McGuinty defends record on child poverty

from The Toronto Star

‘We've made real progress,’ premier says
Rob Ferguson
Queen's Park Bureau
A report that brands Ontario as the centre of child poverty in Canada after four years of Liberal government in the province is off the mark, Premier Dalton McGuinty says.

Despite his attack today on Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory for education and health promises that could erode public services and make life tougher for the "overwhelming majority for whom daily life is a struggle," McGuinty maintained "we've made real progress. I think families themselves would speak to that."

The report by the Ontario Social Planning Network found Ontario is home to almost 44 per cent of the country's poorest children, about 345,000 in all. The group challenged all political parties to put child poverty at the top of their agendas in the Oct. 10 election campaign.

McGuinty said he hadn't seen the report but touted the Liberal government's creation of a new Ontario Child Benefit payment in its March budget and a promise of a $45 million-a-year denticare plan for the working poor as ways of addressing the problem.

"Those are two new directions that we are embracing as a demonstration of our commitment," he told a news conference at a downtown Toronto hotel today before taking his campaign to Hamilton and London, cities visited by Tory and NDP Leader Howard Hampton yesterday.

Hampton has already promised a larger dental care program, called Ontario Smiles, with costs estimated at $100 million annually.

The child benefit will provide up to $1,100 per child into the pockets of parents on welfare or the working poor by the time it's fully implemented in 2011. Smaller payments begin this year.

"It's a benefit that never existed before," McGuinty said. "What's unique about it is it's also available to the working poor."

Tory's party has pledged to continue paying the child benefit if elected.

The social planning network, a coalition of 19 community social planning councils around Ontario, is also calling for a $10 minimum wage. The McGuinty government recently raised it to $8 and will boost it to $10.25 in 2010, saying it would be too much of a shock for employers to order a major rise immediately,