Campaign 2000: End Child and Family Poverty welcomes the federal government’s April 1 announcement of the National School Food Program. Children in Canada will now have access to an important safety net to mitigate hunger at school. 

The federal government’s investment in the National School Food Program demonstrates its commitment to the well-being of Canada’s children and youth.

And while Campaign 2000 commends the federal government for launching this program, the coalition is calling for further investment in income security measures, like the Canada Child Benefit (CCB), to adequately address the crisis that is food insecurity in Canada.

“When it comes to food insecurity, solutions like community food programs can only do a part of the job. To be successful, they must be coupled with strategies to address inadequate or insecure income,” said Chris Brillinger, Executive Director of Family Service Toronto. “The launch of a national school food program is a good policy decision that will take some pressure off household budgets, but without increases to income supports like the CCB, we are not fully addressing childhood food insecurity.”

Read the full C2000 Media Release

Campaign 2000 releases its annual report on child and family poverty, Unprecedented Progress on Poverty Reduction Being Undone. The report finds that in 2021, despite the historic progress achieved in 2020, Canada saw a sharp upswing in national child poverty rates. As pandemic benefits wound down and the cost of living rose, poverty rates rebounded, resulting in over 1 million children living in poverty.

Using tax filer data from 2021, the latest available, this update finds that the child poverty rate rose to 15.6%, up from 13.5% in 2020 (using the Census Family Low Income Measure, After Tax). That represents 163,550 more children living with the short – and long-term physical, mental, emotional, economic and social harms of poverty.

This year’s national report finds that rates of child poverty increased in every province and territory from 2020 to 2021. Disproportionately higher rates were seen for people marginalized by colonization, racism and systemic discrimination, including First Nations, Inuit and Métis children and racialized and migrant children.

The progress achieved in 2020 revealed that there is room for more ambitious targets for poverty reduction in Canada. Campaign 2000 was founded after the unanimous 1989 federal motion to eradicate child poverty by the year 2000. The federal government’s 2015 commitment to the United Nations 2030 Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals, the first of which is No Poverty, signaled an important re-prioritization of poverty eradication. But the latest data presented in this year’s report show troubling signs that progress towards ending child and family poverty is reversing.

Accelerated efforts are required for Canada to meet its human rights obligations to end poverty. This report offers more than 30 recommendations that cover inequality, income security, housing, child care, decent work and healthcare, and calls for bold action to eradicate child and family poverty in Canada.

Key Findings from the 2023 National Report Update:

• Over 1 million children lived in poverty (1,162,460 or 15.6%) in 2021.
• The national child poverty rate increased by 2.1 percentage points between 2020-2021, following a historic reduction of 4.2 percentage points between 2019-2020. This increase represents an additional 163,550 children living in poverty.
• The child poverty rate is higher (16.1%) for children under six than all children.  
• Rates of child poverty increased in every province and territory, with highest increases in Saskatchewan amongst the provinces (child poverty rate of 24.2%) and Nunavut amongst the territories (child poverty rate of 35.8%).
• The gap between wealthy and low-income families widened, as families in the bottom decile of income distribution had only 1.6% of the total share of income compared to families in the top decile, who had 25.4%.
• Government transfers, such as the Canada Child Benefit (CCB), are powerful poverty reduction tools.  The CCB reduced child poverty by 9.2 percentage points in 2021.
• Child and family poverty disproportionately affects marginalized communities due to the historic and current violence of colonialism, racism and systemic discrimination.
• Canada’s universal child care plan must include low-income children with a sliding scale fee model of $0 to $10 maximum.  All child care expansion must be within the public and non-profit sectors.

Want to read more? 

Click on the following links to read and download the 2023 report cards.

