Social Planning Report: The Fight Against Poverty Continues

There are people in our community who live in poverty – this means they struggle to pay for basic needs, such as sufficient housing and nutritious food.

Over time, there has been an increased need for emergency shelter and people are staying for longer periods of time. There are long wait list for many subsidized housing units and food bank use is increasing.

In 1989, the House of Commons resolved to end child poverty by 2000 – instead the rate of children living in poverty has increased.

In Ontario, 1 in 6 children live below the poverty line and just over 17% of the total population lives in poverty. Forty-one percent (41%) of children who live below the poverty line, live in families where a least one parent works full-time¹.

People live in poverty for many reasons, including minimum wage rates that are too low, social assistance rates that keep families living below the poverty line and a lack of transitional support for people trying to move out of poverty.

In January, the Social Planning Department at the United Way Guelph & Wellington and the Social Planning Council of Cambridge and North Dumfries joined many other groups at pre-budget consultation meetings across Ontario to ask the provincial government to develop comprehensive strategies to move forward on their plan to reduce poverty in Ontario.

Other nations and provinces have made progress in the fight against poverty and Ontario can do the same.

In particular, the government was asked to develop indicators for measuring poverty, measurable targets and timelines, a coordinated plan of action across all government ministries with budget commitments and to monitor and evaluate progress to ensure accountability.

We also stated the need to: increase minimum wage rates to ensure those who work full time do not live in poverty, update the Employment Standards Act, increase social assistance rates to ensure our most vulnerable people are not living below the poverty line, increase access to education, early learning childcare education and training, and create more affordable housing.

It is encouraging that the Ontario Government has established the Cabinet Committee on Poverty Reduction; however, it is extremely important that this committee has a strong mandate and adequate resources to address poverty in a meaningful way. We will be watching and waiting for a budget that makes these commitments.

1. Campaign 2000 (2008) Child Poverty in Ontario on the Increase: Campaign 2000 Calls for Ontario Poverty Reduction Strategy Retrieved from: http://action.web.ca/home/c2000/alerts.shtml?x=97480&AA_EX_Session=b187cc0d84ec4795a23ed3770eb2589d

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