The objective, as we see it, is to fund services for victims, and those are very important services that warrant funding. Our objection is not to the existence of the surcharge, or to the funding of those programs, but rather to the mandatory imposition of the surcharge on people who cannot pay it. It's simply an impossibility to ask someone who has only $335 a month from income assistance to pay a surcharge that in many cases represents two-thirds of their monthly income.
While the objective of the legislation is laudable, and we think that the objective is frequently served by people who are able to pay the surcharge, it is not served in the example of Pivot's clients and people who are similarly struggling for basic survival.