savings vehicle. Bill 39 is similar to
an earlier bill, Bill 80, tabled by the previous government on June
12, 2012. The bill was adopted in the general context of the
D'Amours Report1 (tabled during the second quarter
of 2013) and its recommendations.
This new legislation provides that any employer2
having a place of business in Québec may offer a
VRSP to its employees but must do so if it has five or
more eligible employees on December 31 of a given year, unless the
employer makes available to its employees a registered retirement
savings plan or a tax-free savings account or fall into a category
of employees that have a registered pension plan as defined in
