Welfare reform: Keeping more earnings would help single mom

 Single mother on social assistance welcomes incoming premier Kathleen Wynne's pledge to act on welfare reform.

Welfare recipient and single mom Jillian Wilson works part-time in the kitchen at the Daily Bread Food Bank. If the government allows people on welfare to keep the first $200 of their earnings without clawbacks, Wilson says she will have more money to buy food for her four boys, ages 13, 12, 4 and 2. 

More groceries.

That is what Toronto welfare recipient Jillian Wilson would buy if she was able to keep the first $200 of her part-time earnings as a cook at the Daily Bread Food Bank.

“I have four boys and when they open the fridge, it’s just whoosh,” said the 29-year-old single mother, imitating the sound of food flying off the shelves as her sons help themselves.

Wilson’s monthly welfare cheque of just over $1,000 barely covers rent and utilities and she scrambles to feed and clothe her growing boys, who are 13, 12, 4 and 2.

She is grateful for $1,200 in child benefits she also gets every month, but the money doesn’t go far when you add the cost of transportation, school supplies and other incidentals, she says.

It would be a huge boost to be able to keep more of what she earns to make ends meet, she says.

“Groceries. That’s definitely where I’d spend it,” she said.

Anti-poverty activists were thrilled last week when incoming premier Kathleen Wynne highlighted welfare reform as one of her top priorities.

So was Frances Lankin, who was worried her sweeping blueprint for change as co-chair of the province’s social assistance reform commission would be lost in a political black hole after Dalton McGuinty prorogued the legislature and resigned as Liberal leader last fall.

But Lankin, a former United Way president and NDP cabinet minister, was one of the first people Wynne called after winning the leadership. Lankin is also among a handful of former politicians, community and business leaders on the incoming premier’s non-partisan transition advisory committee.

“To have the report and its recommendations signalled as a serious part of the premier-designate’s priorities is very gratifying,” Lankin said of the report she and commission co-chair Munir Sheikh submitted in October.

Among the report’s 108 recommendations is an immediate $100-a-month rate increase for single people on Ontario Works, who receive the lowest monthly rate of $606. It also calls for a monthly earnings exemption of $200 instead of the current 50-cent claw back on every dollar earned. And it recommends asset limits be raised to $6,000 for a single person and $7,500 for a couple.

The cost of the reforms, which include merging Ontario Works with the Ontario Disability Support Program and getting municipalities to administer the new program, was pegged at about $340 million annually.

“You can’t move forward on economic prosperity and competitiveness if you have a group of people who continue to be left further and further behind,” Lankin said.

Although the opposition has been silent on the proposed $100-a-month rate increase, NDP Leader Andrea Horwath weighed in last week with her own call to let those on social assistance keep the first $200 they earn each month, a measure she said would help some 50,000 people and cost up to $60 million annually. Conservative Leader Tim Hudak also endorsed the idea earlier last month.

The political consensus points to at least one move that could break the welfare reform logjam, said Gail Nyberg of the Daily Bread Food Bank.

Mike Creek, a former welfare recipient who heads Working for Change, a group that trains people on social assistance with histories of homelessness and mental illness to become advocates in the fight against poverty, is also optimistic that after promising welfare reform in 2007, the Liberals are ready to act.

“That extra $200 will end up back in the economy and help ease the problems of hunger and increased food bank use,” said Creek, who also co-chairs the 25-in-5 Network for Poverty Reduction, a provincial coalition pushing Ontario to meet its 2008 goal of cutting provincial child poverty by 25 per cent within five years.

It would be a good first step and allow the government time to appoint a commissioner to set welfare rates and earning exemptions based on adequacy, fairness and financial incentive, as the report recommends, he added.

It has been almost a generation since the province attempted meaningful welfare reform under former Liberal premier David Peterson, noted Mary Marrone of the Income Security Advocacy Centre.

“It’s a historic opportunity, but the stakes are high,” she said. “Premier-designate Wynne’s commitment to social justice will be critical to ensuring that deficit reduction doesn’t trump poverty reduction in this process.”

Wynne could move on welfare reform as early as Monday when she meets with cabinet, social policy expert John Stapleton said.

At Daily Bread, Wilson earned $400 last month cooking for the food bank’s cafeteria and catering business as part of a 16-week job training program.

Although she will see her welfare cheque reduced by $200 next month, she is buoyed by the prospect of working more hours and being able to keep more of her earnings.

When she graduates this spring, Wilson hopes she can find full-time kitchen work and leave welfare behind.

“I’m sticking with it. I’ve never missed a day,” she said. “And I’ve never been happier.”