For the National Table of Community Development Corporations, the SOLIDARITÉ Itinérance Network of Quebec, the FRAPRU, the Network of Regional Tables of Women’s Groups of Quebec and the Collective for a Quebec Without Poverty, the observation is clear: that there is Whether it is food insecurity, homelessness, access to social housing, or the poverty experienced by women, the situation continues to get worse. For years now, these organizations (and many others!) have been sounding the alarm and proposing structural measures, but things will only get worse as long as the government refuses to resolutely tackle poverty, according to them.
Missed opportunities
In recent months, François Legault’s government has missed several great opportunities:
– Unveiled in June, the 4th anti-poverty plan has a budget four times smaller than the previous action plan and it does not include any income improvement targets.
– Presented in August, the Quebec Housing Strategy does not include any specific target for the construction of social housing or rent control measures.
– Tabled in September, Bill 71 does not provide for any increase in social assistance benefits and instead proposes cuts for tens of thousands of people, including women already in vulnerable situations.
Urgent requests
The situation is urgent, insist community organizations. It is time for the government to finally assume its responsibilities to ensure respect for fundamental rights and invest in measures to reduce poverty and strengthen the social safety net. The five organizations are asking the Minister of Finance, Éric Girard, to make financial commitments as of the economic update of November 21:
– To ensure that everyone has sufficient income to cover, at a minimum, their basic needs as defined by the Market Basket Measure ($24,200 per year)
– To carry out the construction of social housing so that it makes up, within 15 years, at least 20% of the rental stock, which implies the annual financing of at least 10,000 social and community housing units in different forms (HLM, cooperatives and housing non-profit)
– To increase funding for public services, and thus improve their accessibility and quality.
Beware of austerity
As the government prepares the ground for budgetary austerity, the five community organizations remind it that it is mainly responsible for the current deficit and that it is not up to people in poverty to pay the price for its bad decisions and all the gifts he was able to give to more fortunate people. Let us think, for example, of the recent tax cut which mainly benefits better-off taxpayers but deprives the government of $1.8 billion per year, or the $6.7 billion distributed in one-off aid during the election period which benefited people almost as much. with an annual income of $15,000 than those earning $100,000.
Citations
Marie-Line Audet, National Table of Community Development Corporations
“We are experiencing one of the worst social crises in history in Quebec. Everywhere in communities, we see the devastating effects: rural regions where homelessness is visible, families on the street, workers who have no other choice but to turn for help food, and it’s only gotten worse in the last year. Data from the latest HungerCount confirms this: 940,000 people have used the services of food banks each month in Quebec, an increase of 53% since 2021. This represents more than one in ten people! Community organizations cannot meet the scale of these needs and are at the end of their resources. They demand that the government immediately take its responsibilities. And meanwhile, we are presented with a plan to fight poverty that completely misses the target in addition to being woefully underfunded. This is why the TNCDC launched the Quebec is KO campaign this fall. The government must hear our cry from the heart and invest massively in the social safety net as soon as the economic update is completed, so that Quebec can get back on its feet and finally go from KO to OK. »
Boromir Vallée Dore, SOLIDARITÉ Itinérance Network of Quebec
“Our communities are under stress. A simple walk through our city centers is enough to see the blatant increase in homelessness. We must understand the link between the situation in our public spaces and the opportunities missed by our government. We learn that the health plan is weighed down by problems of access to health, that the plan to fight poverty will not increase the income of the most deprived and that the housing strategy does not provide for specific measures for people in need. situation of great precariousness. It is obvious that our government no longer has the luxury of making mistakes and now bears the burden of correcting the situation. And this above all to guarantee the right to housing, ensure sufficient income and allow access to health care. We demand a firm commitment from the Prime Minister to ensure adequate funding for anti-poverty efforts and effective coordination between ministries. »
Véronique Laflamme, FRAPRU
“Low- and moderate-income renters face growing unaffordability. 173,000 renter households in Quebec already have core housing needs, according to Statistics Canada, because they live in housing that is too expensive, too small or in poor condition, with an annual median income of only $21,400. Private housing, which represents 89% of the rental stock, does not meet the needs of a growing number of tenants. The despair is palpable, accentuated by the lack of alternatives. It is therefore urgent to work on the provision of social housing in different forms to meet a diversity of needs, starting with those of vulnerable tenants who wait for years for low-rent housing. To fight poverty, we need more public social housing and HLM. However, the Minister of Finance is slowing down development by not planning over several years and by not financing a sustainable social housing program. The Quebec government must at least provide for the financing of new social housing units in its economic update. »
Audrey Gosselin Pellerin, Network of Regional Tables of Women’s Groups of Quebec
“In Quebec, poverty has a type. And it is feminine. However, instead of introducing measures that take into account the needs of women and the obstacles they experience, particularly for those at the crossroads of oppression, the government is cutting, with the recent reform of social assistance, in support measures which significantly benefit women already in vulnerable situations, such as the bonus for heads of single-parent families with a dependent child under 5 years old and the automatic granting of the benefit for “temporary constraints to employment » for women victims of domestic violence and living in a shelter. The economic update is an opportunity for the government to correct the situation so that all women and people in poverty can finally have bread on the table. »
Serge Petitclerc, Collective for a Quebec without poverty
“Covering essential needs should not be negotiable. Doesn’t the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms stipulate that “any person in need has the right, for themselves and their family, to financial assistance measures and social measures? […] capable of ensuring a decent standard of living? However, in Quebec, approximately one person in ten lives — or survives — with an income insufficient to cover their basic needs as defined by the Market Basket Measure (MPM), which represents the minimum necessary to hope to live in health, with a “modest” standard of living. And as we have seen, things are getting worse for many people. Given the scale of the needs, the latest plan to combat poverty, the most meager of the four action plans implemented since 2004, represents an affront to all people experiencing poverty. In fact, the Quebec government’s widespread indifference towards them amounts to a denial of human rights. »