English National Update and Press Release

French National Update and Press Release

Check out the provincial and territorial report cards as they become available:

British Columbia Report Card
BC Child Poverty Report Card 2023 – First Call Child and Youth Advocacy Society (firstcallbc.org)
2023 CPRC Media Materials – First Call Child and Youth Advocacy Society (firstcallbc.org)
2023 BC Child Poverty Maps – First Call Child and Youth Advocacy Society (firstcallbc.org)

Alberta Report Card and Press Release

Manitoba Report Card and Press Release

English Ontario Report Card and Press Release

French Ontario Report Card and Press Release

New Brunswick Report Card English and French; Press Release English and French

Nova Scotia Report Card and Press Release

Prince Edward Island Report Card

Newfoundland and Labrador Report Card and Press Release

Nunavut Report Card in English and Inuktitut; and Press Release in English and Inuktitut

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For Immediate Release – Campaign 2000: End Child and Family Poverty is calling on the federal government to accelerate efforts to eliminate poverty and fulfill its human rights obligations as rising costs of living affect communities from coast to coast to coast. The call comes as Canada and other UN member states convene in New York for the 2nd SDGs Summit and Action Weekend to mark the halfway point to the deadline set for achieving Agenda 2030.

“Achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which is grounded in a human rights framework, requires urgency and political will from all levels of government,” said Leila Sarangi, National Director of Campaign 2000. “Poverty is a human rights violation that is disproportionately experienced by those facing systemic marginalization including Indigenous Peoples, racialized and immigrant communities, those with disabilities, lone mothers and youth in the child welfare system, among others. Canada is moving in the wrong direction; any progress we’ve had in the past is being undone. The SDG Summit is the right place for Canada to reflect on where it is falling behind and plan for new actions to end poverty once and for all. We are a wealthy nation, we have the means, we now need the political will.”

“Canada has made real progress in the last decade, especially when it comes to reducing child poverty.” said Terence Hamilton, Policy Specialist at UNICEF Canada. “But the UN Sustainable Development Goals cannot be achieved by 2030 by leaving some children behind. Every child has the right to be free from poverty.”

Campaign 2000, Citizens for Public Justice and Canada Without Poverty co-lead a national research project that engages communities experiencing poverty in policy development to achieve the 2030 Agenda. The project recently completed an eleven-month tour to host 17 conversations with 227 people affected by poverty and systemic marginalization in every province and territory. Participants across the country shared how low wages, precarious work and stagnant government assistance rates, which were dramatically insufficient prior to the pandemic, do not allow them to cover the costs of basic needs today, including food, rent, medications, energy and transportation, which in turn leads to worse health, education and social outcomes for these families.

“Governments must do more to accurately capture experiences of poverty in Canada,” says Natalie Appleyard, Socio-Economic Policy Analyst at Citizens for Public Justice and a co-lead of the project. “Collecting disaggregated data and firsthand accounts of unmet needs is necessary for developing policy solutions that are effective in addressing the structural causes of poverty.”

Canada’s latest Voluntary National Review for the SDGs reports gains in poverty reduction made in 2020 were so significant that poverty reduction targets were achieved a decade early. But the report also shows that progress was a result of temporary pandemic income transfers from the federal government to individuals and families.

“Those benefits are no longer available, and data is showing poverty rates climbing back up,” said Sarangi. “We need to fix the major holes in our income and social security systems. Our communities are in crisis. We are at the halfway mark for meeting our obligations under the SDGs but we do not know what the federal plan is as it relates to ending poverty.”

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Download Press Release
Campaign 2000 is a non-partisan, pan-Canadian network of 120 national, provincial and community partner organizations committed to working to end child and family poverty, hosted by Family Service Toronto. To learn more about Campaign 2000 and the Localizing Canada’s Commitment to the Sustainable Development Goal’s project, visit https://sdg.campaign2000.ca

Contact Information
Athavarn Srikantharajah, Project Coordinator, Campaign 2000

647-894-8737

[email protected]

Campaign 2000 releases its annual report card on child and family poverty, Pandemic Lessons: Ending Child and Family Poverty is Possible. The report shows that during a global pandemic, rates of child poverty in Canada were reduced by a record 40%.  Using tax filer data from 2020, the latest available, this report card finds that child poverty fell to 13.5%, down from 17.7% the previous year.  That is the largest year over year drop since the federal government promised to end child poverty in 1989, and is largely a result of temporary pandemic benefits.  These benefits have all been retracted and this progress is unlikely to be sustained in the future. The federal government must take action to maintain and build on these gains in poverty reduction.  

