poverty « Social Policy in Ontario

Posts Tagged ‘poverty’

The case for a national dental program

Monday, August 19th, 2019

Scientific evidence suggests that having an unhealthy mouth could be contributing to chronic diseases of the heart, lung, and stomach as well as being a risk factor for diabetes. The effects of chronic poor oral health can be physically debilitating and socially incapacitating. It can affect a person’s ability to eat healthy foods, to sleep, to work and to maintain social connections.

Tags: Health, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »

Government of Canada making post-secondary education more accessible and affordable

Wednesday, August 14th, 2019

The Canada Learning Bond is available for eligible children from low-income families born in 2004 or later, and provides an initial payment of $500 plus $100 for each year of eligibility, up to age 15, for a maximum of $2000. The Canada Learning Bond take-up rate has steadily increased from 0.3% in 2005 to 38.3% in 2018. In 2018, 690,559 beneficiaries received $172 million in CLB, with 149,532 children receiving the incentive for the first time.

Tags: participation, poverty, standard of living, youth
Posted in Education Delivery System | No Comments »

CRA program to help poor file taxes yields noticeable bump in people helped

Sunday, July 21st, 2019

… the CRA says more than 835,000 returns were filed by people who are homeless, Indigenous, newcomers, seniors or disabled. The boost is double those seen in previous years, before the Liberals increased annual spending on the “community volunteer income-tax program” to $13 million in the 2018 budget… “It’s a different program and we get to see the direct impact that we have on lifting people out of poverty.”

Tags: disabilities, homelessness, immigration, Indigenous, participation, poverty, standard of living, tax
Posted in Inclusion Delivery System | No Comments »

Hoping the new attorney general does the right thing

Wednesday, July 3rd, 2019

Today we are in the midst of writing a new chapter in the history of legal aid in Ontario — a system that has served as a much-emulated model of the world, with the legal clinics having played a central role of its success. A system that is now under attack, with deliberate misinformation about its lack of efficiency as the justification for its obliteration.

Tags: budget, ideology, participation, poverty, rights, standard of living
Posted in Equality Delivery System | No Comments »

Cuts to legal aid mean worse health for vulnerable people

Tuesday, July 2nd, 2019

Many of my patients have legal needs that require expert intervention to maintain their social and medical stability… for issues ranging from family discord to accessing disability supports… Neighbourhood legal clinics… are now facing crippling funding cuts… When people are denied the ability to advocate for their legal rights, they are left with high levels of stress, in worse poverty, and in increasingly vulnerable situations. This leaves them in poorer health and puts a higher demand on the health system.

Tags: budget, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, poverty, rights, standard of living
Posted in Inclusion Delivery System | No Comments »

How to make community housing work better for Ontarians

Friday, June 28th, 2019

The proposed regulations to simplify the RGI rent amounts aim to reduce barriers to work and decrease administrative complexity. However, as currently outlined they would create a two-tier system that would make it harder for social assistance recipients to enter employment. To avoid this, our submission on the RGI calculation recommends the government consider disregarding social assistance payments from income for the purposes of calculating RGI rent amounts.

Tags: housing, ideology, participation, poverty
Posted in Inclusion Delivery System | No Comments »

To bolster health, would basic income — not pharmacare — make more sense?

Tuesday, June 25th, 2019

… shouldn’t the priority of policy-makers be to ensure that all Canadians can afford necessities such as food and housing, not just prescription drugs? … Affordable sickness care is important, especially if you’re sick. But the way to keep people healthier longer is to ensure that they have a decent income, a roof over their heads, healthy food, a good education, a sound physical environment and sense of belonging.

Tags: economy, Health, ideology, mental Health, participation, pharmaceutical, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »

OSAP offers have arrived, and students are stunned at the numbers

Tuesday, June 25th, 2019

Lowering tuition would help all students across the province, the government has argued. But some students say reductions to grants mean they’re actually further behind. The issue has generated a Twitter storm as students posted comparisons of what they will be getting this year compared with last… Ross Romano, the new minister of training, colleges and universities, said the government is committed to restoring financial sustainability to OSAP…

Tags: budget, featured, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living, youth
Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »

Ontario’s new attorney general should reverse cuts to legal aid

Monday, June 24th, 2019

The fact is, cutting funding for legal aid will further erode any hope the poor and vulnerable have of receiving justice in a system that’s already stacked against them… If he doesn’t, the fallout will be painful for the poor and immensely costly for taxpayers… who will pay for the costly incarceration of innocent people who are not going to get fair legal representation in bail hearings, criminal cases or immigration and refugee detention hearings.