Posts Tagged ‘poverty’

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Welfare rates now $200 a month below the Harris cuts of 1995

Saturday, January 6th, 2024

… inflation over two PC tenures since Bill Davis and Frank Miller has risen 35.2 per cent with no increases to Ontario Works and a total of just 12 per cent for ODSP. The last PC Premier to raise OW rates was Bill Davis 39 years ago in 1985… The cumulative effect of multidecade inaction — whether on housing or climate change — is now coming home to roost. Just look at food bank usage.

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Program at Hamilton Public Library shows how libraries can expand the social services they provide

Wednesday, December 13th, 2023

Library social workers aim to remove systemic barriers… by offering preventative support… and by helping people access services that offer longer-term solutions to their problems… they are trained and able to support trauma, mental-health issues, challenges and complex needs in a way that meets the person where they are at emotionally, physically and/or cognitively.

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Canada is rolling out its dental care program.

Monday, December 11th, 2023

The program will be phased in, starting with seniors. Eligible Canadians aged 87 and above can start applying this month. Those aged 77 to 86 can start applying in January 2024, followed by those aged 72 to 76 in February. If you’re between the ages of 70 and 71, you can apply in March… Starting in May 2024, applications will move to an online portal, and will open up to seniors aged 65 and up. In June, anyone with a valid Disability Tax Credit certificate, and eligible youth under 18, can also begin applying online. Everyone else meeting the criteria can apply online in 2025.

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Ontario needs to remove barriers to child-care subsidies for low-income families

Friday, October 20th, 2023

Ontario’s current implementation plan for child-care and early-learning agreements runs the risk of leaving disadvantaged families further behind, rather than closing gaps in opportunities and outcomes for their children. To prevent this, Ontario, and indeed all provinces, need to double down on removing barriers to child-care subsidies for low-income families.

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Montréal’s ‘mixed’ police squads don’t help the city’s unhoused people — they cause more harm

Monday, October 9th, 2023

The squads add a layer of surveillance and harassment that leads unhoused people to leave the spaces they know best and distance themselves from their support network in order to avoid police… the report calls for a new approach to homelessness, including abolishing mixed squads and reallocating their funding to two types of interventions.

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Social-assistance rates in Ontario should ‘set off alarm bells’: Report

Thursday, October 5th, 2023

Researchers have found that being on social assistance in Ontario is correlated with a higher likelihood of poor health outcomes, homelessness, and food insecurity, among other things… In fact, the “Welfare in Canada” report finds that both OW and ODSP rates have been below the deep poverty line since 2008… “You show how you value people through how you budget.”

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Governments should see social assistance as a solution, not a problem

Thursday, October 5th, 2023

Shouldn’t social assistance prevent poverty? At minimum, it should be a net that prevents people from falling into abject poverty. But it should also provide a ladder, something that people can use to help them up. By failing to deliver social assistance that performs either of these functions, governments are squandering the opportunity to improve people’s lives, their health, and, where possible, their ability to get and maintain paid work.

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Bill C-22 will provide income security to Canadians with disabilities, but it needs to be done right

Friday, September 22nd, 2023

If the Canada Disability Benefit were to replace the disability tax credit while attempting to maintain most of the benefits currently available to higher income families, it would need to adopt low benefit reduction rates similar to the Canada Child Benefit… Taking Bill C-22 at its word, the Canada Disability Benefit should provide a large maximum benefit with reduction rates of one-third or more to make sure the target is those with disabilities who are poor and economically insecure.

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Ontario needs to remove barriers to child-care subsidies for low-income families

Saturday, September 16th, 2023

Ontario’s current implementation plan for child care and early learning agreements runs the risk of leaving disadvantaged families further behind… Inclusivity is explicitly stated as an important goal of the federal government’s Canada-wide early learning and child care initiative… The ultimate solution is publicly funded child care with enough spaces for everyone.

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Realizing the right to an adequate standard of living

Monday, September 4th, 2023

Everyone in Canada has a right to an adequate standard of living… having adequate food, clothing, and housing, and the continuous improvement of living conditions. [ICESCR – 1976] Maytree’s submission to the 2024 budget calls on the federal government to help people realize this right by strengthening income supports, investing in more affordable housing, and embedding human rights into social policies and programs.

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