Six provinces now have poverty reduction plans, although most are still fairly new, and therefore we don’t yet have data to tell us what kind of success they are meeting with, the exceptions being Quebec and Newfoundland. What their plans and results tell us is that poverty isn’t inevitable – that policy matters.

The example of Newfoundland is particularly instructive. There, the Conservative government of Danny Williams has made poverty reduction one of its overarching goals. Back in 2004, Newfoundland’s poverty rate was the second highest in Canada after BC’s. It is now 6.5 per cent, the third lowest in Canada. Their plan has led to concrete policy changes: welfare benefit rates have gone up (and were already higher than BC’s relative to the LICO) and they have been indexed (they go up every year according to the CPI); the minimum wage has been increased to $10; and the province followed Quebec and made dental care universal for children.

Ontario now also has a plan. Indeed, their plan is legislated, with a 25% reduction in 5 years. And notably, that legislation, the Ontario Poverty Reduction Act, was passed with unanimous all-party support, one week before BC’s provincial election last May, at the height of the recession. Like Newfoundland, they have a cross-ministerial secretariat, with a lead minister. And their lead minister must present annual progress reports. They have struck a welfare review panel, undertaking a comprehensive review of all the social assistance rates and rules. And they have gone the route of introducing an Ontario Child Tax Credit (like the federal one) worth $1,300 a year (another policy vehicle for increasing the incomes of low-income families, whether their income comes from welfare or paid employment).

More recently, New Brunswick has tabled their plan. The government there has fundamentally altered the tone of the debate, particularly about welfare. They too have legislated their plan in what they call the Economic and Social Inclusion Act. They too have all-party support. They have enacted some very large increases in welfare benefit rates, and indicated that this is only the start. And they have increased and indexed the minimum wage. And they too have a secretariat to coordinate plans.

The key common features of these plans are these:

• They have been advanced with all-party support
• They have specific targets and timelines, which in most cases are embedded in legislation.
• They are comprehensive (meaning they deal with income – both social assistance and other government income supports, as well as measures to boost labour market income; but they also address the social infrastructure on which low and modest income families depend, such as housing, education, child care, and community health care; and they have specific measures to address poverty among those populations where poverty is most acute, such as Aboriginal people, recent immigrants, people with disabilities and metal illness, and single parents).
• They have accountability mechanisms, such as public consultations, funding for independent monitoring groups, and obligations to report annually on progress. A key need is for timeline benchmarks that are frequent enough that a government can be held accountable within the life of each mandate.
• There is a cross-ministry secretariat to coordinate and integrate plans, and to ensure that policies do not act at cross-purposes.

(The preceding was part of my recent presentation to the BC Legislature’s Standing Committee on Children and Youth. For the full presentation, click here

And to join the call for a BC poverty reduction plan, click here

Of the 24 cities, Vancouver has the highest percent of population with low income; the highest percent of working poor families; and the largest and fastest growing income gap between rich and poor. Welfare income was also very low in Vancouver, and Vancouver had the second highest number of households which paid more than 30% of their income for rent and/or lived in inadequate housing. Vancouver was also worst for “community affordability.” That means that the combination of low income plus high cost of living makes the poorest fifth of Vancouver residents worse off than those in other cities.

That’s why British Columbians should be concerned about a report released earlier this week by the Dieticians of Canada — The Cost of Eating in BC 2009.

Unfortunately, the Dietitian’s report received virtually no media coverage. But it makes a vital point — British Columbians on social assistance and those working for minimum wage cannot afford a healthy diet. For them, meeting the Premier’s great goal is simply out of reach.

Here’s the report in its own words:

Dietitians publish the report to bring attention to the fact that not all British Columbians have enough money to buy healthy food.  While shelter and food costs have risen significantly over the past decade, income assistance rates have remained virtually unchanged and minimum wage, once the highest in the country, has remained at $8.00/hour. For those receiving income assistance or earning minimum wage there simply is not enough money to pay for housing and food, let alone other necessities. Unemployment is up and more people are relying on assistance.  There are too many living in poverty in BC and too many lined up at food banks. Dietitians are calling for the provincial government to take some additional action to address poverty in this province. Other provinces are taking action.  Quebec and Ontario have anti-poverty legislation, while Newfoundland & Labrador, Nova Scotia, Manitoba and New Brunswick all have poverty reduction plans.  Common to them are significant changes to income assistance and increases to minimum wage.

