McGuinty pledges to fight poverty

from The toronto Star

Kerry Gillespie
Queen's Park Bureau

If the Liberals are re-elected, Premier Dalton McGuinty says he’ll make poverty reduction a priority and he’ll introduce firm targets, within a year, so the government can be measured on its progress.

“Targets act as powerful magnets for collaboration . . . It’s really important that as a society we begin to recognize that there is poverty. “Let’s agree on some telling indicators, let’s measure those on a regular basis and let’s put in a focused strategy so we can show we’re making progress. If we’re not making progress, we’ll be held to account,” McGuinty said today at a campaign stop at Toronto's Daily Bread Food Bank.

The gap between the rich and poor in Ontario is at a record high and there are some 345,000 children living in poverty.

Several anti-poverty groups have called on the province to cut child poverty by 25 per cent within 5 years and by 50 per cent in 10 years but McGuinty said he wouldn't commit to any targets until after he consults with experts.

Gail Nyberg, executive director of the Daily Bread Food Bank, was pleased with McGuinty's commitment and called on the other parties to follow suit.

“You have nine days … to put something in your platform that talks about reducing poverty around timelines and measures,” Nyberg said.

Poverty reduction targets have been used effectively in other countries to get numbers down quickly, she said.

In England, “Tony Blair decided he was going to reduce child poverty by 25 per cent in 5 years and you know what, they almost did it, they got to 23 point something and the lesson we learned … is if you’re going to have real reduction in poverty you need to have a plan, you need a poverty reduction plan, you need to have some measures and you need to have a timeline,” Nyberg said.