Human Resources Committee on May 12th, 2009

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

You also spoke about core funding for NGOs. A lot of us have heard that organizations dealing with some of what we would traditionally call the most vulnerable people can't get core funding. They can't get A-base funding. They have to become professional grant writers. They're always having to apply for $3,000 here and 75¢ there, and it just becomes such a pain that it almost disempowers them from getting the work done. Is that what you're referring to?

[Miguel LeBlanc]

Exactly. If you look at the non-profits, they're doing amazing work. As Lillian said, they can't even hire a staff person to actually meet their needs. I think we need to start reviewing the idea of funding, because it's not all project-based. As you mentioned, it's like becoming a professional grant writer. Then there is the accountability after that, which is also time-consuming. I think we need to start examining how we are actually funding.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Does that sound mean I have two minutes left, Mr. Chair?

I'll come back with a question for Leah.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Yes, because it means your mic could be cut at any time.

Thanks, Mike.

Thank you, folks.

Madam Beaudin, for seven minutes, please.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Welcome to all and thank you for being here.

My first question is for you, Mr. Mockler-Caissie. You mentioned a number of measures that partners suggested. We heard this morning from a number of those partners and there has been a lot of talk about pay equity and child care. But you did not mention these as issues. I know that you were focussing on matters that fall under the mandate of the federal government.

Did your partners raise pay equity and child care as issues?

[Phyllis Mockler-Caissie]

Absolutely. We heard that pay equity was an issue. The lack of affordable child care and the lack of spaces for child care are certainly issues for many families--not just for young single moms but for the working poor--with regard to being able to find a job to earn a living.

There were many other points, but I didn't attach them all to this presentation because I didn't find that there was as much that the federal government could do, so I didn't raise them. But I have many other points that were brought up throughout the process.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much. By the way, you say that mothers need child care but more and more fathers do also.

My second question is for you, Mr. Leblanc. Your presentation was very interesting. You made several recommendations, which are not new but which deserve repeating. At any rate, these are corrective measures. I know that some catching up is required, whether in terms of affordable housing, pay equity, homelessness or child care and so on. I imagine you would prefer to invest in prevention.

[Miguel Leblanc]

Obviously, because we believe there are many ways in which poverty could be prevented. It may require an investment at first, but in the long run it would save us a lot of money. I like the idea that every dollar invested will return three dollars in savings. It is an investment. One of our Canadian values is to care for one another. By investing in the prevention of poverty, we promote justice and equity. By doing so, these individuals will be able to contribute to their community. It is one phase of longer term economic development.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Other witnesses told us that we need to take action at the early childhood stage if we want to break the poverty cycle. Do you agree?

[Miguel Leblanc]

Of course, and this is why we recommend a national child care system. We believe that the federal government should provide funding to the province to set up a good child care system. Children are the future of our communities.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Levac, thank you for being here, it is very useful. You mentioned structural models that need to be tailored to the situation on the ground, in the communities. What exactly have you in mind? Could you elaborate?

[Leah Levac]

Yes. I think there are a couple of things. First of all, I think the biggest community-based role is to actually engage with organizations who are already effectively engaging young people, because they already know how to do it. We need to take the models that exist in that way and implement them into other structures that are taking place instead of trying to make it up all over again. That would be one example.

I think that the other really important thing at a community level is that we need to shift the understanding of what we mean when we say leadership, or how we understand who occupies a leadership position. You spoke a little bit about pay equity, which starts to lead me to gender and women in leadership. One of the big problems we have is that we don't think about leadership as something that exists in the masses. We don't believe that everybody has leadership potential.

There's the community organization base. For example, with 21 Leaders, which is a program that we deliver in New Brunswick, one of the things we do is change our selection process so that instead of it turning into a grandstanding contest about who has the most notches on some chart of accomplishments, we put people into situations where they have to practise leadership skills.

