The British Columbia government agrees with most of the Ombudsman's recommendations for fixing the welfare system, but says it may be delayed by the worsening economy.
“The ministry's income assistance application process is unduly complex and not designed to meet the needs of the people who are applying for assistance,” found Ombudsman Kim Carter in the 121-page report, Last Resort: Improving Fairness and Accountability in British Columbia's Income Assistance Program.
The report is the result of a systemic investigation into the provincial welfare system sparked by a 2005 complaint from the B.C. Public Interest Advocacy Centre.
The Housing and Social Development ministry which administers the welfare system fails to give applicants a clear, written explanation of the application process, the report said, adding the process is unnecessarily onerous. “The ministry's income assistance application process can discourage people who are in need from obtaining the assistance available to them.”
Some policies are particularly unreasonable, she said, such as requiring single parents with kids under three years old—who won't be required to look for a job if approved for welfare—to spend three weeks looking for work before they can get help.
Similarly, people who have already spent three weeks looking for work before contacting the ministry should be excused from doing another three week job search, she said.
Nor does the ministry do enough to understand the effects of its policies, she said. “The ministry does not accurately track the number of income assistance applications it receives, approves and denies,” she said. “The ministry lacks evidence to support its conclusion that the reduction in the income assistance caseload is a result of people leaving assistance for employment.”
Carter's report makes 25 recommendations for how to improve the system. A letter from Housing and Social Development deputy minister Cairine MacDonald included with the report says the ministry accepts all but one of the recommendations. The ministry will not compensate people who were denied benefits they were entitled to but did not get due to the government's delay implementing a policy change.
MacDonald cautioned that even the changes the ministry is willing to make may take awhile. “The ministry is experiencing extraordinary demands for service at this time in the face of the current economic situation, and that while we will make every effort to expedite work to implement the recommendations of the report, immediate client needs will be our most pressing priority.”
Andrew MacLeod is The Tyee’s Legislative Bureau Chief in Victoria. Reach him here.
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Frank
2 years ago
Why I learned to love the Liberals
They create big holes in the social safety net so that more and more people drop through without getting help.
They introduce more and more complexity so that a homeless person needs two full-time lawyers to get through the new red tape.
And then they tell us that after 2 terms they really really want to make the system better but their bad handling of the economy has so overloaded the system they can't improve it until there's less people to help.
This logic is a winning formula in places like Point Grey and Cloverdale though.
realisticman
2 years ago
The Liberals listened, something wrong with that?!
They listened and they are going to make improvements. The idea that they also loosened the safety net is unfounded.
What do we want, a government that is deaf to concerns?
This is the group;
"BCPIAC Mission Statement
The British Columbia Public Interest Advocacy Centre is a non-profit society that advances the interests of groups that are generally unrepresented or underrepresented in issues of major public concern."
What more could the government do?
That silly class war statement is typical of the desire of losers that want to drive the age old wedge between a government that has and is making improvements and listening to the electorate, as well, they are stealing the show from the NDP.
Frank
2 years ago
realisticman
Obviously logic was never a part of your education.
realisticman
2 years ago
Frank
The logic you cite is entirely influenced by your personal prejudice. Your ideology precludes any other conclusion.
Frank
2 years ago
realisticman
And of course you're above all that. Calling people "losers" is just your way of demonstrating your lack of ideology and prejudice I guess.
realisticman
2 years ago
Frank
Those that prejudge issues based solely on preconceived ideals as well as attempt to thicken their ranks by employing old divisive simple catcalls, are, in most schools, losers.
Frank
2 years ago
realisticman
Sounds like you have a lot of prejudices realisticman.
As for judging issues, your methods in that respect are pretty obvious, if Harper or Campbell do something its automatically a great idea and everyone who says otherwise is a "loser".
Hmm, considering how fast its grown in the last 8 years I wonder how long it will take before Campbell's Public Affairs Bureau consumes the entire provincial budget?
duffybear
2 years ago
Read the full report
I work for one of the agencies that was involved in the 2005 complaint that prompted this report. Advocates knew at that time how the Liberal government (in particular, although the NDP started it in 1997) had created a bureaucratic nightmare for poorly educated, marginally literate, often ill people, who were trying to get on welfare. We knew that the huge (but hidden) problems with welfare were a major reason why the homeless population was growing in BC. The report confirms everything we observed - and then some. The Ombudsman describes problems we did not even know existed - such as the fact that people were discouraged from continuing in the welfare application process, because workers either (1) told applicants at the front desk that they were not eligible (when they were) and (2) repeatedly asked, throughout the application process, if they wanted to continue, leading applicants to believe it might not be "worth their while" to continue in the application process. The report is extremely enlightening to read.
Make no mistake about it - our government created this current nightmare that we are in. And now they are making out that they are heroes for "fixing it". Sadly, because the press has not really picked this report up and examined it in detail, many people will naively believe our government is doing a terrific job. It's appalling.