Human Resources Committee on June 12th, 2008

[Gerry Mangan]

I think it's fair to say that—you know, we don't want in any way to be unfair to previous generations—there was always a strong commitment to tackling poverty, but it was being tackled in a very diverse way. The people involved were not working together in a coordinated, integrated way. The strategy was introduced to try to have a more effective, coordinated way to understand why poverty existed, what the causes were, what the remedies were, and then to mobilize all the various stakeholders to better effect.

As I mentioned, it's almost an historical question now--why then and not before, why then and not afterwards? I mentioned the confluence of the minister in question who got the support form his government, and also the UN summit, the partnership background, and the economic resources. All of these just came together at the right time.

[Gord Brown, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville, ON]

Before I hand it over to Mr. Wallace, I have just one last question. Is there any advice you might give us, something maybe we haven't asked already?

[Gerry Mangan]

You've certainly asked a lot of questions.

No, I think we've covered most of the ground, certainly from my perspective. I don't know if my colleagues would want to add anything.

[Bevin Cody]

I think there would have been a prevailing attitude in Ireland 20 years ago that if we solved unemployment, poverty would be solved, and the fact that the economy turned around and we had full employment really concentrated the mind on the structural issues that were preventing certain groups from escaping from poverty. Then the establishment of targets had a huge impact on budgetary policy and social welfare rates.

I think the bigger challenge in terms of tackling poverty, which is ongoing and is addressed in the current national action plan, is around the delivery of services, how services are delivered to people in poverty.

[Gerry Mangan]

I will make one very quick point. Possibly it's more of a political dimension than whatever.

I have to say that we mentioned the minister, but really, there was a commitment from the very top. I've sat with my minister around the table at cabinet committee meetings chaired by the Prime Minister, and that gives a very clear message right down the line that this is a top government priority and there is accountability to the very top. So if you can engage people at the very top levels and there's parliamentary support and whatever....

And I suppose I can't emphasize enough the confidence that's there that poverty can be tackled, reduced, and ultimately--who knows?--eliminated. It can be done. What's needed is to have the will, and the will can come from the very top. I think that's a very important dimension, but you must put structures there to ensure that happens.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

We're almost out of time. There were some individuals who wanted to ask one quick question. I'm going to go to Mr. Wallace, Mr. Martin, Mr. Cuzner, and then Madame Bonsant in that order. They will have one quick question just to finish up. There have been no quick questions, that's the problem. But we're going to do our best.

Thanks, Mike. We'll go with you, and then Mr. Martin.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for joining us. This is for Professor Callan on the presentation he provided to us on the impact of tax benefit policy changes from 1993 to 1997 and from 2003 to 2007. My question is simple.

If I look at the chart—and by the way, I'm on the finance committee, so it's more of a finance question—I see that the impact of tax changes in the period 1993 to 1997 affected the middle class a little bit positively and the poorest section negatively, and then it changed in the period 2003 to 2007. I would like to know what the fiscal capacity of the government was in the 1993 to 1997 timeframe compared with the fiscal capacity of the government in the 2003 to 2007 timeframe, and did that change significantly?

[Tim Callan]

I don't have the exact figures at hand, but the capacity wasn't that different. I guess one of the things in looking at that is that big bar at the start on the left-hand side leaps out at you and speaks huge costs, but in fact that's proportionate gain for the poorest quintile. Their incomes are so low that it doesn't actually cost that much.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you very much. That answers the question.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

Mr. Martin, one quick question.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you.

I just want to note that once you decided you were going to act on this, how quickly you moved. We've been in a fairly intellectual exercise, over about 15 years now, trying to decide how to define poverty. We have folks talking about relative poverty; we have other people talking about absolute poverty.

You adopted this notion of social inclusion and exclusion. I notice from stories I read that it's across the board. It's not just including people in the life of their community, but, for example, there was the N1 project in Dublin, where there was a big housing development on your waterfront that was going to happen. Through the proddings of people like Seanie Lambe, I guess, you got out of that project a fairly significant affordable housing piece.

Could you talk a little bit about this whole notion of social inclusion, and why you chose to go that route as opposed to perhaps another?

[Gerry Mangan]

I suppose to some extent social inclusion is a dimension of it, but as Tim said, there's no single indicator in terms of poverty.

I mentioned two. I mentioned basic deprivation, which targets those most in need. Then you have relative poverty, which more than likely targets inequality, or illustrates inequality, or people who have fallen significantly behind the norm. They would not necessarily be experiencing serious deprivation, but they would not be able to keep up with the standard of living that people generally have, and they're clearly vulnerable as well. Some of this vulnerability is vulnerability shocks: when something major happens to them, or whatever, they are not able to contend with it. So they have to be supported.

In terms of social exclusion, then, that deals largely with the extent to which people are isolated by poverty. I'll just give you one concrete example, which might illustrate it for other age groups.

