Family Service Toronto and Campaign 2000 nation-wide release a joint statement denouncing all forms of anti-Black racism, colonialism and white supremacy.   As organizations working directly in the areas of mental health and poverty eradication, we know that Black and Indigenous communities have much worse health outcomes and exponentially higher rates of poverty than white Canadians and that this is a both a result of and a strategy to maintain systemic oppression.  We have a responsibility to ensure that our work in these areas contributes to ending anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism, which cannot be done without critical self-reflection, education and dialogue.

Read the full statement and recommendations.

Read the media release.

British Columbia – First Call: Child And Youth Advocacy Coalition

Alberta – Edmonton Social Planning Council

Saskatchewan – University of Regina

Manitoba – Social Planning Council of Winnipeg

Ontario – Ontario Campaign 2000

New Brunswick – Human Development Council

Nova Scotia – CCPA office in Nova Scotia

Prince Edward Island – MacKillop Centre for Social Justice and the PEI Coalition for a Poverty Eradication Strategy

Campaign 2000: End child and family poverty in Canada, along with over 250  groups and individuals across the country sent a letter today calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the federal COVID Cabinet Committee to ensure children living in poverty from marginalized communities are central to the pandemic response and recovery plan. 

Written by the Campaign 2000 Steering Committee and endorsed by partners from across the country, the letter sets out a suite of immediate and longer-term policy solutions and fiscal investments to ensure that low-income children and families have the supports they need to survive the pandemic and thrive in the recovery.

Campaign 2000, the groups and individuals endorsing the letter propose a robust and bold plan of action.  It includes better investments and universal access to income supports, social infrastructure that prioritizes building and maintaining affordable, public childcare and housing systems as key to economic recovery efforts, and progressive tax measures to mitigate deepening inequality while generating revenue for COVID-related and poverty reduction expenditures.

Read the letter in full in English and in French.  Read our media release in English and French.

Today Campaign 2000 partners in Manitoba release their annual report card on the state of child and family poverty, Broken Promise Stolen Futures: Child and Family Poverty in Manitoba, where 1 out of every 6 children living in a two-parent family live in poverty, and 1 out of every 1.6 children living in a single parent family lives in poverty. This report finds that even with the federal Canada Child Benefit and using both the federal and provincial governments’ preferred and more forgiving poverty measure, the Market Basket Measure, Manitoba ranks 4th in both overall as well as child poverty in 2016. In 2018, there was an increase of 7% in overall poverty and 19% increase in child poverty. The report demonstrates that at this rate it will take 697.5 years to end child poverty in Manitoba.

Click here to download the media release and full report.

Campaign 2000 and the Child Welfare League of Canada have released a joint response to the federal government’s emergency aid package announced March 18.

The release details their call for more robust investments into income security measures and additional strategies to ensure vulnerable and marginalized children and caregivers have immediate access to benefits.

Follow @campaign2000 and @CWLC_LBEC for updates.

Today, Honourable Minister Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Families, Children, and Social Development, attended the C2000 National Strategy Conference to share some words about his work on housing, the Canada Child Benefit, intergovernmental collaboration, and other poverty reduction initiatives.

Minister Hussen fielded questions on a range of issues including the Multilateral Early Learning and Childcare Framework, the high rate of poverty in FN, Inuit and Métis communities and decisions around measurement, and the inaccessibility of the CCB which contributes to poverty among refugee families and children.

The Minister spoke to these questions as well as a need for policy and investment in off-reserve housing for Indigenous people, and the potential for basic income pilots across the country.

Campaign 2000 supporters made it clear that high quality, affordable, accessible childcare, and the reduction of high poverty rates among racialized and Indigenous children, must be prioritized across policy areas within the Minister’s portfolio.

Campaign 2000 looks forward to continuing to work with the Minister and the federal government on implementing the recommendations in the National Report Card released in January, and achieving forward movement on the goal of eliminating child and family poverty.

Campaign 2000, co-ordinated by Family Service Toronto, is a non-partisan coalition of 120 groups and individuals committed to ending child poverty.

Campaign 2000 and Family Service Toronto hold the C2000 National Strategy Conference at 355 Church Street, Toronto, March 4 to 5. Participants are C2000 partners from across the country.

In 1989, all federally represented parties voted unanimously in the House of Commons to end child poverty by the year 2000.  After the passing of this resolution, rates of child poverty continued to rise before they decreased.  Thirty years later, there are over 1.35 million children living in poverty with their families in Canada today and income inequality, the gap between the rich and poor, has grown to unjustifiable heights.

We have missed the opportunity to end poverty for a whole generation of children.

Released on January 14, 2020, the national report card, 2020: Setting the Stage for a Poverty-Free Canada,” provides a current snapshot of child and family poverty in the country and demonstrates the need for continued efforts to eradicate child and family poverty.
As we begin a new decade under the mandate of a new minority government, we are provided with the opportunity for collaboration on the shared goal of ending poverty for all.  We cannot afford to miss another generation of children.