The report contains important calculations, comparing the cost of basic necessities (including a healthy diet), set against the income provided by welfare or a minimum wage job. For example, a family of four on income assistance would need more than 100% of their income for shelter and food alone, leaving nothing for anything else.

The core finding of this report isn’t just of concern to those families caught in this untenable situation. In truth, we all pay for this policy failure. A poor diet means poor health, and we all pick up the tab for that. That’s why the Dietitians have joined the call for a comprehensive poverty reduction plan for BC

The report, which surveys food banks across the country every March, found that in March 2009, food bank use was up nearly 18% nationally, and 15% in BC –– the largest single-year jump and the highest number of people assisted on record.  81% of BC food banks reported an increase in demand in 2009. Of the nearly 90,000 British Columbians who relied on food banks that month, 31% were children, 12% reported employment income, 6% were on EI, 19% were receiving disability-related income support, and 44% were receiving social assistance (yet more proof that our welfare system is structurally dependent on food banks and other charities for people to meet their basic food needs).

Food bank usage had been in decline since 2004, until this year. And so, this report provides important evidence of the impact of the recession. We won’t have up-to-date poverty statistics for another year or so, so reports like this provide an early glimpse of how vulnerable people are impacted by the downturn.

If we are going to end hunger in our society, charity alone is not going to get the job done. We need an income support system and wages that ensure people can meet basic needs. And the report provides yet more evidence that both BC and Canada need comprehensive poverty reduction plans, something Food Banks Canada itself calls for in this report.

The culprit this time is the Housing and Social Development Ministry, which typically provides welfare caseload statistics at the end of each month, but has so far failed to release its April report.

Indeed, when visiting the Ministry’s website today (March 12, 10:30am), it’s quite curious to see the regularity with which reports were posted on the last day of each month as this screenshot demonstrates:

According to this pattern, the welfare statistics for March 2009 should have been released on April 30 or shortly thereafter. MacLeod reports that his emails and calls to the Ministry inquiring about the apparent delay in the welfare data have not been returned.

Welfare data were showing large increases in previous months (as Marc pointed out here and the Tyee reported here) and political commentator David Schreck speculates that delaying the release of the latest welfare statistics may be a deliberate move to contain likely negative information before the election (as quoted in MacLeod’s article).

For reference, the previous provincial election was on May 17, 2005 and the welfare statistics release for March 2005 is dated May 11 (bottom right-hand-side of each page in the report). This was later than the usual last-day-of-the-month pattern, but it came a whole six days before the election date.

Whether or not this delay is deliberate or the result of oversight, it is nevertheless an affront on the democratic process. Transparency, which includes data being made publicly available promptly, is an essential mechanism that allows citizens to keep their government accountable. This is particularly important in the wake of a general election, which is our main tool to keep governments accountable in democratic societies.

Statistics Canada and the Bank of Canada, both of whom release information that can be politically sensitive, have processes to formally schedule and announce release dates well in advance to prevent any possibility that data be withheld for political purposes. The provincial government should be held to similar standards.

–

2009 release dates for all of Statistics Canada’s data products can be found here. The 2009 schedule of interest rates announcements from the Bank of Canada is here.

The report uses tax data of BC welfare leavers between 2000 and 2005 to see how people have done. Comparing those who left welfare before 2002 (when the government brought in sweeping welfare changes) with those who left after 2002 is very revealing. It turns out that the post-reform leavers were no more likely to find work, their incomes were less than the pre-2002 leavers, and they were more likely to be below the poverty line.

All of this stands in stark contrast to a government narrative that has long insisted that welfare caseloads declined after their 2002 reforms because more people were leaving welfare for work.

For more details, see Andrew’s piece.

Today Tom Sandborn writing for the Tyee posted a story quoting Premier Campbell’s response to health and safety issues. The story also dealt with the NDP and labour issues, but the NDP section focused on such issues as Green Bonds.

Here are some of the Premier’s comments.

