Poverty in Canada.

[Twila]

Consider our systems though. You are making $300 a month on welfare.

I use to work for a neighbourhood house. We provided programs for welfare recipients to look for work. Job finding clubs. 1 of the worse problems we had was that these 'strong, fit, able young men" were starving and unable to fully participate in the class. Several passed out from hunger! This is not the case with every individual...but with the majority who have the "welfare mentality" it's difficult.

To have to walk into a gov't office and beg for money (essentially) to be treated like a 4th class citizen, to feel that day in day out....

Then should you get a job, explaining to fellow co-workers what you've been doing for the last few months/years....and all the things you DON:T have in common with them...and the looks they give you and you know they have NO comprehension of what welfare is like.

When I first started to work I heard a coworker say how she'd like to be able to sit around and collect welfare and not have to work. She thought that welfare recepients made a comparable "salary"

There is alot they have to overcome....but to have underlying problems like FAS.....with out a total revamp.....and an approach that takes into account the individual rather then what one gets they all get....there will always be these people and their kids and their kids kids using welfare as a life long support.

 

[Reverend Blair]

I use to work for a neighbourhood house. We provided programs for welfare recipients to look for work. Job finding clubs. 1 of the worse problems we had was that these 'strong, fit, able young men" were starving and unable to fully participate in the class. Several passed out from hunger!

Anybody who has hired casual workers for manual labour has seen something along those lines.

One of the major problems in construction and landscaping is that they simply don't have what they need to do the job either. You can't let them on site without workboots and, in some cases, hardhats. Many jobs require at least minimal tools, but a tool belt and a hammer go for about fifty bucks. By the time you throw in a screwdriver and a utility knife, there is no way they can buy what they need. Many places also require a driver's license. If you grew up in a family that didn't own a car, chances are that you don't have one of those.

 

[Jay]

In Ontario at least, if you have found a job, and it requires something like work boots, or a few tools, and you don't have it, call the welfare office. They will more than likely cut you a cheque for the expense of the equipment.

 

[Twila]

You can't let them on site without workboots and, in some cases, hardhats. Many jobs require at least minimal tools, but a tool belt and a hammer go for about fifty bucks. By the time you throw in a screwdriver and a utility knife, there is no way they can buy what they need

Well the gov't line for this is that they will provide the money for these tools...the reality is you can't get a job without the tools. It's a catch 22 for many. What I found very frustrating was that in order to get subsidized daycare I had to first have the job.....then once I'd started work I had to go into their office's and fill out paperwork. This required taking time off work!! I'd only just started! Can you imagine having to ask your employer for an hour or 2 (depending on transit) off after you've just started!!!!???!!

 

[Reverend Blair]

That takes time though, Jay. Most construction jobs are along the lines of, "You start tomorrow," and if you lose the job because you've never actually worked on a construction site before and/or don't have any energy because you can't afford food, welfare wants the money back.

 

[Twila]

Not to mention you have to prove you have a job.....

Who wants to admit their on welfare?

 

[Reverend Blair]

We need a new system. This one doesn't work.

 

[Twila]

It works for some people. It worked for me. But it doesn't work for everyone nor does it work for the majority.

They need to give the workers the ability to work on each case individually. They need to give the workers the time to work on each case individually. THey need to provide the workers with stress relief and counselling to provide them the tools to deal with these types of people.

Like I said it worked for me. I don't know why.....but I left many people behind.......I may have been fortunate enough to have the right workers...or the right support system.....or both....or neither.

 

[Durgan]

Winter will be hard, food-bank report warns
Last Updated Wed, 23 Nov 2005 13:01:01 EST
CBC News

http://urnfulge.notlong.com


FROM OCT. 15, 2004: Another 65,000 people added to food bank rolls.
However, use is still up 24 per cent from 1997 and 118 per cent from 1989.

The report says 823,856 Canadians, including more than 300,000 children, visited food banks in March, the report says.