This year’s national report card focuses on changes to income security measures, the need for decent work for all and the role of childcare in supporting low-income families.  It draws on data from focus groups and community conversations across the country to share the experiences of the real people who often get lost behind the numbers and emphasizes the need for trauma-informed and rights-based policy solutions to address the inequities of child and family poverty in this country.   

This report offers more than 50 recommendations on poverty reduction measures that cover inequality, income security, decent work, childcare, housing and public health. The pandemic, government response and significant reduction in poverty rates demonstrated that child poverty is a policy choice, not an economic inevitability.  These recommendations offer the opportunity to build on the progress of 2020 and make the choices necessary to end child and family poverty.    

Key Findings from the 2022 National Report Card: 

• Nearly one million, or more than 1 in 8 children, are growing up with the short- and long-term physical, mental, emotional, economic and social harms of poverty.   
• Child poverty declined in every region across Canada.   
• Government transfers can end poverty.  Without temporary pandemic benefits, 1.5 million children would have been living in poverty or nearly 21% 
• Child and family poverty disproportionately affects marginalized communities: For racialized children, it was 15.1%. For children in lone-parent families led by women, it was 29.7%. For First Nations children living on reserve, it was 37.4%. 

Want to read more? 

Click on the following links to read and download the 2022 report cards.  

English National Report Card, Infographic and Press Release 

French National Report Card and Press Release 

Check out the provincial and territorial report cards as they become available: 

British Columbia Report Card and Press Release

Alberta Report Card  and Press Release

Manitoba Report Card and Press Release

Nova Scotia Report Card and Press Release

Ontario Report Card, Interactive Maps of Child Poverty in Ontario, Press Release in English and French  

New Brunswick Report Card and Press Release 

Prince Edward Island Report Card and Press Release

Newfoundland and Labrador Summary of Report Card and Press Release

Yukon Poverty Report Card

The Auditor General’s report released last week on COVID-19 benefits is a cause for concern say anti-poverty advocates.  The report, which calls for a more vigorous post-payment verification and repayment process for individuals, will drive more people into deeper poverty while it lets corporations who benefitted from the pandemic off the hook.

Data show that marginalized workers – women, Indigenous, racialized, young, low income, and with precarious labour market attachment – were more likely to receive pandemic benefits.  These benefits led to significant reductions in poverty and inequality, precisely when these payments were needed most.

Alarmingly, the AG finds that the benefits paid resulted in disincentives to work at a time that the government was urging Canadians to stay at home and many lower wage service jobs were unsafe.  “The AG was not hired to be an expert in social policy, and she has no qualifications in employment policy,” said Sid Frankel, Associate Professor of Social Work at the University of Manitoba and Campaign 2000 Steering Committee member. “She clearly lacks awareness of relevant research from more than a dozen basic income trials that found no evidence of significant reductions in either hours of work or labor participation rates in response to these programs.”

During the pandemic and after its worst days, low-wage workers have experienced difficulties in obtaining and maintaining housing, supports to manage child and elder care, and achieving basic food security, contributing significantly to the inability of people to return to work when pandemic restrictions were loosened or lifted altogether.

For the AG to say that the availability of additional income resulted in failure to take on employment among the poorest of the poor reveals a significant misunderstanding of how the job world works. Canadians would be best served if the AG focused on accounting and audit functions within her considerable realm of expertise and refrained from conjecture rooted in stereotypes of benefit recipients gaming the system and being lazy and undeserving of help. 

“Parliament presumably neither retained nor paid the Auditor General to serve up this kind of misinformation concerning which features of pandemic relief programs actually incentivize work. On the one hand, she is out of her depth. On the other, it is simply not in her mandate,” said Shalini Konanur, Executive Director of the South Asian Legal Clinic of Ontario. 

The federal government is already spending more than $250 million in taxpayer dollars to verify eligibility and pursue repayments from people they have deemed ineligible for pandemic benefits they received.  While they have been calling their approach compassionate and flexible, what we have been learning in the nearly two years since this process started is that it causes unnecessary hardship for the mostly low-income people who are being pursued. 

