Canadian Social Research Newsletter
March 19, 2006

Welcome to the weekly Canadian Social Research Newsletter, a listing of the new links added to the Canadian Social Research Links website in the past week.

The e-mail version of this week's issue of the newsletter is going out to 1576 subscribers.
Scroll to the bottom of this newsletter to see some notes and a disclaimer.

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IN THIS ISSUE:

Canadian Content

1. Opposition to the Proposed Reforms to the Ontario Human Rights Code  (Disabled Women's Network Ontario) - March 19
2. Ontario Alternative Budget Paper Released (Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives - Ontario Office) - March 16
3. International Institute for Child Rights and Development - Victoria BC
4. What's New from Statistics Canada:
--- Consumer Price Index, February 2006 - March 16
5. Guide to Government of Canada Services for Seniors
6. Quickscribe Services - law library service (BC)
7. Back to Work: Learning from the Alberta Welfare Experiment (C.D. Howe Institute) - April 1997
8. What's New from the Childcare Resource and Research Unit (University of Toronto) - March 17

International Content

9. Poverty Dispatch Digest : U.S. media coverage of social issues and programs --- March 16
10. Tackling poverty – a progress report (U.K.) - (Department for Work and Pensions) - March 2006
11. New Human Rights Council at the United Nations (replacing the Human Rights Commission) - March 15
12. 2006 Global Summit of Women - Cairo (June 10-12) + Colloquium on Global Diversity - New York (February 23, 24)

Have a great  week!

Liberals’ patchwork reinvestment strategy leaves
public services underfunded, says Ontario Alternative Budget
Press Release
March 16, 2006
"TORONTO— According to an Ontario Alternative Budget technical paper released today by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, the McGuinty government’s current fiscal plan would result in program spending dropping to levels lower than it was when they took power. Despite funding increases in key areas, the McGuinty government has done little to reverse the cuts to government services imposed under the Harris/Eves regime."

Complete report:

Destination Unknown:
The McGuinty Government
Into the Home Stretch (PDF file - 230K, 7 pages)
March 16 2006
By Hugh Mackenzie

More Ontario Alternative Budget Papers

Source:
Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives - Ontario Office

Related link:

Poor need help from budget, group says
McGuinty Liberals have ignored needy: Think tank report Funding urged
for affordable housing and child care
March 16, 2006
"Ontario's poorest people need more from the upcoming provincial budget than a $1.5-billion Spadina subway extension, a left-leaning think tank says. The influential Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives says Premier Dalton McGuinty has done little for the province's most vulnerable people in more than two years in power. In a report today in advance of Finance Minister Dwight Duncan's budget next Thursday, the organization warns that things are worse than they were under Progressive Conservative premiers Mike Harris and Ernie Eves."
Source:
The Toronto Star

- Go to the Canadian Government Budgets Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/budgets.htm
- Go to the Ontario Municipal and Non-Governmental Sites (A-C) page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/onbkmrk2.htm

International Institute for Child Rights and Development (IICRD) - Victoria BC
"IICRD is a Canadian leader in community-based, national, regional and international applications of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). These applications are unique in that they provide a "culturally grounded" approach to children's rights that build on children's natural resiliency (strengths) as well as the strengths of families, communities and culture."

Related Link:

Children as Partners (CAP)
"Children as Partners is a place where young people and adults from around the world who support child participation can share what they think, what they know and helpful information."

Source:
Centre for Global Studies,
University of Victoria

- Go to the Children's Rights Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/chnrights.htm

What's New from The Daily [Statistics Canada]:

March 16, 2006
Consumer Price Index, February 2006
Consumers paid less for gasoline at the pump in February, which pushed the 12-month change in the Consumer Price Index back down to 2.2% from 2.8% the month before.

