Dear All:

I realize that there are many on the list who do not reside in Canada. But,
what is happening here is not unique.

I would like to understand better why this situation can continue. What I
really would like to understand is why-- with the incredibly well- organized
education and advocacy campaigns we have in Canada; with the high level of
public awareness and expressed concern; with most public health professionals
in positions of some authority having some understanding of the links between
poverty and health; with conferences galore on the topic--we have not budged
this matter at all.

If there is reason to be hopeful, someone enlighten me and the list.How can
Ken Dryden claim not to know what to do? Does he mean he doesn't know what can
be sold to those who might "lose" if Canada got really serious about this
matter?

I wonder at times if the reluctance is mostly about the fact that children are
poor because their parents are poor and many of their parents are single
women..and not enough people in power are really worried about them. Even if
the "real poverty rate" is only 10% as the Fraser Institute asserts, that is
10% too many.

Yours in frustration,
Rhonda Love




Quoting Dennis Raphael <[log in to unmask]>:

> Campaign 2000 Report at:
> http://www.campaign2000.ca/
> ------------------------------------------------
>
> Child poverty rises for first time in six years
> http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1101180066249_72/?
hub=Canada
> Canadian Press, Nov. 22 2004
>
> OTTAWA — The level of child poverty is up slightly for the first time in
> six years despite a humming economy and federal coffers bursting with extra
> cash, says an anti-poverty group.
>
> A yearly report card to be released Wednesday by Campaign 2000 calls on
> Ottawa to pay down what it calls Canada's "social deficit."
>
> About a million children, more than 15 per cent of all Canadian kids, are
> growing up poor in a country that consistently posts budget surpluses, says
> the group, a coalition of 90 anti-poverty organizations across Canada.
>
> Campaign 2000 blames reduced access to employment insurance, lack of
> affordable housing, the high cost of child care and tax policies that
> penalize welfare families. It has repeatedly called on Ottawa to spend an
> extra $18 billion a year on related programs.
>
> The federal Social Development Department, using Statistics Canada figures
> from 2002, says the child poverty rate is closer to 10 per cent or 700,000
> children.
>
> Whatever numbers are used, the situation is "a disgrace," says veteran New
> Democrat MP Ed Broadbent.
>
> Kids are still waking up and going to bed hungry 15 years after MPs
> unanimously supported his motion to wipe out child poverty by 2000, he
> said.
>
> "It's an abominable record. It's something that could have been dealt with
> in the 1990s."
>
> Broadbent blames Prime Minister Paul Martin for a lack of government
> action. Little has changed since the former finance minister erased large
> annual deficits by the late 1990s with the help of deep cuts to social
> programs, Broadbent said.
>
> "We've had a very socially conservative government. Mr. Martin came in.
> Yes, the deficit had to be dealt with early on. But we've had seven surplus
> budgets since then, and if he wasn't so damned conservative . . . he
> would've taken care (of the problem)."
>
> Martin likes to stress that Ottawa spent about $8 billion last year for
> National Child Benefit payments to help working-poor families. The
> government has also promised $5 billion over five years to set up a
> national child-care program, and it pledged $2 billion over six years to
> build more affordable housing and upgrade shelters.
>
> Still, Social Development Minister Ken Dryden says it's not enough.
>
> "We need to do better," he said Monday. "We need to find other and
> additional . . . ways of doing better."
>
> Asked if he had any ideas on what should happen first, Dryden said: "Not
> yet, no."
>
> Campaign 2000 measures hardship using Statistics Canada's low-income
> cut-offs. By those standards, a family of four is deemed to be in
> "straitened circumstances" if its before-tax income is less than $37,253 in
> a major city and less than $25,744 in a rural area.
>
> Conservative groups like the Fraser Institute argue that such gauges
> overstate the extent of true poverty. The real child poverty rate is around
> 10 per cent if only the most basic housing, food, clothing and medical
> needs are considered, it says.
>
> Anti-poverty advocates counter that an explosion of food-bank use in the
> last 10 years shows how social spending cuts by Ottawa and the provinces
> have played out.
>
>
>
>
> © Copyright 2004 Bell Globemedia Inc.
>
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