Colleen Sym Executive Director Halton Community Legal Services - PDF document

Colleen Sym Executive Director Halton Community Legal Services Speaking notes Health and Social Services Committee July 6, 2010 Delegation in Support of SS-24-10/MO-32-10 The Halton Social Audit, April 26, 2010 On April 26 social audit hearings were held in Halton Region. On June 2, the Interfaith Social Assistance Reform Coalition (ISARC) hosted a provincial gathering of communities that participated in the social audit. 20 of the 30 communities where audits were held were represented. Halton was well represented by the organizers and participants in the Halton Social Audit and by Douglas Bartholomew-Saunders. I would like to digress just for a moment and express my appreciation of how atypical the relationship between Halton Region and the legal clinic is. The level of cooperation and collaboration that we enjoy would be hard to find in another jurisdiction. The cooperation of Director Bartholomew-Saunders and his staff in organizing the audit greatly contributed to its success. The materials provided by Maria Antonakas to brief the rapporteurs were excellent and, of course, the participation of Director See as a rapporteur was crucial to having a Region and a health lens through which the proceedings could be filtered. I should note that this is fourth time that ISARC has led a social audit, but as far as I know the first time that Halton has participated. 1

The opening comments by the past chair of ISARC on June 2 affirmed the purpose of the audit. “Telling our story is important and hearing those stories is important. Stories are important because they remind us of who we are. …Stories are important because when we listen – really listen to them – they can be a profound affirmation that those who have not been heard matter.” Halton Community Legal Services took the lead on behalf of ISARC in organizing the social audit hearings in Halton. As a community legal clinic funded by Legal Aid Ontario to assist those in poverty, we hear the stories of the most vulnerable members of our communities who are struggling on the margins everyday. As an agency of last resort, our clients are those who face eviction, live in substandard accommodation, have become ill or injured and are unable to work or have been wrongfully dismissed, face discrimination and those whom the system has turned away as they apply for disability benefits, public pensions or social assistance. The Halton Social Audit on April 26 was an opportunity to hear stories that would not otherwise be heard in Halton by those who would not otherwise hear them. Due to the stigma of living in poverty in a region of affluence, it was important that the audit process protect the privacy and dignity of the witnesses. Each was given a time to appear before the Rapporteurs to share their experiences. The courage they must have summoned to sit before a group of strangers and give account of the struggles they face every day of their lives while risking yet again being treated as “less than”, or the “other” cannot be overestimated. The analysis and reporting on the day done by the four Halton Rapporteurs was of exceptionally high quality. In recognition that a cross sector, cross community response to poverty is critical in reducing poverty by increasing resiliency and economic vitality, the Halton Rapporteurs were recruited from the faith, 2

community health, education and business communities. Some of you had the opportunity to hear the initial reflections of Michael Bird, Joyce See, Kerry Sagar and Marc Hamel immediately following the completion of the hearings on April 26. Their written reflections are contained in the Halton Social Audit Report along with the record of the stories of the 15 witnesses. The Rapporteurs identified themes from the stories of the witnesses that will be of no surprise to this committee as they are those that this committee grapples with - issues around housing, nutritious food, transportation, health – physical and mental, communication relating to access to the system and the system itself. Importantly the day was not just about the rates. There was no refrain of “if you just gave me more money”. Although all who participated recognized that there is a significant gap between social assistance rates and what is truly needed to survive – a gap that is filled by charity from friends, family, food banks and churches to name a few. The day was about how we in Halton can do better what we already in many ways do well. While the provincial focus of the social audit process is the province’s Poverty Reduction Strategy and the Social Assistance Review and the Halton Report has formed part of the provincial record that ISARC is compiling on its recommendations, locally it was an important undertaking as part of the work of community stakeholders as conversations are taking place, including within the Enabling Resilient Communities group, on how to collaborate to develop a broad-based community plan to address poverty in Halton. Community based solutions are possible and within our reach to address these higher level themes arising out of the Halton Social Audit: • the need for better understanding of the needs of service users, 3

that is the need to do more than simply apply the eligibility criteria of the program that one is responsible to administer, being aware of what else is out there to assist with dental care, mental health services, child care, healthy food – over the course of the audit day I could tell when Director See knew of a program in the Health Department that would assist a witness that they had yet to be referred to. • the need for streamlining administration a complaint we heard was - having to tell the story too many times to too many people. • the need for enhancing awareness of services region wide and referral capacity, is this available in the north, who does that in Milton… • the need for changing attitudes about poverty in the community – too often we pathologize issues such as poverty as being personal trouble resulting from poor choices or inherent weaknesses of character instead of acknowledging and responding to the structural source of these troubles. The people who presented their stories in the course of the social audit did not voluntarily choose to live in the state of material deprivation and social exclusion brought on by poverty. • the need for coordinating services between programs, agencies and services to serve the whole person/family. Building on the work of groups like ESAC and the Halton Housing Advisory Committee, it is a recommendation coming out of the audit that an Ontario Works/ODSP Operational Advisory group be formed. The group, with administrative support from the Region, should be made up of Ontario Works and Disability advocacy representatives including those with lived 4

experience and Halton Community Legal Services with Employment and Social Services Division representatives and representatives from the Burlington Local Office of the Ontario Disability Support Program. The leadership of the Region within the voluntary not for profit sector in Halton and the willingness to work collaboratively with agencies like the legal clinic ensures that such a group would be an effective forum to create a better understanding of the needs of service users and inform how services can be delivered in a way that recognizes the need to deal holistically with the families and individuals who live in poverty. While we have to recognize the complexity of the factors that contribute to why people end up in poverty and the complexity of how to assist to lift them out of poverty, we cannot be deterred in trying to respond by changing what we can. Waiting for change at the provincial or federal level would not have us do well for our communities. I encourage you to support the Community Awareness Day being planned for the fall. One of the greatest benefits of working on the audit was to have had the benefit of the participation of the Rapporteurs. The perspectives that each brought to the process was a valuable lens through which to not only see the problems in a new way, but to spur thinking on what we can do differently to do better. In particular the passion of Marc Hamel, a senior investment advisor from Burlington and his willingness to problem solve was evident almost immediately when he started asking questions that highlighted the need to broaden the conversation about a Halton response to the poverty amidst us. The perspectives of all members of the community including business and those with lived experience, not just the usual suspects, need to be heard and we need to continue to collaborate to do what so many other communities across the 5

province are doing. In Halton we need to develop a place based plan to address poverty in our community. 6