THUNDER BAY – The Social Planning Network of Ontario is calling for a poverty free Ontario.

“We’re part of a struggle,” said Marvyn Novick, community activist with the Social Planning Network of Ontario. “Aboriginal peoples have their historic dimension to that struggle that has to be honoured, but we also have a struggle about the things in common because all peoples need good wages in the labour market and need to know that the rents they pay won’t take food money.”

Speaking at the Lakehead Social Planning Council’s annual general meeting May 18 in Thunder Bay, Novick said Aboriginal peoples need institutions to end poverty.

“The government of Canada has a fiduciary responsibility to honour commitments made to Aboriginal peoples so Aboriginal peoples can develop their collective institutions and work for ending poverty,” Novick said.

He said the federal government should work with Aboriginal peoples to develop strategies to end poverty on and off reserve and where to get the powers and resources to do so.

The Social Planning Network of Ontario has been holding Moving to a Poverty Free Ontario sessions in 21 communities across Ontario.

The policy agenda for a poverty free Ontario focuses on three key areas: ending deep poverty by upgrading social assistance, ending working poverty by assuring basic living wages, and protecting food money by phasing in a full housing benefit.

The Social Planning Network of Ontario is aiming to build cross-community support for a poverty free Ontario by the end of the decade.

“Human dignity reminds us that there is a moral issue underlying local poverty,” Novick said.

“We’re now recognizing that poverty is not a condition that we have to accept.”

http://www.wawataynews.ca/archive/all/2011/5/26/social-planning-group-aims-end-poverty-province-end-decade_21481

Published in Wawatay News, May 26, 2011, Volume 38, No. 11