Fighting for a hearing ... with buck-a-beer
Question period at Queen’s Park sparks ‘fury’ and ‘disgust’ from the Hamilton contingent
The Spectator joined the local group on their journey to Queen’s Park:
8:30 a.m.
The bus is quiet as it takes off for Toronto. As the city approaches, basic income recipient Jessie Golem asks who might participate in her portrait series on basic income. Her goal is to take photographs of at least 50 recipients while they hold signs explaining what the project means to them. The 29-year-old hands out pieces of cardboard and markers.
Adrienne Newport, 26, writes about her cat, Bruce. Basic income brought her “pride and joy” into her life, which has helped with her loneliness and depression.
10:30 a.m.
After the bus arrives at Queen’s Park, the group is ushered off to question period, where the topic of basic income dominates much of the discussion alongside Premier Doug Ford’s move to bring back buck-abeer.
Provincial NDP Leader Andrea Horwath told the story of Hamilton’s Tim Button, who has said he could now make choices – to buy healthier food, to pay to take transit, to meet a friend for coffee – since enrolling in the basic income pilot project last October.
Hamilton Mountain NDP MPP Monique Taylor spoke about Dave Cherkewski, who has been enjoying fruit smoothies with the extra money and had hoped to spend three years creating a work co-op for people with disabilities by people with disabilities.
Taylor announced she would be tabling a motion, calling on the government to reverse its decision to cancel the basic income pilot and cut a planned three per cent social assistance increase in half.
Minister Lisa MacLeod said the basic income project is “failing.” She said the previous government had difficulty signing people up for the project. “Now a sizable number, over 25 per cent, have either dropped out or were failing to meet their obligations such as filing their taxes,” she added. As the discussion flipflops from basic income to buck a beer, program participants shake their heads in the public gallery. Newport begins to weep, later adding that she is “hurt” and “destroyed” by the government’s decision.
Noon
“Infuriating” and “disgusting” are some of the words being thrown around by the group after watching question period. Afterward, Horwath and other NDP MPPs meet with program participants, listen to their stories and encourage them to keep up the fight.
“It gives us dignity, it gives us enough money to eat properly,” Michael Hampson tells them about basic income. “It’s because of basic income” that he’s able to wear clothes from Gilbert’s Big & Tall Clothing in Hamilton, he said. “Basic income has given me freedom from the chains of ODSP,” he added.
Sheila Regehr, chair of the Basic Income Canada Network, tells participants their stories are the only data to have come from the program.
1 p.m.
The group divides, with some staying to chat with NDP MPPs, others speaking to Green Party of Ontario leader Mike Schreiner and another bunch meeting with Liberal MPP Mitzie Hunter and interim Liberal leader John Fraser. Fraser said the group has the party’s commitment to fight on their behalf for reinstatement of the program.
1:30 p.m.
Golem and another basic income participant, James Collera, join in a news conference in the Queen’s Park media studio. Golem spoke about how she had been using basic income to expand her freelance photography business and a not-for-profit where she is operations manager.
Before basic income, she held down four jobs, she said. “I barely had time to eat,” she later added.
Collera, another Hamilton program participant, said he has thrived while participating in the pilot, which offered him a springboard to pursue entrepreneurship after having worked as a bank teller. Cooper noted two-thirds of program participants were working, while the other third had previously been on social assistance. “I think the biggest change was the restoration of dignity for a group that has been forgotten for so long,” he said about those receiving social assistance.
2:15 p.m.
While basic income participant Alana Baltzer waited to board the bus back to Hamilton, she said she was feeling worse after Wednesday’s visit. She said she was “disgusted” the PC government dodged basic income questions during question period and switched the topic to buck a beer. The cancellation of the pilot has prompted her to consider leaving Ontario.
“They don’t want to care, that’s OK – I’m not going to care either,” she said.
Meanwhile, back on the bus, Tom Cooper, director of the Hamilton Roundtable for Poverty Reduction, said he felt the group got their message across.
As for what’s next, he said they’ll continue trying to salvage the project, and he still hopes to speak with MacLeod.
“We’re using whatever resources we can to talk to the federal government about the possibility of adopting the basic income pilot, which might be the best option right now,” Cooper said.