Then we can watch, for ourselves, the difference between having been given a position for legitimate reasons, or not, and the actual way in which you play a leadership role in your community. There are shifts in the way we think about leadership, and then how we go about identifying the people we need to invite to be a part of the process.

Does that help?

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Yes, thank you very much.

By the way, in Quebec, the cohesive leadership support program is funded by United Way. Under this program, leaders are being trained at the grass roots and community level in Quebec. I believe a third cohort is being trained. This program is a great success and will bring about the emergence of a new type of leaders in the community.

I also have a question on housing. We have been travelling for the last two days and hearing from witnesses. I just called my riding office and was told that yesterday a 26-year-old young man showed up there because he did not know where to spend the night. The night before he slept in the street because there was no space left at the shelter and he had nothing to eat. Yesterday in Nova Scotia we visited a couple of shelters.

We need to put people at the heart of our concerns and of all our decisions. Having a roof over one's head and something to eat seems to me to be a priority. Once that is in place, we can look at other things.

Mr. Glauser, in terms of needs, what concrete action could the government take that would have a quick impact? We are in an emergency.

[Gary Glauser]

Let me say that in Fredericton we've had discussions with Brian Duplessis of the Fredericton Homeless Shelters. I think he appeared here. His line is that he doesn't want more beds; he wants to be working himself out of a job there. We are simply saying that we're in a sort of backlog situation, in that from 1993 to probably 2001, there was not very much social housing built in Canada. I think we are still in a sort of backlog situation.

The government has to be the leader, I think, working with the provinces, the private sector—I think the private sector has a huge role to play in the affordable housing game—and the municipalities to make affordable housing development easier, because lots of times an affordable housing project takes so long to go through the regulatory process and the community engagement process that by the time the project gets built, the waiting list has gotten even higher. I think it is a collective effort, but I think the federal government has to be the leader.

How you get units on the street really quickly is a multi-faceted nut to crack, so to speak, because there are a lot of players involved. The federal government can put out more and more money, but it has to have the cooperation of all the players down the line, right down to the municipal planning department that's stamping the project. Dollars are wonderful, but it has to be a partnership effort.

As I said, our Fredericton affordable housing committee has been doing very well. We have all the actors at the table. On the zoning process, in the City of Fredericton there's a sign saying “zoning control”. That says it all right there. The word “control” has to be turned around. A city has to want to have affordable housing projects, to engage them, rather than having the not in my backyard scenario.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Gary.

Tony, you have seven minutes.

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

Thank you.

I thank all of you for being here today. I've learned something new from each one of you this afternoon.

Phyllis, I just wanted to know what your next steps are.

[Phyllis Mockler-Caissie]

In June we will be holding what we're referring to as round table sessions. There will be about six full days with 30 participants who we believe are experts in poverty. I don't necessarily mean academics; I mean those who have lived in poverty, those who have first-hand knowledge of dealing with people in poverty. Those 30 people will come together and review the “What was Said” report, which, as I've said, represents the input from all the participants in phase 1.

Options will be put together. We believe that a poverty reduction plan has four main components. Those would be: establishing a global objective; identifying indicators so we'll be able to measure success; determining what accountability and monitoring mechanisms need to be put in place; and, obviously, what the priority actions are to reach that global objective. At the round table sessions, options will be put forward to yet another group, which we're referring to as the participants of the final forum.

The final forum is slated to be held in November. It will be about a day and a half that will be chaired by our premier, wherein those who can make decisions—I will call them the heavy hitters, the representatives of government, business, community, and the non-profit sector, and others from within the community who are leaders—will determine which of those options should be put forward in a poverty reduction plan for New Brunswick.

It will be a shared responsibility. People will leave that day assuming responsibility to implement one or more of those priority actions that have been collectively identified by citizens of New Brunswick through this public engagement initiative.

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

That sounds very good. It looks like you're moving. You're not wasting any time now that you're up and running.