On a CCPA report that called for better enforcement of worker safety regulations:

He said he had not read a recent study from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and the B.C. Building Trades Council that called for reforms to construction industry safety practices, and he expressed skepticism about the usefulness of on-site safety enforcement. “I don’t think it’s something where you say we’ve got, to be candid, a whole bunch of people coming around and throwing fines at people. I think it gets them to avoid the issue.”

Campbell did say he would read the report if it were sent to him, and expressed willingness to meet with union representatives to discuss safety issues and training.

and more:

Campbell was asked about the changes his government brought in during its first term that effectively eliminated lifetime pensions for injured workers and reduced the amount available for shorter-term WorkSafe payments by 13 per cent. Would a re-elected Liberal government at least restore the level of support for injured workers to 2001 levels?

“I won’t commit to that today,” the premier said. “I think we have a relatively fair system. Workers are now getting taken care of far more rapidly than they were before.”

A welfare rate increase, he said, was “not in the books.”

And finally, on public private partnerships:

the premier noted that the P3 (public private partnership) approach, strongly championed by his government, can slow timelines for projects. “Up front, they are slower, for sure.”

The Time is Now: A Poverty Reduction Plan for BC Slideshow

0. THE TIME IS NOW – Introduction from CCPA on Vimeo.

This is a narrated presentation about how BC could end street homelessness and reduce poverty by one third — within the mandate of the next provincial government (first chapter is shown above — view the full slideshow here). It includes interviews with people working on health, immigration and family well-being issues, and with Erna Calingasan, a parent struggling to make ends meet by working two jobs. Here is the interview with Erna:

THE TIME IS NOW – Erna Calingasan from CCPA on Vimeo.

Poverty Amid Plenty: A Slideshow About Welfare in BC

1. POVERTY AMID PLENTY – Introduction from CCPA on Vimeo.

Welfare is the program of last resort for people who find themselves without work, or who are unable to work because of a disability. It is supposed to protect people from homelessness, hunger and other hardships. BC was in the midst of an economic boom when this slideshow was created, but as we enter a recession in 2009, welfare is more vital than ever (first chapter shown above — watch the rest here). The slideshow addresses some myths about welfare and poverty — that welfare is easy to get; that life on welfare is an easy ride; that poverty is inevitable; and that solutions to poverty are too expensive.

The slideshow includes interviews and images of people who are living on welfare benefits, as well as advocates who work with welfare recipients and/or anti-poverty groups (these interviews can be watched separately). Here’s four of them:

POVERTY AMID PLENTY – Judy Graves from CCPA on Vimeo.

POVERTY AMID PLENTY – Richard Watson from CCPA on Vimeo.

POVERTY AMID PLENTY – Matthew Matthew from CCPA on Vimeo.

POVERTY AMID PLENTY – Susan Henry from CCPA on Vimeo.

There is a lag in the EI numbers, since the most recent data are for January. But we already know that in February, unemployment rates rose again, so the growth in the number of EI recipients is even greater.

The main point is that both EI and social assistance, the two key “automatic stabilizers” have been greatly weakened since the mid-1990s. Back in 1990-91, EI benefits were about $600 per week in today’s dollars; the current maximum EI benefit is $447. Inflation has also eroded the real value of social assistance benefits, which are already much smaller than what one could access on EI.

Even more troubling is that only 42% of BC’s unemployed workers qualified for EI benefits in December, and this percentage is even lower in Vancouver (33%) and Victoria (31%). This will put more pressure on provincial social assistance rolls, which were up 37% at last count. Social assistance also suffers from tremendous barriers for those in need to access the program.

Removing these barriers and increasing benefit levels would be a wise means of stimulating the economy, as almost all of that money would get spent, thereby supporting demand just at the time we need it.

Alas, in its 2009 budget the government planned for only a small rise in temporary assistance caseload of 6%, and for the total caseload, 4.6%. We noted on budget day that given a then-50% (now 60%) increase in the numbers of unemployed over the past year, the budget is essentially on a different planet.

So just as February’s unemployment rate has exceeded the budget’s projection for the whole year, budget projections for social assistance are essentially out the window a month after the budget was tabled. As reported in the Sun:

Welfare numbers in B.C. soared by 36.5 per cent in January compared to the previous year, and government expects the figures to keep increasing. Between January 2008 and January 2009 — the last month for which the province has figures — the number of people in the temporary assistance/ expected to work category rose from 20,800 cases to 28,391. In the month between December last year and the end of January this year, the caseload increased by 10.8 per cent.

