Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, everyone.
My name is Mary-Lou Donnelly and I am the president of the Canadian Teachers' Federation. I have here beside me John Staple, who is the deputy secretary general of the CTF.
The federation is a national voice for teachers in Canada on education and related social issues. We represent upwards of 200,000 teachers across the country through 16 provincial and territorial teacher organizations.
Our presentation and brief will focus on an issue that demands the immediate attention of the Canadian public and all levels of government, and that is child poverty. Over the past two years we have taken on child poverty as our main focus on social justice issues at the Canadian Teachers' Federation.
In 1989, the House of Commons unanimously passed a resolution setting the goal to eliminate poverty among Canadian children by 2000. Here we are 20 years later and the child poverty rate remains essentially at 1989 levels. Canada's after-tax child poverty rate appears stalled at just over 11%. Nearly one of every nine Canadian children lives in poverty. Child and family poverty rates are at double digits in five out of ten provinces in our country. One out of every two children living in a family that recently immigrated to Canada lives in poverty, and one in two aboriginal children under the age of six, not living in a first nations community, lives in a low-income family.
There has been an 86% increase in the use of food banks since the 1989 unanimous House of Commons resolution to end child poverty, but what we see happening is that we have actually regressed in this area. In the same year, CTF issued a report that examined the impact of poverty on children, specifically how it affected the success of children in elementary and secondary school. The report concluded that children living in low-income conditions experienced reduced motivation to learn, delayed cognitive development, lower achievement, less participation in extracurricular activities, lower career aspirations, interrupted school attendance, lower university attendance, increased risk of illiteracy, and of course higher high school drop-out rates. There is a well-established correlation between socio-economic status and children's academic performance, and our brief makes reference to research supporting that contention.
CTF has an extensive policy on children and poverty. It is based on the fundamental premise that all children, regardless of circumstances or family income, have the right to the full benefits of publicly funded education. In supporting this, teachers and their organizations participate in the development of educational and public policies designed to reduce the incidence and impact of child poverty. Our policy stresses the importance of child care and early intervention, and the role of government in addressing that concern. Governments at all levels must undertake coordinated social and economic policies designed to eliminate child poverty and to assist those currently living in poverty.
We know that teachers see the evidence of poverty in their classrooms year after year. They see it when students move and change schools frequently during the school year because the family does not have enough money to pay rent. They see it when students shrink from shame or lash out from anger because of the stigma of poverty. And they see it when students can't afford to buy books, go to the book fair, or go on school trips with the other kids because of poverty.
We have called for a greater political will and commitment to a national poverty reduction strategy for Canada. Several provinces have taken or are planning to take coordinated action to address poverty. Newfoundland and Labrador and Quebec have implemented poverty reduction strategies. The federal government needs to build on these initiatives and create a national strategy that complements and supports provincial and territorial programs.
In our brief we make the following specific recommendations, among others, to the federal government: to raise the minimum wage; to expand the eligibility for employment insurance; and to put in place a universal child care system.
I spent the day at the Conference Board of Canada, and they're actually coming out with a report on child poverty tomorrow, so it'll be interesting to see that. It's very timely, and they rate Canada at one of the lowest rates in the world on child poverty.
Thank you.