Related (Historical) Link:
Guide to the Consumer Price Index (PDF file - 321K, 23 pages)
December 1996

- Go to the Federal Government Department Links (Fisheries and Oceans to Veterans Affairs) page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/fedbkmrk2.htm

Guide to Government of Canada Services for Seniors
January 2006
Table of Contents:
[Click the link above to access resources under the following headings.]
- Introduction
- Finances and Pension
- Health and Wellness
- Housing
- Safety and Security
- Veterans and Canada's Military
- Consumer Issues
- Travel and Leisure
- Computers and Learning
- List of Key Publications
- Provincial and Territorial Contacts - Seniors-Related Enquiries
- Contact Service Canada

Download a PDF copy of the complete guide. [623K, 48 pages]

Source:
Seniors Canada On-line

- Go to the Seniors (Social Research) Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/seniors.htm

Quickscribe Services - law library service (BC)
"Quickscribe is a Victoria-based, family owned business offering clients access to provincial legislation both in hard copy and online formats. We've been in business since 1984 and offer a more affordable alternative to the subscription based Queens Printer legislation service. Our online service is fully searchable, printable and includes and email notification service that alerts clients to recent amendments."

- Go to the BC Government Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/bcbkmrk.htm
- Go to the Non-Governmental Sites in British Columbia (C-W) page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/bcbkmrk3.htm

Back to Work:
Learning from the Alberta Welfare Experiment
April 9, 1997
By Kenneth J. Boessenkool
Now here's a moldie goldie oldie - I lost track of this report some time ago and just recently stumbled across it again.
I'm flagging this as an important report, not because I think the author "got it right" in his assessment of the relative success of Alberta's welfare reforms starting in 1993, but rather because I consider it a kind of manifesto of social conservatives with respect to welfare and welfare reform in Canada. Author Ken Boessenkool hails "the change [in 1993] in the administrative culture of Alberta Family and Social Services, as a result of which welfare applicants are now routinely turned away unless they have exhausted all other sources of support. In the second stage [of Alberta welfare reforms], the province brought benefit levels in line with wages earned by Albertans with low incomes. Together, these reforms appear to have contributed to a nearly 50 percent decline in the number of Albertans on welfare, Boessenkool says." [bolding added]

On page 6 of his report, the author states, "Alberta did not cut its benefits [in October of 1993] uniformly for all recipients. Rather, it focused its most severe reductions on single, employable individuals. They faced a 19 percent decline in benefits, which brought the amount just below the minimum wage." Wow. The welfare income of a single person with no disability in 1993 was "just below minimum wage" AFTER a 19% decrease in that person's maximum benefit level??

No way. Not true.
I did interprovincial welfare rate comparisons for over 25 years as part of my job with the federal government. Never in that period - not once - did a single employable person on welfare receive even close to the prevailing minimum wage, in Alberta or in any other Canadian province. According to the National Council of Welfare's Welfare Incomes report, a single person on welfare in Alberta received about $5,600 for all of 1993. The provincial minimum wage for that year was $5.00 (or about $9,700 for the 52 weeks).

Alberta welfare reforms
a model for other provinces, says C.D. Howe Institute study (PDF file - 668K, 38 pages)
April 1997
[NOTE: this PDF file includes a communiqué in English and one in French as well as the 29-page report itself]
By Kenneth J. Boessenkool
"The welfare reform program that Alberta embarked on in 1993 has reduced the province’s welfare caseload, as a percentage of its population, to levels not seen since before the early 1980s’ recession, a success that has important lessons for other provinces, concludes a C.D. Howe Institute Commentary released today. The study, Back to Work: Learning from the Alberta Welfare Experiment, was written by Kenneth J. Boessenkool, a Policy Analyst at the C.D. Howe Institute." [Excerpt from the Communiqué]

Source:
C.D Howe Institute

Related Link:

March 14:
Tory strategists return to jobs as lobbyists
Watchdog says move by Harper aides violates spirit of proposed ethics law
By Glen McGregor and Tim Naumetz
The Ottawa Citizen
"Two former top aides to Prime Minister Stephen Harper registered to lobby the new Conservative government on key issues such as gas exploration, fuel taxes and airport policy just weeks after they helped Mr. Harper campaign on a promise to stop the revolving door between the lobbying world and government. Former Harper advisers Ken Boessenkool [bolding added] and Yaroslav Baran returned to the lobbying business, separately listing clients that include an association backing ethanol fuel tax breaks and Canada’s busiest airport, after taking a two-month break to work on the Conservative election campaign. An ethics watchdog says the lobby registrations violate the spirit of Mr. Harper’s proposed federal accountability bill, which promises to stop government officials from becoming lobbyists for five years after they leave their jobs. The registrations also may contravene standards already set by the existing federal code of ethics for lobbyists, says Democracy Watch director Duff Conacher."

