Despite decades of policy changes, more than 126,000 children in British Columbia were living in poverty and living in single-parent households in 2021, according to a recent report from child advocacy groups. Some of the worst conditions are seen on indigenous reserves.
According to the First Call Children and Youth Advocacy Association's B.C. Child Poverty Report Card, child poverty rates are showing a slight increase following a sharp decline in the previous year.
In 2020, British Columbia's child poverty rate was lower (13.3%) than the national average (13.5%) for the first time in 20 years.
Adrian Montani, the association's executive director, said the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) was the reason so many families moved above the poverty line that year. Mainly acknowledged.
”[Child poverty] We're starting to see an upward trend again,” Montani said Monday on CBC. Today's BC.
Although pandemic benefits were reduced in 2021, they continue to have a significant impact on child poverty rates across the country, she said.
Immigrant children in British Columbia are at high risk of poverty, with more than one in five living in poverty in 2020, according to the report. (Ben Nelms/CBC)
“We know what works to reduce child poverty…and government transfers to household incomes make the biggest difference.”
Without government funding, British Columbia's child poverty rate would have been 29.6 per cent in 2021, the report claims.
The report also makes more than 20 recommendations, nine of which focus on increasing family incomes through the payment of family-supporting wages and improved income support.
Lorraine Copas of British Columbia's Social Planning and Research Council said in a news release that the government should build on the lesson that poverty rates fell dramatically when families received pandemic support. Ta.
“Strengthening policy tools already in place, such as federal and provincial child benefits for households, will halt the rise in child poverty rates and help end child poverty in Canada, as promised long ago. We can work towards that.”
The province's 2024 budget introduced the BC Family Benefit Bonus. This is a one-off bonus for the 2024/25 benefit year, which will increase the annual BC Family benefit amount by 25%.
But Montani says that's not enough.
“It's only for one year…making it a permanent increase is what we really need,” she said.
Some groups are at higher risk of poverty
Although the province's child poverty rate in 2021 was lower than the national average of 15.6%, the child poverty rate on the 67 First Nations reserves was nearly double the national rate, and even higher at 40% for single-parent families. It becomes.
Inequality is also widening, with the highest income households earning 25 times more than the lowest income groups, Montani said.
One of the report's first recommendations is to increase the state's minimum hourly wage rate.
The overall child poverty rate for B.C.'s 67 First Nations reserves in 2021 was 31 per cent, more than double the child poverty rate for B.C. as a whole. (2023 BC Child Poverty Report Register)
B.C.'s lowest-paid workers will get a raise on June 1, when the minimum wage increases from $16.75 an hour to $17.40 an hour.
Child advocacy groups are recommending the state raise wages to at least $20 an hour by 2026.
The report says poverty has improved in British Columbia in recent years, with the child poverty rate third lowest among 13 provinces and territories, but new efforts and urgency are still needed to reduce poverty. It is said that
Overall poverty statistics also hide the fact that some children in British Columbia are at higher risk of living in poverty.
“According to 2021 Census data, the child poverty rate for certain visible minority (racialized) groups was higher than the non-racialized child poverty rate of 9.8 per cent in B.C. ” states the report.
“Arab, Korean, and West Asian children were more than two to three times more likely to be at risk of poverty than non-racialized children, followed by Chinese and Latin American children. .”
Immigrant children in British Columbia are also at high risk of poverty, with more than one in five living in poverty in 2020.