I'd suggest that at the end of it you'll find the same thing that Newfoundland and Labrador, Ontario, and now Nova Scotia and Quebec are finding, which is that you'll need a huge partner at the federal level, particularly to fund some of your proposals.

I would agree with Miguel, who said that we as the federal government need to be willing to use our fiscal and funding powers to make sure that some of this actually happens and to work with you as a partner.

[Phyllis Mockler-Caissie]

At this stage of the process, of the initiative, we haven't really found a way to bring the federal government to the table. In the dialogue phase, we talked about how we are going to get them there. That was really sort of the big picture phase, the brainstorming, allowing people to really get comfortable and also bringing about awareness of poverty in the communities.

Yes, I think it's true. Kudos to the other provinces that have undertaken a poverty-reduction initiative and have come up with plans. We like to pride ourselves on the fact that ours is a little bit different. It is not a consultation. This is not a government document that will come out of it. This is a community document. This will be owned by the people of New Brunswick. We are looking at very innovative partnerships happening and at people really standing up and saying, “You know what? We can do more in that area.”

We know, as everybody has said, that non-profit organizations are doing phenomenal work and they do need more support, but maybe there's a way in which we can all work together to help each other continue the good work that's being done. But that isn't to say that we wouldn't look for some assistance from the federal government, for sure, for some particular programs.

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

I'm intrigued as well, Leah, with your suggestion that one of the things we need--and we haven't heard this before--is a new generation of leadership coming up that's not so much on the MBA track but the social justice track. I live and breathe social justice and left-wing politics at my house, but all my kids seem to be interested in are careers that will pay them big bucks. It concerns me deeply.

Lillian, I started out running a soup kitchen in the basement of a church back in the early 1980s during the then recession. Out of that, what we did was have forums every three or four months. We would bring in community members and young people to talk about poverty, including why there is poverty, the underpinnings, the dynamic, and everything. Out of that were developed some alternative approaches to creating work.

Quebec is a wonderful example of some real creativity. The social economy that's developing in Quebec should be studied by everybody. Out of some of the work.... I'll take some small credit for a program at our university in Sault Ste. Marie now, which is training young people, particularly those from aboriginal communities, in community, economic, and social development; again, it's studying the dynamic and all of that.

Is this something that you've thought about as well, Leah? Getting young people into those hands-on types of work and then having them.... Anyway, I think you know.

[Leah Levac]

Absolutely. When people become aware of a lot of the pressing needs, some of that shift happens because you become committed before you realize that you're committed. Exposure and experience are a part of that process.

I also think it's much harder to tailor in terms of how do we do that, but if I think about the role of a federal government, largely, it can't be anything more than providing an overall will of what we as a country value and believe in. What do we mark as our priorities?

Just for kicks, I went on to the federal government website, searched “poverty reduction”, and then searched “economic development”. I got half as many hits for “poverty reduction” and “social justice” as I did for “economic development”. That is obviously not a good test of anything, really, except to say that our discourse does not focus us in the direction of getting people to buy into the importance of valuing your neighbours, your community, and social well-being.

Also, I think, our story is an important part of how you move people's interest from “how much more money can I make?” to “how do I make sure that the people around me are living in a way that's fair?”

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thanks, Tony.

Thanks, Leah.

We're going to now move to the last questioner of the first round. That will be Mr. Komarnicki.

You have 10 minutes, sir.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Thank you.

As I think of it, economic development does have a part to play in poverty reduction in the sense that if you get people working and move them up by providing jobs, that's a good thing. I think both need to be looked at.

Thank you very much, all of you, for your presentations, coming as they do from different perspectives.

I think, in listening to Lillian MacMellon, that there is something intrinsically satisfying in providing food and clothing to those who most need them. Organizations like yours go a long way to doing that. It's a pleasure to go there and see what you do. I realize that more funds would always be welcome. A lot of what you do is through volunteerism, and I want you to know that we greatly appreciate it.