The national report card is released in coordination with several provincial report cards from our partners in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia to Prince Edward Island. Winnipeg partners will release their provincial report card at the end of January and Ontario partners at the end of February.

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

• National Report Card in English: 2020 Setting the Stage for a Poverty-Free Canada (updated) and French: 2020 : Préparer le terrain pour un Canada sans pauvreté

• National Campaign 2000 media release in English and French.

Check out the provincial report cards on child poverty:

• Prince Edward Island Report Card
• Nova Scotia Report Card
• New Brunswick Report Card
• Ontario Report Card (released April 2020)
• Manitoba (released April 8, 2020)
• Saskatchewan Report Card
• Alberta Report Card
• British Columbia Report Card

On the eve of a new parliament being sworn in, Campaign 2000 and its partners from coast to coast to coast are urging the new and returning cohort of federally-elected politicians to seize the opportunity and make history by recommitting to the elimination of child and family poverty in Canada.

November 24, 2019 marks 30 years since the signing of the all-party resolution in the House of Commons to end child and family poverty. From 1989 to 2019, three decades have gone by and based on the latest statistics, over 1 million children still live in poverty. Child poverty exists in every riding across the country, with some of the deepest pockets of child poverty occurring in the North, and among Indigenous and racialized children.

On Monday November 25 at noon, join our partners in Winnipeg on the front steps of the Manitoba Legislative Building, where those under 30 will share their experiences and what the legacy of 30 years of child poverty means to them.

Campaign 2000 and several of its provincial partners will release their annual report cards in early 2020, which will include updated statistics, analysis, and recommendations. Stay tuned as we enter the 31 st year of our Campaign. We hope this is the last milestone anniversary we will have to mark. Children and families across the country deserve to live free of stress, ill-health, precarious housing, and poor access to food, and collectively we will continue to make these goals a reality. We cannot afford to wait another 30 years.

Read the Media Advisory for the Winnipeg event

Read the National Media Release (English)

Read the National Media Release (French)

Today is the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty and in four days, polls will open for Canada’s 43^rd federal election.

This year also marks 30 years since each federal party represented in the House of Commons committed to ending child poverty by the year 2000. There is no better time than the October 21 election to hold every party accountable to that commitment. Campaign 2000 sent an open letter to the leaders of every registered federal party asking to see their plans on eradicating child and family poverty in Canada. 

Since the all-party resolution was passed 30 years ago, Campaign 2000 has been developing a suite of achievable policy recommendations to put Canada on the track to eradicating child and family poverty.  These recommendations were outlined in our letter and each party was asked to respond directly to questions based on the recommendations. Nine responses were received, and of those, only one party, the Green Party, responded directly to the questions. The Liberal Party and NDP were the only other two parties who provided substantive responses related to poverty reduction.

Our report, Child Poverty by Federal Riding: the work ahead for Canada’s next Parliament, shows significant levels of child poverty in every federal riding across the country.  Child poverty is an everyday issue, and with the looming federal election, we have the opportunity to make it an election issue as well. Ending poverty must be a priority for all members of the incoming government.

Read our full statement here

Read the response from the Green Party here

Read the response from the Liberal Party here

Read the response from the New Democrat Party here

In the lead up to the federal election, Campaign 2000 has mapped the prevalence of child poverty by federal riding from coast to coast to coast.  The interactive map, produced in partnership with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, and this corresponding report is the second update to the initial 2015 report.  Using the most recent data available, this interactive map shows the rate of child poverty by federal electoral district along with socio-economic indicators, allowing users to get a snapshot of state of child poverty by federal riding.  Readers can also view demographic characteristics that are associated with high poverty rates in each riding.

This update shows that while there is an important trend downwards in the rate of child poverty across the country since 2015, a significant number of children remain in poverty in every federal riding across Canada.  The latest data continue to paint a stark portrait of inequality with high- and low-income families living in close proximity while divided by wide social and economic gaps that leave too many children hungry, sick and stressed beyond what is expected or acceptable for children.

Federal ridings with the highest levels of child and family poverty are home to a higher proportion of Indigenous, racialized and immigrant community members and lone parent led families.  This correlation signals the persistence of discrimination and systemic inequalities that drive higher unemployment, lower labour market participation rates and higher proportions of renters and people spending more than 30% of their income on housing.

The presence of child and family poverty in every riding in Canada demands for it to be a priority issue for every party this election, with a commitment to strong and decisive federal action.  Clearly, every community, every candidate and all political parties have a stake in the eradication of poverty.

Read the press release and the Child poverty by federal riding: the work ahead for Canada’s next Parliament report. Click on the map below to see the rate of child poverty in your riding. Read the list of the best and worst ridings.

Talk to your local candidates about how they will work to end child and family poverty in your riding.  Read our letter to federal party leaders to see what we asked.
Read the Toronto Star exclusive: Report aims to put poverty on the agenda in federal election campaign