Poverty, inequality & welfare

Yet another case of our government delaying the release of important data

May 12, 2009
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Less than a week after BC’s Freedom of Information and Privacy Association (FIPA) report raised serious questions about secrecy in government (see Keith’s comments here), The Tyee reporter Andrew MacLeod has uncovered another case of important statistics not being released on time. The culprit this time is the Housing and Social Development Ministry, which typically… View Article

BC government should heed its own report on childcare

May 7, 2009
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Do you remember the 2008 Throne Speech in which the provincial government launched a feasibility study on providing full day kindergarten for 5 year-olds and extending full day preschool options to younger children as well? Here’s a refresher: A new Early Childhood Learning Agency will be established. It will assess the feasibility and costs of… View Article

Poverty reduction and the party platforms

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The CCPA is a member of the BC Poverty Reduction Committee, the network that has been pressing all the BC political parties to commit to a comprehensive poverty reduction plan. Over 280 organizations have now signed an Open Letter to all the political parties calling on them to commit to a poverty reduciton plan with… View Article

Government report on welfare leavers at odds with narrative

May 1, 2009
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Kudos to the Tyee’s Andrew MacLeod for extracting a long delayed report on welfare leavers from the provincial government. The report can be downloaded here. Andrew’s Tyee article about the report can be found here. The report uses tax data of BC welfare leavers between 2000 and 2005 to see how people have done. Comparing… View Article

The devil take the hindmost

Apr 15, 2009
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In an earlier post I talked about the fact that when New Brunswick raised its minimum wage this spring, BC would be tied in last place for the lowest minimum wage in Canada. NB raised its minimum wage today and now BC, with the highest cost of living in Canada, is tied with two provinces… View Article

Unemployment surges again in March

Apr 9, 2009
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Just in time for a heated election campaign, the latest unemployment numbers paint a grim picture for BC. Just a year ago, BC was coasting along with an unemployment rate of just over 4%. By the end of 2008 that had crept up to 5%. And now a truly brutal first quarter that saw the… View Article

Wishing away child poverty

Apr 3, 2009
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This past week, local CTV news ran a series on child poverty called “BC’s Shame”. They’ve posted the series on their website, along with the full interview reporter Mi-Jung Lee had with Premier Campbell about child poverty. The series was very good, but the premier’s comments were disappointing. Premier Campbell spent much of the interview… View Article

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words

Mar 27, 2009
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Or twenty thousand as the case may be. The CCPA published a number of major studies in recent years about BC’s unacceptably high levels of poverty and homelessness, as well as provincial welfare policies that contribute to hardship and homelessness. These issues are brought to life in a series of narrated slideshows created for the… View Article