The child comes home to its mother, a lone parent maybe, and says, “My friends have invited me to a party.” The present for the party costs 20 euro. The mother has already set out her budget for the week. The child can't go to the party, or if she does go to the party with a present, the mother has problems with her budget. There are people who live in a very tight situation who can't avail themselves of going out for a night, who are isolated from friends and relations. There are older people who live apart. This is what social exclusion is: people don't participate in society. Maybe they don't vote. They don't get involved in community activities. There's a whole range of areas from which people are excluded. The core of that is poverty, but the impact is social exclusion.

In addition, there's a need for the type of community development that will provide people with that support and that access to living a better quality life than otherwise might be the case. So when you're looking at poverty, you have to bear in mind that whole dimension as well.

The European Union would say about us that we don't give enough focus to trying to meet the challenge of social exclusion as we do to meet the challenge of poverty in the traditional sense, and therefore we need to do more in that area as well. I think that's the point in that regard.

You need a number of measures of poverty, and each of them will tell you something important.

[Kevin O'Kelly]

Mr. Martin, I would just add that we've been researching over the last number of years around people who are socially excluded; they're also financially excluded. They don't have bank accounts. They don't have access to credit. So from the point of view of having access to finance to get over these humps that Gerry talks about, they don't have that, unless they go to moneylenders at horrendously high interest rates.

That's something we're working on with the financial institutions here to try to tackle, to try to get basic bank accounts through the postal system to alleviate the type of marginal income problems that people have who are living at risk of poverty.

[Gerry Mangan]

I'd like to just quickly supplement that from Kevin.

We have a money advice service, which, again, we will send you details on.

I won't delay any further, but you might be interested in that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

That's great.

We have bells ringing, which means votes, so we'll be leaving in 15 minutes. But I do have two quick questions, from Mr. Cuzner and then Madame Bonsant.

Mr. Cuzner, please.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Thank you very much.

My question is specifically about some of the challenges that are faced by people living in poverty in rural communities. Obviously, the vast size of our country amplifies that. But in your situation in Ireland...and I think there was a reference made earlier to transportation and access for people looking to secure training and what have you. Do you have some specific initiatives to deal with rural poverty, or do you try to build enough latitude into some of the criteria or structure of your programming to accommodate and help those living in rural communities?

[Gerry Mangan]

I think we do have some. One of our categories is “urban and rural disadvantaged”, and the rural is an important one.

First of all, it's a question of looking at the population mix. There's a much higher proportion of older people and younger people in rural communities. The middle group very often migrate to towns and so on to take up employment.

My experience is that the problems with rural poverty are quite similar across developed countries. I was at a conference recently in Rome, and from a European perspective, I just couldn't believe how similar the problems were.

What you mentioned there is true. First of all, people live in isolation, and there's a need for some form of organized support and intervention in that regard. We're providing that and developing that in Ireland through community development initiatives, where people are contacted, befriended, and they're brought to community centres on a daily basis so they can interact with others and with people of their own age.

In the northwest of Ireland there's a particular project for older men, who are regarded as particularly vulnerable by virtue of being isolated and so on, and a lot of very good work has been done. Actually, it's a border region, so this is a combined project between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

In terms of what you mentioned about transport, it's very true. We have a rural transport initiative. Public transport runs very irregularly, so this is one that's very much focused on people's needs--when people are trying to access services, access training if they're unemployed, access employment at times. And that's key to improving considerably people's quality of life. A lot of the services at a local level are being run down because of the lack of critical mass. In other words, people with cars are able to go to bigger centres. Of course, people who don't have cars or can't easily access these services are left, then, with very deficient services.

So these are just some examples; we have many more. But the nature of rural poverty is that it's a very distinct form of poverty requiring very distinct supports, and a strategy can identify that and come up with solutions on a more integrated basis.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

Now we have one last quick question from Madame Bonsant, and then we're going to have to get to our votes.

Go ahead.

[France Bonsant, Bloc, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

I would be interested to know what impact the decrease in poverty rates has had on crime. If there has been an impact, I would like to know its extent.

[Gerry Mangan]

You could argue that there's been an increase in crime for different reasons. A lot of crime in Ireland is related to drugs and drug trafficking, drug addiction and whatever, and there's been a significant increase in that in Ireland. That has helped to increase, perhaps, more serious crime than would have been the case in the past. And that's key. Clearly, to some extent there's a basis for that in poverty. There are certain areas of extreme disadvantage still, and drugs and drug addiction and drug trafficking are very much part and parcel of these areas.

I suppose in many respects some forms of crime would have been reduced because more people are in employment and better off. But that type of crime, unfortunately, has increased.

In addition to that, there's a much greater availability of firearms and more of that type of serious crime, which maybe wouldn't have been the case in a simpler past in Ireland. But it is there today, like in a lot of other developed countries.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Gerry, Kevin, Bevin, and Tim, thank you so very much for all the insight you have given us today. This committee is very grateful for your time.

If you have any information you can send off to us, it would be greatly appreciated. As well, if there are any strategies you have tried that haven't worked, you could maybe make note of those as well when you send stuff in.

Thank you very much. We wish you all a great day. Thank you.

The meeting is adjourned.