Low-income earners have a much harder time meeting verification requirements.  Many are paid in cash and these payments do not flow through bank accounts because of their need to make essential purchases immediately.  People who receive honoraria from non-profits rarely receive accompanying paperwork they can use to prove eligibility. 

Others were encouraged to apply at the outset of the pandemic when the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) was rolling out quickly and there was much confusion regarding eligibility.  We will not leave anyone behind, the federal government repeatedly announced.  Social workers, community workers, welfare case workers, constituency office workers, CRA workers all either encouraged or mandated people to apply. 

“The pandemic benefits were not tucked away into savings accounts by people who struggle to live on low incomes.  The money was spent to provide for their basic needs,” Leila Sarangi, National Director of Campaign 2000.  “Seeking repayments now, in the context of record high inflation, from people who already cannot make ends meet, can only result in more hardship and destitution.”

The Auditor General’s report also looks at the Canada Employment Wage Subsidy.  It found that, alarmingly, the program did not collect enough data for the report to determine its effectiveness in supporting employees. The Auditor General was unable to determine if wage subsidies were even used to prevent layoffs because the government chose not to collect that data or to follow up with employers.

The report fails to address the fact that wage subsidies flowed to major corporations who were strong enough to withstand pandemic downturns.  It does find, however, that unlike the CERB, which changed over time to address the changing landscape, there were few improvements made to the wage subsidy program over the course of its life. 

The Auditor General’s report should have recommended more aggressive pursuit of large corporations that used wage subsidy programs to pad their bottom line and the pockets of their CEOs, and a CERB repayment amnesty for individuals living on low and moderate incomes who continue to struggle to make ends meet.

“The bias displayed in this report is reprehensible.  Individuals who were struggling before the pandemic took the lifeline, CERB, offered by the federal government as they had nothing to fall back on.  Now we are going to force them to pay back what they used to survive and have a different standard of accountability for businesses who accessed pandemic benefits?” said Kate Kehler, Executive Director of Social Planning Council of Winnipeg.  “If employers want to attract and retain employees, they need to pay a living wage and provide good working conditions and governments should be mandating that, not pushing struggling individuals and families over the edge.”

About Campaign 2000: Campaign 2000 is a non-partisan, pan-Canadian network of 120 national, provincial and community partner organizations committed to working to end child and family poverty, hosted by Family Service Toronto. For more information visit https://www.campaign2000.ca. To view an interactive map of Canada showing child poverty rates by federal riding, click here.

Download press release

MEDIA CONTACT                                                                            

Leila Sarangi
National Director, Campaign 2000: End Child and Family Poverty
647-393-1097

[email protected]

TORONTO – This week the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) will be notifying tax filers of how much they will receive in refundable tax credits, such as the Canada Child Benefit (CCB). Many families who have received pandemic benefits in the past will surprised to learn of further reductions in upcoming credits. 

Campaign 2000 has been organizing a CERB Amnesty Working Group for over two years. Membership is made up of community organizations, policy analysts, community legal clinics and people with living expertise of poverty/disability and other intersections of marginalization.  Together, they have been monitoring the effects of CERB on the incomes and the lives of people with low and moderate incomes. According to analysis by Open Policy, this round of clawbacks will primarily affect mothers, despite commitments from the federal government to advance gender equality and feminist policy.

“Letters from federal departments going out to millions of mothers this July will confirm that pandemic benefits will be confiscated from their ongoing child benefits” says John Stapleton, Principal and Founder of Open Policy.  “And those mothers with larger families will be hit hardest – the ones who require child benefits the most. For a mother with 4 children with a modest earned income of $33,000 a year and who would otherwise receive the maximum CCB amount, the hit will be over $3,000 in reduced refundable credits.”

The Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB), three recovery benefits and the lockdown benefits all count as taxable income, which can affect how much a person is eligible for in refundable tax credits.  For those with low and moderate incomes, depending on the particular tax credit, the amounts of the pandemic benefits could push incomes up over tax credit thresholds, resulting in clawbacks.

