OTTAWA (CBC) - Nortel pensioners are welcoming news that the federal government is reforming federally regulated pensions and that the Liberal party has launched a working group to study pensions, even though those actions won't affect the Nortel pensioners directly.

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced the changes to federally regulated pensions on Tuesday.

Only around 10 per cent of pension plans are federally regulated and Don Sproule, national chair of the group representing Nortel retirees, acknowledged that Nortel's pension is a provincial responsibility.

However, politicians finally seem to be listening, Sproule said after Flaherty indicated Monday that he was about to announce the changes.

"People hopefully thought the company [Nortel] might re-emerge. It's now quite apparent that it's not and it's heading towards bankruptcy," he said. "And I think that people are now understanding the implications to the pensioners and people who are owed money from the Nortel estate."

Nortel retirees have been lobbying governments for months, since Nortel filed for bankruptcy protection in January and began selling off its units one by one.

They worry they will lose a large chunk of their pension once Nortel finally ceases operations, leaving them officially in the queue of the company's unsecured creditors. That means they would have to jostle with other creditors for a share of whatever is left.

Flaherty said during question period Monday that "comprehensive reform" to federally regulated pension plans would be announced shortly, following consultation with stakeholders that started last January.

On Tuesday, he confirmed the government plans to boost the allowable surplus for federally regulated pension plans from 10 per cent to 25 per cent. In the past, it was capped to protect tax revenues, as pension plan contributions are tax-exempt.

The government also plans to make employers who terminate a pension plan to fund all of the benefits of those already retired, rather than the 80 per cent currently required.

The federal Liberal party was also talking about pensions this week.

Many Nortel retirees sat in the audience Monday as a Liberal working group on pensions heard from politicians, labour and finance experts.

They described the pension deficits faced by many companies, which worsen during a recession, and the problems that occur when a company goes bankrupt and employee contributions to the pension plan cease.

Pierre Laporte, a Toronto pension lawyer who co-chairs the working group, said its goal is to get people involved to "come up with meaningful, substantive policies to fix the mess we're in" and to provide advice to the Liberal party.