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Ontario’s poor need to make some noise
Monday, September 3rd, 2012
Mar 02 2012
History shows us that poor people’s silence will be met with government inaction. As American academics Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward put it in their classic book Regulating the Poor, “A placid poor get nothing, but a turbulent poor sometimes get something.” The Drummond report tells poor people they must wait. Now it is up to the poor to reply: “We will not.”
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, poverty, rights, standard of living
Posted in Inclusion Debates | No Comments »
Depressed wages are a drag on Canada’s economy
Sunday, September 2nd, 2012
September 01, 2012
… if four out of five jobs added to Canada’s labour market since the 2008 recession are temporary or contractual then it is no wonder that 22 per cent of the working population in Ontario can’t call themselves “gainfully employed”… lack of protection in these precarious jobs, both under the law and because of low levels of unionization, means that many casual, part-time and contract workers aren’t familiar with the few rights they do have, or else they are afraid to exercise them for fear of reprisal, blacklisting or deportation.
Tags: economy, ideology, participation, rights, standard of living
Posted in Policy Context | 1 Comment »
Ontario dead last in terms of inequality, poverty and funding for public services
Saturday, September 1st, 2012
August 29, 2012
… according to Ontario’s finance ministry and 2012 budget, the province spends less than any other province on public programs and services. Provincial budget advisor Don Drummond said this is a sign of fiscal prudence and good management. But… Ontarians are paying for this through reduced services and the highest user fees in the country. Last spring’s cuts to social assistance, school closures, cancelled hospital projects, delayed child benefits, eroded social housing budgets and public sector restructuring that will result in “thousands” of lost jobs, will only make matters worse…
Tags: budget, economy, Health, housing, ideology, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Governance Policy Context | 8 Comments »
Happy Labour Day. It’s all pretty grim
Saturday, September 1st, 2012
August 31, 2012
Unions are solidly middle-class institutions. True, their rhetoric may be radical… But in reality, unions are fundamentally conservative. Most today are not trying to break new ground. Instead, they are attempting to hold on — often desperately — to what they have… As unions disappear, so do well-paying, secure jobs. When labour is strong, even non-union shops pay well — just to prevent themselves from being organized… Sadly, much of the middle-class doesn’t recognize the role that unions play in keeping everyone’s wages at livable levels.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, pensions, rights, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Turning around Ontario lives hurt by fetal alcohol spectrum disorder
Saturday, September 1st, 2012
August 31, 2012
this province lags far behind the rest of the country in addressing this complex yet preventable disability, and is unnecessarily relegating far too many people to the margins of society… research suggests that youth with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder are 19 times more likely to be incarcerated, and the incidence of FASD may be as high as three in 10 among federal inmates… It fills prisons with individuals whose permanent neurobiological impairments won’t be fixed through punishment, and eats up resources that could be invested in avoiding victimization and criminality.
Tags: disabilities, economy, Health, mental Health, participation, poverty, standard of living, youth
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
Though business sits on $500 billion, workers’ salaries are under seige
Tuesday, August 28th, 2012
August 27, 2012
The point of job security — a key right won by unions — is to give employees security against arbitrary firing. But removing that sort of security — leaving workers fearful and therefore malleable to the demands of their employers — has been a central aim of the right and segments of the business community… As long as the right can keep workers envious and suspicious of each other, the focus won’t be on those at the top, where the benefits have actually gone… Labour’s share of Canada’s national income has fallen from 65 to 60 per cent since 1990, partly because of policies like privatization and deregulation
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, pensions, privatization, rights, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Ontario neglecting its most vulnerable workers
Tuesday, August 28th, 2012
26 August 2012
Roughly 1.7 million workers in the province — 1 out of 5 — have little or no protection from bosses who pay them less than the minimum wage, compel them to work on statutory holidays without overtime and don’t allow them time off for illness, a family emergency or the death of a loved one. Some of these inhumane practices happen within the bounds of Ontario’s gap-ridden Employment Standards Act. Some happen illegally because the rules are so poorly enforced.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, rights, standard of living
Posted in Policy Context | No Comments »
The wait in Ontario for social housing can run to 10 years
Monday, August 27th, 2012
August 26, 2012
For the fifth year in a row more Ontario households joined the waiting list for social housing than got off it. Queues across the province have swollen by a shocking 26 per cent since 2007 with some people waiting a decade for affordable housing… For all too many, that amounts to a 10-year sentence of being trapped in poverty as rents they can barely afford gobble up their money, leaving precious little on which to live. In a country as rich as Canada, this is a disgrace.
Tags: budget, homelessness, housing, ideology, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Delivery System | 3 Comments »
Marketing mindset shapes Stephen Harper’s anti-crime agenda
Monday, August 27th, 2012
August 26, 2012
The Conservative government has introduced 69 “crime” bills since 2006… These bills are more silly and stupid than they are offensive or destructive. The “protecting seniors” bill changes nothing; the “victim surcharge” bill imposes additional financial penalties on offenders who can’t pay… Conservative criminal justice policy is developed not to serve public or societal needs but to help market the Conservatives to specific constituencies…
Tags: budget, corrections, crime prevention, ideology
Posted in Child & Family Policy Context | No Comments »
Toronto social housing wait lists growing
Monday, August 27th, 2012
20 August 2012
Households — single people, families and seniors — on waiting lists for affordable housing grew by 2.9 per cent to 156,358 in 2011… “Ultimately, governments, especially the federal and provincial governments, have to realize affordable housing is not something they can download to the City of Toronto and offload to the private housing markets… We have to get governments back to the table as serious partners.”
Tags: economy, homelessness, housing, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Delivery System | 1 Comment »
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