- Go to the Alberta Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/abkmrk.htm

What's New - from the Childcare Resource and Research Unit (CRRU) - University of Toronto

Each week, the Childcare Resource and Research Unit disseminates its "e-mail news notifier", an e-mail message with a dozen or so links to new reports, studies and child care in the news (media articles) by the CRRU or another organization in the field of early childhood education and care (ECEC). What you see below is content from the most recent issue of the notifier.

17-Mar-06

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New BRIEFing NOTE
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The state of the national child care program
and provincial/territorial contexts
March 2006
Prepared by Martha Friendly and Carolyn Ferns
This BRIEFing NOTE provides an update of the current state of the national child care program in Canada. It features a short introduction to recent developments in ELCC, from the 2004 election campaign to March 2006. It includes a table summarizing selected features of provincial/territorial contexts, including:
- working force participation of mothers;
- percent of children for whom there is a regulated space;
- provincial/territorial child care budgets and allocation per space and per child;
- whether the province/ territory signed a bilateral agreement with the federal government and the amount of expected funding.
Finally, this BRIEFing NOTE features media quotes from provincial officials that provide a picture of where individual provincial governments stand on the current state of the national child care program.

Complete briefing note:

The state of the national child care program
and provincial/territorial contexts (PDF file - 188K, 4 pages)
March 2006

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WHAT'S NEW
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>> Inclusive education: A review of programming and services in New Brunswick
Report for the New Brunswick government contains 95 recommendations to improve education quality; calls on the provincial government to "support access to inclusive day care".

>> Support for child care
Motion passed unanimously by the Vancouver City Council supports "access to affordable and accessible child care through the established national child care program."

>> One parent families: Characteristics, causes, consequences, and issues
Report from the Vanier Institute of the Family's Contemporary Family Trends series examines the circumstances and prospects of one parent families and their members.

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CHILD CARE IN THE NEWS
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>> King of the child-care castle wants a bigger slice of cake [AU]
by Farouque, Farah / The Age (Australia), 16 Mar 06

>> Childcare set to take three steps back [CA-AB]
by Moore-Kilgannon, Bill / Edmonton Journal, 14 Mar 06

>> Even failures marked fit for child care [CA]
by Horin, Adele / Sydney Morning Herald, 14 Mar 06

>> We could have our daycare cake, and eat it too [CA]
by Stanford, Jim / rabble.ca, 14 Mar 06

>> Caring for kids: the dollar beats dazzle [AU]
by Pryor, Linda / Sydney Morning Herald, 13 Mar 06

>> Backbenchers hold out hope for child care changes [AU]
Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 13 Mar 06

>> Daycare workers strike for an hour-a-day [CA-QC]
940 AM News (Montreal), 13 Mar 06

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
This message was forwarded through the Childcare Resource
and Research Unit e-mail news notifier. For information on the
CRRU e-mail notifier, including instructions for (un)subscribing,
see http://www.childcarecanada.org
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Related Links:

What's New? - Canadian, U.S. and international resources
Child Care in the News - media articles
ISSUE files - theme pages, each filled with contextual information and links to further info
Links to child care sites in Canada and elsewhere
CRRU Publications - briefing notes, factsheets, occasional papers and other publications

Also from CRRU:

Towards a national system of early learning and child care
Regularly updated
NOTE: this is a large (and growing) collection that includes government and non-governmental reports, press releases, news articles and other documents dealing with the new federal-provincial-territorial arrangements for early learning and child care in Canada.

Current developments in Early Childhood Education and Care: Provinces and territories
Regularly updated

- Go to the Non-Governmental Early Learning and Child Care Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/ecd2.htm

POVERTY DISPATCH Digest
Institute for Research on Poverty - U. of Wisconsin
This digest offers dozens of new links each week to full-text articles in the U.S. media (mostly daily newspapers) on poverty, poverty, welfare reform, child welfare, education, health, hunger, Medicare and Medicaid, and much more...
The Institute for Research on Poverty (IRP) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison offers a free e-mail service that consists of an e-mail message sent to subscribers each Monday and Thursday, containing a dozen or so links to articles dealing with the areas mentioned above. The weekly Canadian Social Research Links Poverty Dispatch Digest is a compilation, available online, of the two dispatch e-mails for that week --- with the kind permission of IRP.

