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May 13, 2005
JFSA working to meet demand
Government's welfare and wages policies hurt vulnerable, says
agency.
PAT JOHNSON
Changes to government policy over the past several years have resulted
in a massively increased burden on Jewish social services, says
Vicki Robinson, director of basic resource services for the Jewish
Family Service Agency of Greater Vancouver (JFSA).
Robinson supervises the JFSA team that works on financial assistance
and poverty relief programs and she is also a member of the Yad
b'Yad council on poverty.
"This current government has treated women and children very
badly," Robinson said bluntly. "We've seen a large increase
in the work that we've done as a result of the fact that women and
children, as well as families, are experiencing much greater difficulty
in supporting themselves and making ends meet."
Income assistance rates are lower now than in 1996, she said.
"We all know the cost of living in B.C. hasn't gone down since
1996," Robinson said. "For about 80 per cent of the clients
that we see in our part of the agency, housing is an issue. Either
they can't find it or they can't afford it or they're living somewhere
quite inappropriate."
Vancouver has one of the most expensive housing markets in North
America and the availability of subsidized housing cannot meet demand.
"In terms of actual affordable housing – B.C. Housing
– there are 10,000 people on the waiting list for that housing,"
Robinson said. "People are paying three-quarters or more of
their income [for rent]," she added.
Among the new policies instituted over the past four years is a
three-week waiting period for any financial assistance from the
province, which is a "long time if you can't pay your rent
and you can't feed your kids," she said.
Among the problems, Robinson said, is a minimum wage that, at $8
an hour, is too low, in her opinion, and a sub-minimum wage of $6
an hour that has been instituted for people without work experience.
Moreover, the minimum call-out has been reduced to two hours from
four – meaning that an employee whose shift is cancelled need
only be paid for two hours, not four, as had previously been the
case.
"Those three specific things have made a huge impact on the
people that we work with because we have many people who work full
time and are still not able to make ends meet or support their families
because they're working at minimum wage or training wage,"
Robinson said. This has led many people to question the worth of
taking a low-paying job. "You can understand that they would
be [asking]: Is it worth it? Is it worth it to be away from your
family all day or, often, these jobs are in the evenings or on the
weekends, and still not be able to pay rent. Is that what is best
for these families?"
Recent reports on a doubling of homelessness in the Lower Mainland
are borne out by her clients, Robinson added.
"We see it. We see more clients of no fixed address. More clients
who, if they are lucky, are shelter-hopping, but not really able
to have a secure home because they can't pay the rent," she
said. The JFSA is struggling to meet demand.
"The amount of aid that we've given out is about one-and-a-half
times what it was a couple of years ago," Robinson said. Part
of that increased expense comes from a new emergency medical fund,
set up to cover some of the expenses that the public medical services
plan no longer covers.
"The number of things that are covered by medical has gone
down so dramatically with this government that if a family is already
living on the edge and then they have a medical emergency, there
is simply nowhere to go," she said. "There's no safety
net anymore."
Pat Johnson is a B.C. journalist and commentator.
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