Louis Shalako
This is a workable plan for the reduction of poverty
in Ontario. Yes, it will cost a little money, which will result in savings
elsewhere. Only one example, this would be in hospital admissions for mental
health/addictions, which term has had an unfortunate tendency to become all one
word in media coverage of issues related to poverty.
It is an unfortunate tendency to lay the problem of
poverty on mental illness and addictions, which is an unfair moral judgement as
well as a conflation of two separate and distinct issues.
***
The roots of poverty are structural, and therefore the
solutions must also be structural.
This program specifically addresses the Ontario
Disability Support Program and Ontario Works, (welfare). As a highly-trained
Canadian journalist, the author has been embedded in this story for 24 years,
and he is very familiar with the ODSP program in particular. He is proficient
at interpreting guidelines insofar as that relates to his employment and
business interests. When the landlord is taking seventy percent of an ODSP
pension in rent alone, working means eating. For whatever reason, this writer
has become rather fond of eating over the last 59 years or so—
Raise the rates, annually, at greater than the rate of
inflation, which currently stands at roughly two percent.
Raise the allowable earnings limit, which currently
stands at $200.00 per month for a single adult.
Lower the rate of clawback on earnings over the limit
from its current fifty percent to thirty or even twenty-five percent.
Under CPP (D) guidelines, clients can earn up to
$5500.00 annually, and they don’t even have to report it. I would recommend the
same level for ODSP/OW clients, in order for the province to be more in line
with federal policy. This would save much administrative time for Ministry
staff, resulting in higher morale, less staff turnover, and real financial
savings.
Presently, with $100.00 in Work-Related benefit and an ‘automatic’
business deduction of another $100.00, it now stands at $2400.00 per year.
(That automatic deduction is a trap. Staff would prefer that clients NOT keep
track of each and every receipt, each and every kilometre. It is, after all, a
real headache to administer such a client, who is perfectly within their rights
to pursue employment and business interests.)
Raise the mileage rate for employment/business/medical
travel from $0.40 per kilometre to $0.45 or $0.50 per kilometre. Note that
medical travel is a cash disbursement, while the rate for employment/business
travel is a deduction from gross income. It is interesting that Ministry staff
probably receive (in cash disbursements) more like $0.55 per kilometre when
traveling on business when using their own vehicle. The per-kilometre costs of
operating a vehicle are well-known and have been studied extensively. This
government might ask what the Canada Revenue Agency recognizes as a legitimate
rate of mileage/reimbursement, and
model their own program accordingly.
Raise the work-related benefit from $100.00 per month
per single adult to $200.00 month per single client. Adults with families
should get an additional hundred a month benefit per child.
Keep rent controls in place, as presently constituted,
for three to five years, in order for the province’s most vulnerable citizens to
have some reasonable time to catch up.
Raise the provincial minimum wage to $20.00 per hour
by 2024.
A special housing benefit to augment the federal
housing benefit, slated for 2019, although details are presently sketchy.
A dedicated university fund, initially $25-million per
year, in order for ODSP/OW clients to get the skills and education required to
break the cycle of poverty and to address the skills shortage presently
plaguing the province.
There’s more, which I will address in a future post.
END
Please read this additional coverage.
Image. Louis Shalako.
Thank you for reading.