Here's the complete collection of U.S. media articles in this week's Poverty Dispatch Digest:
(click the link above to read all of these articles)

March 16, 2006

Today's subjects include: Federal Program Enrollment // Medical Care and Race // State Health Care Costs // Wal-Mart and Employee Benefits // Wal-Mart and Employee Benefits – Opinion // Welfare Reform and Health Insurance // School Vouchers – Opinion // Child Support Enforcement // U.S. Census – American Indians // W-2 Testing Program – Milwaukee, WI // Health Care – Madison, WI // Food Stamp Use – Iowa, New York // Low-Wage Jobs and Taxpayer Costs – Utah // Early Childhood Education – California, South Carolina // School Vouchers – Ohio // Academic Achievement Gap – Michigan // Higher Education for Low-Income Students – California // Minimum Wage – Michigan // Low-Income Workers and Housing – Louisiana // Homelessness – Montana

March 13, 2006

Today's subjects include: Poverty Measure // Economic Inequality - Editorial // Planned Changes in Child Care Bureaucracy // Faith-Based Initiative // State Food Tax // Emergency Aid for Poor Katrina Evacuees // Child Care - Missouri // Cuts in Health Coverage for Children - Texas // Medicaid - Utah // Dental Care for Low-Income Residents - Michigan // Effect of High Utility Bills - Baltimore // Gambling and Low-Income Players - Iowa // Income Gap - Arizona // Minimum Wage - Michigan, Pennsylvania, Tennessee

Each of the weekly digests offers dozens of links or more to media articles that are time-sensitive.
The older the link, the more likely it is to either be dead or have moved to an archive - and some archives [but not all] are pay-as-you-go.
[For the current week's digest, click on the POVERTY DISPATCH Digest link above]

Subscribe to the Poverty Dispatch!
Send an e-mail message to John Wolf [ jwolf@ssc.wisc.edu ] to receive a plain text message twice a week with one to two dozen links to media articles with a focus on poverty, welfare reform, child welfare, health, Medicaid from across the U.S.
And it's free...

Source:
Institute for Research on Poverty (IRP)
[ University of Wisconsin-Madison ]

For the current week's digest, click on the POVERTY DISPATCH Digest link at the top of this section.
Recently-archived POVERTY DISPATCH weekly digests:

- March 9, 2006
- March 2
- February 23
- February 16
- February 9

POVERTY DISPATCH description/archive - weekly issues back to August 2005, 50+ links per issue
NOTE: this archive is part of the Canadian Social Research Links American Non-Governmental Social Research page.

- Go to the Links to American Government Social Research page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/us.htm
- Go to the Links to American Non-Governmental Social Research (A-J) page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/us2.htm
- Go to the Links to American Non-Governmental Social Research (M-Z) page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/us3.htm

Making a difference
Tackling poverty – a progress report (PDF file - 639K, 38 pages)
March 2006

Source:
Department for Work and Pensions (U.K.)

Related links:

Principles of Welfare Reform

Welfare Reform Green Paper - U.K. - January 2006
Click on the link above to download the report in separate PDF files, or click the link below to download the entire report in one file.

A new deal for welfare:
Empowering people to work (PDF file - 1.1MB, 112 pages)
Presented to Parliament by
the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
January 2006
"Proposals outlined in this paper are informed by ongoing informal consultation with key stakeholders. Indeed, we have been consulting on incapacity benefits reform since 2002, when we published Pathways to work – Helping people into employment. Proposals for lone parents, Housing Benefit and occupational health are similarly the product of a lengthy process of consultation and evaluation of evidence from existing policies."

"Welfare reform proposals include:
* reforming incapacity benefits;
* a £360 million roll out of Pathways to Work across the country by 2008
* extending support to lone parents and older workers;
* reforming housing benefit;
* transforming support for people living in our cities; and
* delivering support to meet the needs of everyone
It sets out our proposals for achieving an 80% employment rate for people of working age."