“The problem is that the benefits were received months ago – and in some cases over a year ago. Families have spent that money on what it was intended for, that was to stay safe and shelter at home,” says Leila Sarangi, National Director of the anti-poverty coalition Campaign 2000: End Child and Family Poverty. “In the context of rising inflation, families, including those on moderate incomes, are depending on government transfers like the Canada Child Benefit to make ends meet.”

According to a recent report by the Parliamentary Budget Office, child benefit payments were reduced on average by $606 in 2021/22 because of pandemic benefits being counted into income calculations.  Over three years, these clawbacks will mean that the federal government will spend $1.45 billion less in child benefit payments.

“It seems exceptionally punitive and antithetical to feminist economic policy,” Jasmine Ramze Rezaee, Director of Advocacy and Communications at YWCA Toronto.  “It’s why we’ve urged for immediate CERB Amnesty.  Government refunded clawbacks to seniors, gave the self-employed repayment amnesty and provided partial relief for students. Now is the time for a CERB Amnesty for mothers, children and anyone living with low or moderate incomes.”

CONTACT INFORMATION                                                                            

National: Leila Sarangi, National Director of Campaign 2000: End Child and Family Poverty Email: [email protected] Cell: 647-393-1097

National anti-poverty coalition reacts to 2021 federal fiscal update – precedence set for a full CERB Amnesty

Toronto – Since June 2020, national anti-poverty coalition Campaign 2000 has been sounding the alarm about the negative consequences the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) has been having for people living on low incomes.

Yesterday’s fiscal update promises a one-time repayment to low income seniors who received the CERB, which then unexpectedly reduced, and in some cases cancelled, their Guaranteed Income Supplement (GIS), resulting in loss of housing, homelessness, food insecurity, the inability to pay for medications and increased stress and anxiety.

The update also provides debt relief to students who received, but were ineligible for, the CERB and were eligible for the Canada Emergency Student Benefit (CESB) by offsetting their debt with the CESB amount.

“A one-time repayment for seniors who lost their GIS and creating a mechanism to offset student CERB debt are first steps in the right direction,” said Leila Sarangi, National Director of Campaign 2000.  “Compensation must now be expanded to include anyone living on low incomes who had other income benefits reduced, including people on social and disability assistance, and those who saw their workers benefit, child benefits and housing supplements reduced.”

In an open letter to Members of Parliament sent yesterday, Campaign 2000 urged all elected officials to support a full “CERB Amnesty”, which includes ensuring pandemic emergency benefits do not interact with other types of income supplements; that anyone living on or near poverty levels who had a loss to income supplements receive full repayment to compensate for that loss; and for the federal government to immediately cease pursuing people for CERB repayments who are living in poverty, regardless of eligibility. 

CERB Amnesty also recommends the reinstatement of the Canada Recovery Benefit for individuals whose working hours are still impacted by the pandemic into Bill C-2, An Act to provide further support in response to COVID-19 and ensuring social and disability assistance adequacy standards are tied to the funds given to provinces and territories through the Canada Social Transfer.

 “No one should be left worse off for having received federal pandemic benefits in a time of crisis,” Sarangi added.  “Now that precedence is set with repayments and debt relief for certain groups, we expect that this fix will be extended to everyone living in poverty.”

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Campaign 2000 is a non-partisan, pan-Canadian network of 120 national, provincial and community partner organizations committed to working to end child and family poverty, hosted by Family Service Toronto. To download 2021 report cards or for more information, please visit https://www.campaign2000.ca.

Contact information

Leila Sarangi, National Director of Campaign 2000, 647-393-1097, [email protected]

Campaign 2000 releases its annual report card on child and family poverty, No One Left Behind: Strategies for an Inclusive Recovery. The report shows data that suggest poverty reduction has declined and in some parts of Canada, poverty has increased. Using the latest data available (from 2019) this report paints a stark picture of income, health and social inequalities and deepening levels of child and family poverty.  In fact, children are living in deeper poverty. For example, the average single parent family with 2 children living in low income was $13,262 away from the CFLIM-AT in 2019, compared to $9,612 away in 2015. To reach the poverty line, a parent earning $15 per hour would need to work an additional 5.5 months full-time, assuming no taxes or deductions.

