Dear Editor:

In MP Colin Carrie’s recent newsletter, he states that child poverty has fallen from 19 per
cent to less than 12 per cent today, and poverty among single mothers has fallen from over 50 per cent to less than 30 per cent. All of this is great. However, 12 per cent and 30 per cent are still too high. We need it much closer to five per cent like it is in Scandinavia. The newsletter states taxes are at a 44-year low and unemployment is at a 33-year low. Mr. Flaherty stated recently, “We are experiencing the second-longest period of economic expansion in Canadian history,” and “business investment in Canada has expanded for a 12th consecutive year.”

We have been told that poverty will take care of itself with an expanding economy. When? Forty-one per cent of children living in poverty live in families with at least one income earner working full-time all year.

That is because the minimum wage is too low. The economy may be booming, but not everyone benefits. Many people are living in poverty because of temporary jobs, no health or statutory benefits, and no job security. If this is the case when we are in a boom period, what will it be like what the economy takes a downturn, as it appears it will?

Lower rates of poverty are great, but we need them even lower. To do that, we need national and provincial poverty reduction strategies, as they have in Ireland, Britain, Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador.

Ron Dancey
Oshawa