You were speaking, Phyllis, about education and about maybe providing education at no cost. I suppose there would be a cost to doing so. You'd have to see what it is. We've taken on some specific non-repayable funding for targeted groups, for people with disabilities or on low incomes. We've had some grants of $250 per month or $150 per month. We're tending in that direction.

There is also a new initiative to somehow tie the repayment of student loans to the ability to repay so that not more than 20%--or some per cent--of their income is used for repayment of loans.

We're making some steps forward, maybe not as quickly as many would like, but they are tending in the direction you're suggesting.

Some of the people who have appeared have said that the root causes of poverty and what you might do about them have been talked about for years and years, and that what we don't need is another study or another round table, but some action. When you say we're going forward through these steps and are hoping to get to another level, the big question always is implementation.

There are two sides to it. One is money, pure and simple: where does it come from when you decide what it is you want to do? The other is whether the money you're presently using is being directed to where it should be. Maybe it's a question of using the money more wisely.

As you go through your process—in a fairly quick timetable, I must admit, when I listen to what you're hoping to accomplish—what are your thoughts in terms of actually putting into practice, by practical steps, what you're going to hear, in terms of what it's going to cost and who's going to pay for it to be sure it happens? Second, are you going to be looking at reallocation of funding at provincial, federal, and municipal levels or not?

[Phyllis Mockler-Caissie]

Those are good points. Yes, the provincial government is only one player at the table, and yes, it's a very tight timeframe. But when the provincial government comes to the table as a player....

We're a bit unique, in that we're an umbrella group. This is not about just the Department of Social Development. This is broader. Every government department has a role to play in helping to reduce poverty, especially when we hear such things as the point that mental health issues are causing poverty. The education system, public safety...all of those other departments are coming together.

The non-profit groups don't have an umbrella organization per se for which they can have a leader. We're like a pyramid. We say, “Here are the things that are coming out of the “What Was Said” document that suggest government needs to do things differently.” So that group gets together, they consider whether they need to re-profile dollars, and they see that it's an opportunity to look at those things they've been doing and haven't evaluated for a long time, to recognize that they're not working.

Maybe people in New Brunswick will say to stop putting money into adult literacy and put more money into the early childhood years. We heard that over and over: kids need to learn to read so they can read to learn. That's not my phrase; it's Dr. Doug Willms'.

It is important to look at where we're spending our money. The other players who will come to the table, the non-profit groups and the business sector, also need to contribute and to consider where they can help.

There are some great models happening in New Brunswick. The Business Community Anti-poverty Initiative in Saint John is a model that is working fabulously. In it, the three sectors have come together and are really making strides in reducing poverty in Saint John, which used to be the most hard hit area of the province with respect to poverty.

Then there's implementation. I used to be an evaluator and I'm all about implementing. This is not another study. We continue to reiterate that. This will produce a plan that everybody will share in helping to implement. We will ensure that there are monitoring mechanisms in place, and we will establish measures to ensure that we are reaching our objective, or the global objective that is set by the next round of participants.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I certainly wish you success, that's for sure.

The other thing we've heard, and I think you may be part of the way on this, is that many times federal and provincial programs are designed, there are calls for proposals, and that gets a number of people competing for the same set of funds and trying to build into a particular fund, whether it addresses the greatest need on the ground or not. They find that there's a degree of competition and they spend a lot of time making applications for funding, trying to get the grants that are available, and tailoring their operation to that end.

The sense I get is that what the people on the front lines would like to see is their understanding of what needs to happen, their understanding of the needs, being funnelled up to the various levels of government, to have the programs then tailored back to them, with some sort of systemic process in place to ensure that this happens on an ongoing basis.

What you're suggesting is to get to a certain point and then implement, but this thing carries on and continues, and programs may need to be redeveloped and realigned based on regional needs, on individual needs, and on the things that are happening.

What do you propose in terms of structural systemic things that can be put in place to ensure that these things come about?