The grim reality that this recession is going to be worse than the BC government is admitting. That increase alone if annualized will add about $128 million to provincial expenditures, and I would not be surprised if the caseload continues to rise at a rapid clip over the remainder of 2009.

But let me get this straight: when the budget was tabled in mid-February, the government did not know that the social assistance caseload from January had shot way up? Surely, it cannot be correct that the officials in the Ministry of Finance were ignorant of this fact, even if just anecdotally, even though everyone has been talking about a recession for months, and even though this is a major source of cost pressure in the budget.

This publication basically asks where the income in various BC communities comes from. In many communities the resource sector is the number one employer, and this usually means forestry, though in a few it means extraction of minerals or oil and gas. No surprise there.

But what is really interesting is how much the public sector is a player (and here we are talking only about federal and provincial jobs as money that comes from outside the community). In almost every community the public sector employs a major share of the local population, typically accounting for between 20 and 30% of local income (with a low of 14% in Fort St John and a high of 50% in the central coast of Vancouver Island). This includes civil servants in federal and provincial ministries, but also teachers, doctors, nurses, social workers and so on. All totaled, the public sector is the number one source of income in many communities in BC, and in the major resource communities it is a close number two.

In addition to employment in the public sector, another major source of income for all BC communities is income transfer payments (federally this includes the GST credit, the Canada Child Tax Benefit, Old Age Security, Canada Pension Plan and Employment Insurance; provincially, Income Assistance). These range from 5 to 26% of income in BC communities, with an average in the high teens.

If you add both public sector jobs and income transfers together, the broader public sector is the number one source of income in all but three of the 63 communities listed in Table 2.1 (pages 8-9). Which is why the budget cuts delivered by the Liberals in their first mandate (between 2002 and 2004) hurt so much. True, all of those communities also pay taxes that flow out of the local economy, but as we pointed out in a CCPA study a few years ago, this dynamic was a net loss for the vast majority of BC communities outside Vancouver and Victoria because the “hinterland” gets back more public sector income than they pay in taxes.

The impact of those cuts has been masked by a boom in resource extraction and exports due to high commodity prices and due to accelerated cuts in response to the mountain pine beetle. It will be interesting to see an update of the economic dependency numbers after the next census, as this BC snapshot was taken at the top of a commodities boom that has now gone bust.

The lesson is that the public sector provides a major bulwark against bad economic times. Without all of those public sector jobs and transfer payments, the closure of a mill would lead many a community to turn into a ghost town. Some are now arguing that in the current economic crisis, the public sector needs to tighten its belt by downsizing operations, and jobs. But that would only worsen the pain, and lead to a longer and deeper slump. If anything we need more public sector income to be a stronger counterweight that sustains BC communities.

A policy to make sure all government contractors pay a living wage to their employees would mean hundreds of parents could afford to afford have just one job, rather than running between 2 and even 3 jobs, and never having time to see their children.

Families want the dignity to buy their own shoes. They should be able to. Income inequality is growing and charity isn’t the answer.

To our credit, and thanks to the work of tireless parent and professional advocates, BC now has a child and youth mental health plan.  Funding through the Ministry of Children and Family Development for prevention, treatment and family supports has increased significantly over the past 5 years.   BC has doubled the number of children receiving mental health services to about 20,000, but another 70,000 kids are still not getting the help they need.  Think these figures might be related to the rising number of people with mental illnesses who are homeless and on the street?

Some children are born with or develop mental health problems regardless of their family or social circumstances. But cutting edge research also tells us that poverty can create physical and psychological stress leading to illness.   Children with learning disabilities who don’t get the diagnosis and specialized help they need in school are vulnerable to developing mental illnesses. [PACFOLD study]

So let’s ask these questions of anyone who wants our vote:

• Will your government sustain and increase the funding that will keep BC’s child and youth mental health plan alive?
• Will the erosion of funding for special needs services and supports in schools continue or be reversed in tough times?
• Will you commit to a poverty reduction strategy for the province so we lower the risks of mental illness for more children?
• What will you do to reduce waitlists for young children needing early intervention services?

Preventing and reducing harm while children are still developing – cost effective, smart and the right thing to do.