A Roadmap for Change
It is time for government programs to reflect the realities of precarious employment
The world we once knew doesn’t exist anymore. We used to enter the workforce with thoughts of advancement. If you worked hard for them, employers would take care of you. Workers could rely on drug, dental and vision benefits, short- and long-term disability insurance and earning a good wage after a few years. But we know that isn’t reality anymore. Over the past 25 years the security we once knew and expected has evaporated. Employment has changed, and the demands of making a living became much harder. Costs of living have increased dramatically but wages, security and support have fallen behind.
More and more of us struggle to find and maintain employment. Contracts are the new normal, and stringing together multiple part-time jobs has left gaps in employment for some. Workers are left unsupported by programs like employment insurance because they are not able to accumulate enough hours. These gaps have made it impossible to move ahead on things we used to take for granted — marriage, buying a home or saving for the future.
Contracting a chronic illness that requires medication can be an economic calamity and interfere with food and housing costs. Heaven forbid we need to take time off work for cancer treatment or recovery from heart attack or surgery, let alone taking leave, without pay, to be a caregiver for a loved one.
And for all these changes, many of our income security supports still operate as they did at the end of the 20th century. Our programs have not kept up with this harsh new economic reality.
It’s for these reasons I agreed to participate in the Ontario government’s Income Security Reform Working Group. I believe it’s time to reform programs to meet the needs of people in Ontario today.
This past week we released a new vision. Income Security: A Roadmap for Change is quite literally a plan for the next 10 years to improve upon the province’s social supports.
The Roadmap defines an income line under which no one should be living, assessed not through comparative incomes but by what it actually costs to live here. This new measure of adequacy is used to build blocks of stackable supports to meet the need of families and individuals.
One of our most basic needs is housing. A Portable Housing benefit is proposed to help supplement a portion of our housing need, especially in overheated markets, so that all can afford to eat and meet rental payments.
An introduction of core health benefits (drug, dental, and vision) will also offset pressures on household budgets — the province has already begun this with OHIP+ for children and youth 24 years and younger.
Changes to Working Income Tax Benefits are needed so that they actually assist singles in a meaningful way like it has working families. We also want to see modest changes to Ontario Child Benefit to ensure that no child is ever again on what we call “welfare.”
There are also bold changes in legislation to allow those who need income supports room to make new choices and operate fairly for all.
We envision changing how people engage with systems. A social service worker should be just that, someone trusted to assist in times of crisis, ensuring barriers people are facing are dealt with so that they can move on in their lives. These supports could encompass direction to emergency housing, caregiving supports, addressing health issues mental or physical, engaging with the community and, of course, education and employment.
And, of course, we needed to address income security itself.
The days of assistance being for some mythical undeserving, lazy other is long gone. A vast majority of those denied employment insurance applications right now have no recourse if single and families can’t help. Sixty-eight per cent of people in Ontario either have been or knows a family member or friend who has struggled on social assistance.
This income system needs to work toward adequacy. John Stapleton, Innovation Fellow with the Metcalf Foundation and fellow working group member, puts the current amounts into perspective: “The programs we have in place have endured almost 25 years of real belt tightening. Had the single social assistance rate been increased with inflation from 1993, the rate would now be $1,012 a month. Today it is only $721 a month.”
We urgently call for early increases for singles left behind on Ontario Works of 10, seven and five per cent over the first three years, and five per cent per year for Ontario Disability Supports Program.
We also recommend an Assured Income for Persons with Disabilities that is tax delivered, acknowledging the lifelong nature of disability causing varying incomes throughout their careers. We advise the lessons from the current basic income pilot help define best practices for this program.
There is more in the Roadmap. I encourage you to read the executive summary online and provide feedback to the ministry.
Join us later this month. We’ll discuss the report at a town hall on social assistance reform: Thursday, Nov. 23, 1:30 to 4 p.m., Hamilton City Hall, Council Chambers, 71 Main St. W., Hamilton.