For the first time, the national report examines poverty through a social determinant of health framework. It is accompanied by an interactive map that shows that child poverty is a significant issue in every federal riding across the country. The report finds disproportionately higher rates of child poverty among communities marginalized by systemic barriers.

It was found that poverty reduction associated with the Canada Child Benefit will continue to stall and that it does not provide enough support to move families out of poverty. As such, the report offers recommendations for moving forward in a way that is inclusive and plays a clear role in poverty reduction.

This report offers 60 recommendations for poverty reduction and recovery efforts.

Key Findings from the 2021 National Report Card, No One Left Behind: Strategies for an Inclusive Recovery

• Nearly 1 in 5 children lived in poverty (1,313,400 or 17.7%) in 2019
• The national child poverty rate declined by .5 of a percentage points between 2018-2019, representing an additional 24,170 lifted out of poverty.  At this rate, it would take 54 more years to end child poverty.
• The child poverty rate is higher (18.5%) for children under six than all children.  
• The reduction in poverty associated with the Canada Child Benefit will continue to stall. The benefit cannot move eligible families in deep poverty out.  The maximum CCB was $6,639 for each child under six and $5,602 for each child between the ages of six and seventeen in 2019.
• Canada’s universal childcare plan must include low-income children with a sliding scale fee model of $0 to $10 maximum.
• Care work should be decent work. The care economy (including health, childcare, education) represents 21.1% of all jobs and generates 12% of GDP and must be central to an inclusive recovery.
• Canada still needs a national pharmacare plan, which should be expanded to include dental, vision, rehabilitation.

Want to read more?

Click on the following links to read and download the new report cards as they become available.

English National Report Card (Amended), Infographic and Press Release

French Executive Summary; Full French National Report Card and French press release

Check out the provincial report cards:

British Columbia Report and Press Release

Alberta

Saskatchewan Report Card and a Critical Review of Canada’s Poverty Line: The Market Basket Measure

Manitoba Report Card and Press Release

English Ontario Report Card and Press Release; French Ontario Report Card and Press Release

New Brunswick Report Card and Press Release

Nova Scotia Report Card and Press Release

Prince Edward Island (amended)

Yukon (forthcoming)

People across Canada are supportive of a broad repayment amnesty for anyone living on low incomes, according to a Campaign 2000 petition presented to the House of Commons today.

The petition, signed by people living in nearly every jurisdiction in the country, called on the government to implement a repayment amnesty for all people who received the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) whose incomes are below or just above the poverty line, and for all youth transitioning out of care, regardless of eligibility to receive the benefit.

“The CERB was not intended to be a poverty reduction tool, but that’s exactly what it did. The federal government should be applauded for taking quick action in a time of crisis and delivering this low-barrier benefit to people who needed it,” says Leila Sarangi, National Coordinator of Campaign 2000. “Not only is it cruel to ask for money back from those living on low incomes who took and used the benefit for what it was meant to be used for, but it goes against the government’s own goals to reduce poverty.” Read the full press release.

Today campaign partners in Saskatchewan and Yukon release new reports on child and family poverty. This is the first ever Campaign 2000-affiliated child poverty report released in the Yukon – thank you and congratulations to the Yukon Anti-Poverty Coalition. 

The Yukon report found that in 2018, 10.9% of Yukoners were considered low income, but Yukoners most likely to be considered low income based on the Low Income Measure included Lone-parent families (22.1%) and Households living outside of the Whitehorse (14.5%). Read the full report, which includes 10 recommendations and several policy proposals to improve the health and wellness of children, youth, and families in the Yukon.

The Saskatchewan report reveals a provincial child poverty rate of 26.1%, well above the child poverty rate of 18.2% for Canada as a whole, and greater than all other provinces and territories with the exception of Manitoba and Nunavut. Children in lone parent families had a poverty rate of 59.9%.

Read the Saskatchewan 2020 Child and Family Report Card and Poverty Report Brief.

Read the Yukon 2020 Child and Family Report Card and the media release.

Also out today is the French 2020 National Report card.