This is where it starts: sometime this month – or maybe next – a mid-size company in Mississauga is pushed to outsource its IT department to stay viable. A person loses a job.
At first, he finds freelance work, then temporary manual labour gigs. Then, nothing.
A single parent, he looks at starting his own business, but that would require an infusion of cash. Or retraining, but that too would cost money, and leave the household without an income for an extended period of time.
The first things to go are the luxuries – TV packages, smartphones, music lessons. The SUV is traded in for a used compact car. Next come some harder choices – running the washing machine less often to save on hydro and water, fewer trips to the grocery store supplemented with items from the local food bank.
One day – and then the next – both kids go to school without breakfast. These are the faces of child poverty in our communities.
In a four-part Metroland special investigative series, reporters from community papers across southern Ontario examine the issue of child poverty, which may at first blush not be visible in affluent areas such as Oakville – or Flamborough. They present research that says more than 370,000 Ontario children (or 13.8 per cent) lived in a low-income household in 2013, only slightly better than the national average of 14.3 per cent. They also found that more than 800,000 students take part in more than 4,000 school meal programs across the province. Included in the articles are interviews with educators, food bank workers and politicians.
According to recent numbers, 96 children are among the families currently registered with the Flamborough Food Bank, and that doesn’t include those who turn to Food With Grace in Waterdown, or other church-organized programs. And we have no idea how many don’t seek out assistance because of the stigma attached to poverty.
Certainly, initiatives such as the recent changes to the Child Tax Benefit program will help address the problem. As well, accurate, detailed information garnered through the recently restored long-form Census will aid in creating a focused poverty plan. But it could be years before such strategies bear fruit.
Other avenues that need to be explored include economic development initiatives that focus on maintaining – and creating – local jobs, investments in training and seeking out ways to help Ontario Works clients secure meaningful employment without worrying about clawbacks to benefits. Most of all, students need to learn life skills and strategies that will help put them on a path to a successful future.
Make no mistake: child poverty is family poverty, and it is a cycle we need to break.
This is where it starts: sometime this month – or maybe next – a mid-size company in Mississauga is pushed to outsource its IT department to stay viable. A person loses a job.
At first, he finds freelance work, then temporary manual labour gigs. Then, nothing.
A single parent, he looks at starting his own business, but that would require an infusion of cash. Or retraining, but that too would cost money, and leave the household without an income for an extended period of time.
The first things to go are the luxuries – TV packages, smartphones, music lessons. The SUV is traded in for a used compact car. Next come some harder choices – running the washing machine less often to save on hydro and water, fewer trips to the grocery store supplemented with items from the local food bank.
One day – and then the next – both kids go to school without breakfast. These are the faces of child poverty in our communities.
In a four-part Metroland special investigative series, reporters from community papers across southern Ontario examine the issue of child poverty, which may at first blush not be visible in affluent areas such as Oakville – or Flamborough. They present research that says more than 370,000 Ontario children (or 13.8 per cent) lived in a low-income household in 2013, only slightly better than the national average of 14.3 per cent. They also found that more than 800,000 students take part in more than 4,000 school meal programs across the province. Included in the articles are interviews with educators, food bank workers and politicians.
According to recent numbers, 96 children are among the families currently registered with the Flamborough Food Bank, and that doesn’t include those who turn to Food With Grace in Waterdown, or other church-organized programs. And we have no idea how many don’t seek out assistance because of the stigma attached to poverty.
Certainly, initiatives such as the recent changes to the Child Tax Benefit program will help address the problem. As well, accurate, detailed information garnered through the recently restored long-form Census will aid in creating a focused poverty plan. But it could be years before such strategies bear fruit.
Other avenues that need to be explored include economic development initiatives that focus on maintaining – and creating – local jobs, investments in training and seeking out ways to help Ontario Works clients secure meaningful employment without worrying about clawbacks to benefits. Most of all, students need to learn life skills and strategies that will help put them on a path to a successful future.
Make no mistake: child poverty is family poverty, and it is a cycle we need to break.
This is where it starts: sometime this month – or maybe next – a mid-size company in Mississauga is pushed to outsource its IT department to stay viable. A person loses a job.
At first, he finds freelance work, then temporary manual labour gigs. Then, nothing.
A single parent, he looks at starting his own business, but that would require an infusion of cash. Or retraining, but that too would cost money, and leave the household without an income for an extended period of time.
The first things to go are the luxuries – TV packages, smartphones, music lessons. The SUV is traded in for a used compact car. Next come some harder choices – running the washing machine less often to save on hydro and water, fewer trips to the grocery store supplemented with items from the local food bank.
One day – and then the next – both kids go to school without breakfast. These are the faces of child poverty in our communities.
In a four-part Metroland special investigative series, reporters from community papers across southern Ontario examine the issue of child poverty, which may at first blush not be visible in affluent areas such as Oakville – or Flamborough. They present research that says more than 370,000 Ontario children (or 13.8 per cent) lived in a low-income household in 2013, only slightly better than the national average of 14.3 per cent. They also found that more than 800,000 students take part in more than 4,000 school meal programs across the province. Included in the articles are interviews with educators, food bank workers and politicians.
According to recent numbers, 96 children are among the families currently registered with the Flamborough Food Bank, and that doesn’t include those who turn to Food With Grace in Waterdown, or other church-organized programs. And we have no idea how many don’t seek out assistance because of the stigma attached to poverty.
Certainly, initiatives such as the recent changes to the Child Tax Benefit program will help address the problem. As well, accurate, detailed information garnered through the recently restored long-form Census will aid in creating a focused poverty plan. But it could be years before such strategies bear fruit.
Other avenues that need to be explored include economic development initiatives that focus on maintaining – and creating – local jobs, investments in training and seeking out ways to help Ontario Works clients secure meaningful employment without worrying about clawbacks to benefits. Most of all, students need to learn life skills and strategies that will help put them on a path to a successful future.
Make no mistake: child poverty is family poverty, and it is a cycle we need to break.