Child poverty rate in B.C. worst in Canada -- report: National advocacy group says one in four B.C. kids living below line
Times Colonist (Victoria)
21 Jul 2006
By: Lindsay Kines

EXCERPT

B.C. posted the worst child-poverty rate in the country in 2002 and 2003 with nearly one in four children living below the poverty line, according to a national report released Thursday.

The Poverty Profile by the National Council of Welfare shows British Columbia topped all provinces with a child-poverty rate of 23.9 per cent in 2003, down slightly from 24.2 per cent the previous year. Prince Edward Island recorded the lowest rate at 11.3 per cent.

The national rate was 17.6 per cent in 2003.

B.C.'s Ministry of Employment and Income Assistance noted that the council's numbers are three years out of date, and that the report would tell a different story if done today. Ministry spokeswoman Anne McKinnon said the provincial economy has improved dramatically since 2003.

"Right now, unemployment is at one of the lowest levels in 30 years, and today there's virtually a job for any British Columbian that wants one," she said. The average wage in British Columbia, meanwhile, has increased by 10 per cent over the past four years.

"This government believes the best way to tackle poverty is through the strong economy," she said.

NDP children's critic Maurine Karagianis, however, said the council's report highlights a "very disturbing trend" in B.C.

"I've been around the province a lot in the last year and this really reiterates what I've heard in communities as well," she said. "Growing numbers of families dependent on food banks. Growing numbers of families who are homeless. And a growing number of children who are living in poverty despite having working parents."

The Esquimalt-Metchosin MLA called on the B.C. government to make child poverty a priority and take immediate steps to review its income-assistance rates and its affordable-housing policies.

"If we are raising one in four or one in five children in this province in poverty, what kind of future are we offering them?"

The national council, which is a citizens advisory group to the federal government, said that while Canada has made progress reducing poverty among seniors, the poverty rate for children and working adults remains almost what it was a quarter-century ago. The council said Canada needs a national anti-poverty plan to tackle the problem.

"The market is clearly not going to solve the poverty problem on its own, when full-time, full-year employment is not always enough to get an individual over the poverty line, as this report shows, and when precarious employment with few or no benefits is on the rise."

The report notes the Scandinavian countries have used labour market policies and the social- insurance system to post some of the lowest poverty levels in the industrialized world. ...