- Go to the Government Social Research Links in Other Countries page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/internat.htm

Secretary-General's Statement on the Human Rights Council
March 15, 2006
"Today, by this historic resolution, the General Assembly has established the new Human Rights Council that world leaders resolved to create at the summit last September. This gives the United Nations the chance – a much-needed chance – to make a new beginning in its work for human rights around the world."
Source:
United Nations

High Commissioner for Human Rights Salutes Creation of Human Rights Council
March 15, 2006
"High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour called the establishment of the United Nations Human Rights Council today 'a historic opportunity to improve the protection and promotion of fundamental freedoms of people around the world. The decision of the General Assembly to create the Council is momentous, the High Commissioner said. 'It responds to the hope that the global community could come together and create a strong institution at the heart of the international human rights system.'"
Source:
UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights

United Nations Human Rights Council
Frequently Asked Questions
NEWS: The UN Human Rights Council will replace the 60-year-old UN Human Rights Commission.
March 15, 2006
"On March 15, 2006, the UN General Assembly voted 170 to four to create a new human rights body – the UN Human Rights Council – to replace the 60-year-old UN Human Rights Commission. Canada voted in favour. The U.S. cast one of the four votes in opposition. The other countries voting against the Human Rights Council were Israel, the Marshall Islands and Palau. Belarus,"
Source:
CBC News Indepth:
The United Nations

Google Web Search Results: "Human Rights Council, United Nations"
Google News search Results: "Human Rights Council, United Nations"
Source:
Google.ca

- Go to the Human Rights Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/rights.htm
- Go to the United Nations Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/un.htm

2006 Global Summit of Women - "The Davos for Women"
Cairo, Egypt
June 10-12, 2006
Informally, called the “Davos for Women” by past participants, the Summit has developed a reputation as a gathering of high caliber participants: for fifteen years, the Global Summit of Women has celebrated women’s leadership by bringing together outstanding women business, professional, and governmental leaders from around all corners of the globe. (...) The Summit focuses on accelerating women’s economic development through the effective use of technology, and maximizing the benefit of cross-border business alliances.
Source:
Globewomen.Com
The Premier on-line source for women in business globally...
Links business women worldwide through three channels: the Global Summit of Women, Corporate Women Directors International and WEXPO Online

Related Link:

Colloquium on Global Diversity: Creating a Level Playing Field for Women
March 16, 2006
"On February 23 and 24, 2006, Chief Commissioner Mary Gusella was pleased to participate in the 2006 Colloquium on Global Diversity: Creating a Level Playing Field for Women, at the Harvard Club in New York. This year’s discussions focused on work/family balance and mentoring programs. (...) The Colloquium is a by-product of the 16 year-old Global Summit of Women, the premier gathering of business, professional and entrepreneurial women worldwide which brought together 925 women from 75 countries last year to discuss how to accelerate women’s economic progress globally.
Source:
Canadian Human Rights Commission

- Go to the Links to International Sites about Women's Social Issues page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/womeninternat.htm
- Go to the Conferences and Events Links page: http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/confer.htm

Disclaimer/Privacy Statement

Both Canadian Social Research Links (the site) and this Canadian Social Research Newsletter belong solely to me, Gilles Séguin.

I am solely accountable for the choice of links presented therein and for the occasional editorial comment - it's my time, my home computer, my experience, my biases, my Rogers Internet account and my web hosting service.

I administer the mailing list and distribute the weekly newsletter using software on the web server of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE).
Thanks, CUPE!

If you wish to subscribe to the e-mail version of newsletter, go to the Canadian Social Research Newsletter Online Subscription page:
http://lists.cupe.ca/mailman/listinfo/csrl-news

You can unsubscribe by going to the same page or by sending me an e-mail message [ gilseg@rogers.com ]

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The e-mail version of this newsletter is available only in plain text (no graphics, no hyperlinks, no fancy bolding or italics, etc.) to avoid security problems with government departments, universities and other networks with firewalls. The text-only version is also friendlier for people using older or lower-end technology.

Privacy Policy:
The Canadian Social Research Newsletter mailing list is not used for any purpose except to distribute each weekly issue.
I promise not share any information on this list, nor to send you any junk mail.

Links presented in the Canadian Social Research Newsletter point to different views about social policy and social programs.
There are some that I don't agree with, so don't get on my case, eh...

To access earlier online HTML issues of the Canadian Social Research Newsletter, go to the Newsletter page:
http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/news.htm

Please feel free to distribute this newsletter as widely as you wish, but please remember to mention Canadian Social Research Links when you do.

Cheers!
Gilles

E-MAIL:
gilseg@rogers.com