Durgan

 

[Jay]

So I can only guess that Canadian socilism isn't working.

Time for a diffrent approch.

 

[Twila]

So I can only guess that Canadian socilism isn't working.

I think we have a fake socialism. I know Gordon Campbell is not for socialism...he'd much rather give his rich corporate buddies all sorts of breaks and do away with programs for those in need....if he doesn't comb his hair just right for photo's you can see his horns.

 

[Reverend Blair]

Fake socialism is a pretty good way to put it, Twila. Even a government that was totally committed to changing things would be undermined by the crap that goes on.

The biggest portion of that is the rhetoric that everybody on welfare is a lazy scam artist who produces babies to increase the size of their cheque. Such rhetoric (lies would actually be a better word, let's use it)...such lies marginalise everybody who has ever been at all involved in social assistance, including the government workers who provide services.

Once that portion of the population is marginalised, there is nobody left to speak out and say what the reality is. Without that, the problem cannot even be discussed in an intelligent manner...look at Jay's post, for example.

 

[Twila]

The biggest portion of that is the rhetoric that everybody on welfare is a lazy scam artist who produces babies to increase the size of their cheque. Such rhetoric (lies would actually be a better word, let's use it)..

Well to be fair, I've known 2 individuals who have done this...not to increase their chq's but to keep their chq's coming....I've met people who work under the table and collect welfare....I've known drug dealers (making thousands a month)who collect. But I've also known individuals who've been treated worse then rabid dogs but have desperately needed and deserved help. If intake workers were able to work on the individuals circumstances rather then seeing which "hole" they fit into.....these types of people wouldn't get away with it.

 

[Reverend Blair]

There will always be those who take advantage of any system, Twila. They don't define the whole group though, in fact they make up a very small portion of it.

One of the things about out present system is that it encourages cheating though. If somebody is making $300 a month on welfare and they can work a couple days a week for cash, they certainly will, for instance.

That puts them in the position of being "scammers" but what they are really trying to do is survive.

I think a guaranteed annual income combined with real education and social programs would solve a lot of these problems.

 

[Twila]

Your right Rev, it is a very small portion. But the public only remembers the bad and never the good. Nobody will know or remember about all those who'd gotten off welfare or who'd done good deeds...they only remember hearing of those who scam.

We need to do something about those who scam so the rest don't suffer...

 

[Jay]

"$300 a month"

Where is this figure comming from?

 

[Reverend Blair]

Where is this figure comming from?

That's what a single male gets to cover everything but rent in Ontario, Jay. Thing is that they often have to cover part of the rent out of that too.

Your right Rev, it is a very small portion. But the public only remembers the bad and never the good. Nobody will know or remember about all those who'd gotten off welfare or who'd done good deeds...they only remember hearing of those who scam.

We need to do something about those who scam so the rest don't suffer...

'

We do something though. When they are caught they are punished.

I think it would be a lot better to publicise what life on welfare is really like and how people end up in that situation, then offer long-term solutions.

I've never been on welfare, but I've known quite a few people who have been. Those who got off of it managed to do so in spite of the current system, not because of it, but the problem wasn't that they were given too much but that they weren't provided the resources to do anything else.

 

[Jay]

Where is this figure comming from?

That's what a single male gets to cover everything but rent in Ontario, Jay. Thing is that they often have to cover part of the rent out of that too.

Well I have used the sytem in my youth, and that is a hell of alot more money than they were giving me.

 

[Twila]

lWe do something though. When they are caught they are punished.

http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2002/10/16/housearrest_021016


I think it would be better to prevent the fraud in the first place rather then punish those that commit. Cause those that suffer are not just the perp's but the perps kids...remember this story

I would like to see a type of profiler used in intake cases...it might help weed out the frauds.

 

[Reverend Blair]

I remember that story, Twila. There was a more in-depth version of it on CBC radio as well. That woman was very much killed by Mike Harris and his band of thugs.