Anti-poverty groups condemn decline

from canada . com

James Wood
CanWest News Service

REGINA -- A decline in the percentage of government dollars spent on social services in Saskatchewan in the last two decades is no surprise to anti-poverty and community organizations in the province.

A Statistics Canada study released Friday found that social service spending by the Saskatchewan government had gone up to $1,141,000,000 this year from $748 million in 1989.

But as a portion of the government's overall budget, the percentage dropped from 13.3 in 1989 to 10.2 per cent in 2007, the third-lowest proportion among the provinces last year.

Sue Delanoy, executive director of Saskatoon's Communities for Children program, said more money is needed as one Saskatchewan child in four lives in poverty.

"My bottom line is that I'm interested in children and the effects on children. I don't even really care what the stats are, we just have way too many kids living in poverty and way too many children not having their basic needs met. And most of those children are First Nation," she said in a telephone interview.

The figures used by Statistics Canada include social assistance payments, workers compensation, pension benefits, motor vehicle accident compensation and other social service payments such as money paid for the support of people with mental or physical disabilities or to people unable to work because of sickness.

The amount does not match up with the budget of the Community Resources department, which was $625,209,000 this year.

No one from the NDP government was made available to comment Friday.

The decline in the overall percentage of social services spending in Saskatchewan between 1989 and 2007 is in line with almost all other provinces and the federal government. Only Quebec and British Columbia saw small increases in their percentage of social spending while Prince Edward Island and Alberta had the largest proportional declines at five and 4.2 per cent respectively.

Statistics Canada says the overall proportion of social spending in Canada was in 1994, which was also the year Saskatchewan saw a record with over 41,000 people on social assistance. That figure has dropped below 28,000 since the province implemented a strategy to reduce welfare rolls by moving people to employment.

Social assistance payments were increased by $10 a month in the NDP government's March provincial budget, following increases of $40 in 2006 and $10 in 2005.

But the latter increase was the first in two decades.

Debbie Frost, the Saskatoon-based president of the National Anti-Poverty Organization, said the province should raise rates by $200 a month and index them to the annual rate of inflation.

While it would be expensive, it would ultimately help get people off of welfare, which has become increasingly difficult.

"There's no resources such as proper clothing, transportation or child care to go out and look for work," she said in an interview.

"If there was a commitment of new dollars it would enable people to get out there and look for work."

Delanoy said changes need to be made in how social services are run.

"We still have way too many fragmented programs, not enough universal programs, not enough affordability, not enough accessibility and we need to take a closer look at how we do that," she said.