Hello. Thank you, Chair and members of the health committee, for the opportunity to speak today.
Campaign 2000 is a non-partisan, pan-Canadian coalition of over 120 organizations working to end child and family poverty.
We submitted a brief to you that we co-authored with colleagues at PROOF, a research program based out of the University of Toronto that focuses on policy interventions to address food insecurity. We are recommending several changes to the Canada child benefit as a key tool enabling the federal government to improve children's health. These recommendations would enable the CCB to have a bigger and broader impact on reducing poverty and food insecurity in Canada.
Our recommendations are these.
First, increase the CCB amounts for the lowest-income households so that there is a targeted focus on families living in deep poverty, by creating an “end child poverty” supplement for families living with incomes below the low income measure, as modelled in the 2023 alternative federal budget.
Second, create an additional supplement to provide more money to low-income families in remote and northern communities.
Third, enable families with precarious immigration status to access the CCB. Many are considered residents under the Income Tax Act, but eligibility for the CCB is arbitrarily tied to immigration status. This means that even though these families work and file taxes and may have Canadian-born children, they are ineligible for the benefit.
Fourth, end the ongoing clawbacks of the CCB for moderate-income families who received emergency pandemic benefits.
There is an inextricable link between poverty and ill health. Research shows that poverty is causally related to children's developmental outcomes. Poverty is one of the strongest and best-established predictors of poor health and child development.
In 2019, more than 1.3 million children—nearly one in five children—lived in families with low incomes in Canada. Their average income was 37% below the low income measure. This is a matter of health equity, as we just heard, since child poverty rates are significantly higher for groups facing colonization, systemic racism and marginalization.
In 2020, despite a global pandemic, we saw rates of child poverty being reduced significantly because of large investments in income transfers to families. These benefits have all expired, and Statistics Canada is predicting that poverty will return to prepandemic levels.
Household food insecurity is the inadequate or insecure access to food due to financial constraints. It is a potent social determinant of health, with associated health disadvantages being similar to those of low income. Living in a household struggling to afford food is toxic to children's health and well-being in ways that are not limited to poor nutrition. These children are at greater risk of mental health problems like anxiety, depression and suicidal ideation.
Food insecurity is not just about food, but rather about the household's financial well-being. It is a marker of pervasive material deprivation, and at its core is a problem of income inadequacy.
The persistently high proportion of children living in poverty and in food-insecure households demonstrates that the CCB has not provided enough money to enable families to be secure. In 2021, 1.4 million children lived in households affected by food insecurity across the provinces. In Canada, the mere presence of children in a household increases the probability of food insecurity. The situation is especially dire in Nunavut, where almost 80% of children live in food-insecure households.
As the primary federal policy supporting low-income families with children, the CCB has the potential to have a much larger impact. It is currently failing to live up to this potential, because it is not providing enough money to lift families out of poverty, and there are barriers to accessing it for families from systemically marginalized communities. The exceedingly high proportion of children affected in Nunavut also demands special attention in the form of an additional supplement for northern families that addresses the high costs of living.
Policies that have increased the financial resources for low-income families have repeatedly shown that they lower food insecurity among families. Considering the strong relationship between food insecurity, poverty and health, the Canada child benefit is very much a health policy. CCB enhancements and reform stand to protect children and their families from circumstances that are very toxic to their health.
Thank you for your time today. I look forward to answering any questions.