Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Agriculture and Forestry
Issue 17 - Evidence - Meeting of February 23, 2007 - Morning
DEBERT, NOVA SCOTIA, Friday, February 23, 2007
The Standing Committee on Agriculture and Forestry met this day at 10:40 a.m. to examine and report on rural poverty in Canada.
Senator Joyce Fairbairn (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: Thank you very much, and good morning. It is a pleasure to be here in Debert, Nova Scotia. As most of you probably know, your Member of Parliament, Bill Casey, invited the committee to come to Debert. Mr. Casey, we are grateful for the invitation.
Debert is the last stop of our tour of Atlantic Canada. Mr. Casey asked us to come here because of the pressing rural poverty problems in this riding.
It may comfort you to know that Debert is not alone in this respect. In our travels so far we have heard many heart wrenching stories about the impact of rural poverty on the elderly, on women, on men, and, of course, always on children. Despite the sometimes-bleak news, however, rural Canada has lived up to its reputation, getting us everywhere, and greeting us everywhere with an unflinching kindness, generosity and openness, for which we are truly grateful.
We feel a great responsibility to produce a report that will reflect the views we have heard, make their situation known, and hopefully get something done about rural poverty.
With us this morning, to tell us more about rural poverty is Claudia Jahn, Executive Board Member of the Affordable Housing Association. With Ms. Jahn is Lucille Harper, Executive Director of the Antigonish Women's Resource Centre, and Bernadette MacDonald, Executive Director of Pictou County Women's Centre.
Claudia Jahn, Executive Board Member, Affordable Housing Association: Good morning, everyone. I am the Community Liaison for Community Action on Homelessness in Halifax, and I serve on the board of the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia, and the board of the Safe Harbour Housing Society in Musquodoboit.
I became an active and passionate housing advocate in 2002 while working on a research study on the housing situation of single mothers in rural Nova Scotia. The living conditions of mothers and their children I met during personal interviews and the stories of struggle I heard made me sad and angry, and I promised myself to do more than just write about it and dropping off some groceries. Therefore, I am pleased to be here, and I would like to applaud you for this wonderful initiative and for the comprehensive interim report, Understanding Freefall: The Challenge of the Rural Poor, and all your efforts to examine the needs of the rural poor. With my presentation, I would like to add one more piece to the puzzle of the poor in rural Nova Scotia, which is rural housing.
If we want to achieve our common goal to keep rural Nova Scotia viable we have to make sure that there is affordable and suitable housing available for people who want to stay in our communities. In order to examine the current housing situation in rural Nova Scotia the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia is currently conducting seven provincial roundtable discussions with community stakeholders. This process will be followed by a symposium in May, 2007, here in Debert, where the analysis of the roundtables will be incorporated into a policy paper.
Every community across the province has its own unique issues but emerging common threats are in regards to hidden homelessness, substandard and unsafe housing conditions, a growing number of people living in temporary shelters in the woods, long waiting lists for the scarce social housing units, frequent foreclosures on family homes, and many people leaving the community due to the lack of affordable housing. Only a strong desire to remain in their communities, close to their social network, and the resilience of the rural population can explain why so many accept to live in such conditions. However, many are forced to leave due to the lack of housing options, especially families with children.
I met mothers who had moved into affordable housing units in town but could not cope with being away from their social networks, from their families, or with the exposure of drugs and other issues in the city, and moved back to their community. Where do they move back to? How do they live? Where do they live?
I have seen too many mothers living in isolation in unsafe trailers, without heat, with frozen water pipes, and at times without power because of their inability to pay the bills. Since heat is, in most cases, not included in the rent in rural Nova Scotia the rural poor on social assistance are even poorer than the urban poor because they are forced to use their food budget to cover heating costs.
When the federal government abandoned the social housing program in the 1990s it was devastating for the whole country, but especially for the rural communities since it meant that a much needed rental market was not developed.
Home ownership used to be the preferred choice of tenure for Canadians but with the socioeconomic changes, this form of living is no longer attainable, especially not for the rural poor.
In 2002, the Safe Harbour Housing Society in Musquodoboit Harbour on the Eastern Shore of Nova Scotia proposed a housing complex for mothers and their children. The complex includes not only affordable rental housing units but also a resource space for employability training, daycare and personal development. The concept was the result of a research study and a focus group with mothers and the community at large.
The developed model addresses issues mentioned in your report, such as isolation, lack of transportation and lack of services. Previous attempts to access funding from the existing programs failed since all available programs, such as the federal National Homelessness Initiative and the bilateral Housing Agreement are urban focussed. Affordable housing cannot be developed without support from government since the affordable housing market is not profitable and, therefore, of no interest to the private sector.
For many good reasons the right to shelter is a human right. Only with secure, safe and affordable housing are citizens able to think about health, education, personal development and community participation. This right is denied to many Nova Scotians living in rural communities.
The Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia would like to provide the following recommendations for improving the housing situation in rural communities. We encourage the federal and provincial government to use funding powers to create supportive housing options in rural communities and provide financial resources to upgrade existing social and private housing stock. We recommend that the governments utilize local expertise and skills by strengthening the capacity of non-profit organizations, enabling them to develop suitable housing options for rural communities. We recommend the adjustment of the current shelter allowance rate to the actual shelter cost. As mentioned earlier, we will be able to provide a policy paper at the end of May, after the Rural Affordable Housing Symposium.
As a summary, I would like to say, build it and they will come, build it and they will stay. Without housing we cannot keep rural Nova Scotia alive.
Bernadette MacDonald, Executive Director, Pictou County Women's Centre: I would like to start by congratulating the committee on its excellent report, Understanding Freefall: The Challenge of the Rural Poor. Being a person who lives in a rural community and commutes to a small town, where I work at a women's centre that works with women and their families on a number of issues that pertain directly to poverty, your report touched me on both a personal and professional level.
On a personal level, I see the kindness extended to our aging population and without this kindness of neighbours and family, these people would have to leave. I see the number of farms that have closed. I see the one remaining family farm that works most of the open land in our area make the financial decision to go more industrial, hence deeper in debt, to stay viable. I see the number of people who volunteer to keep our fire departments, community halls, and not- for-profit agencies vibrant. I see the contribution our rural communities make to being good stewards of the land. I see our citizens trying to protect our woodlands so that we can start the next generation of old growth forests and contribute to reversing climate change and combatting the CO2 emissions and other greenhouse gases.
On a professional basis your report touched me because at the women's centre we see the impact of this deep poverty that has gripped a significant percentage of our population. As a feminist organization we know that women are more vulnerable to poverty and that poverty affects women more and differently. The poverty is due in part to the roles that women play in child bearing and care giving. Gender stereotyping has affected women's economic independence and society has denied women's rightful share of the wealth.
Working at the women's centre also means carrying out community development and addressing public policy that affects women. We work with our many community and government partners to address gaps in our social infrastructure. Just this week our community had another meeting on how we can address the need for a public transit service. Our community of Pictou is rural and we have a number of challenges, which are articulated a number of times in your report.
In terms of public policy, we have worked with our sister and social justice organizations, primarily here in Nova Scotia, to address public policy that has negatively impacted women. Most of this work has been done through Status of Women Canada. Being an organization in a rural community we have been able to put a rural, as well as a feminist lens, to our public policy analysis. With the changes in the terms and conditions of the Status of Women Canada program, our ability to address public policy has been severely restricted.
As this committee meets with ordinary Canadians like us, you are probably hearing, and will hear, similar stories about the challenges faced by our rural communities. This is probably a good thing, so the solutions being put forward will be applicable, whether we live in Nova Scotia or British Columbia.
As a possible solution, we are pleased to see in your report a reference to a guaranteed annual or liveable income. This is a solution we would like to emphasize, as it would address the many concerns and challenges faced by women and rural citizens, and give recognition to the important contributions women in rural communities make to the health and welfare of our country.
The makeup of our social safety net is forever changing. My grandmother, as a single parent, raised 13 children on a farm on P.E.I. If she could come back today, she would not believe the social safety net we have in place. In her day, there was nothing. Since that time we have moved from nothing to a recognition and implementation of a number of social security programs. From that time to the present the population of the rural versus urban has shifted from 80-20 per cent to 20-80 per cent, and productivity has increased due to mechanization, automation and computerization, to mention just a few of the changes.
If we have a number of social security programs in place why are there so many people living in poverty? Why are our rural communities in freefall? Why are so many people sick? Why is our very planet in peril? We believe it is because our thinking is faulty. We have not caught up to our changing world. We feel we need to change our way of thinking from the production of products to the thinking that embraces productive choice. Our current emphasis on production is based on consumption and market measures of wealth. This type of thinking is having an enormous negative impact on the health of humans, other animal species, and our environment.
We would like to put forward these recommendations which we feel will assist in moving our thinking and analysis forward for the health and well-being of our citizens and our planet. We recommend that the Senate be the champion for a guaranteed liveable income and that over the next two years the Senate strongly encourage a process of engagement with all citizens in Canada on guaranteed liveable income, so Canadians fully understand the concept and governments garner from all interested citizens how Canadians see its implementation.
Our second recommendation is that both Houses work with the provinces, territories and social justice organizations in moving a Canadian poverty reduction strategy forward that embraces a guaranteed liveable income as part of the continuum of our social security infrastructure. In the interim we encourage the Senate to work with the House of Commons on implementing a number of the recommendations from the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance, pre-budget report, Canada: Competing to Win, and in particular, recommendations 11, 12 and 13.
I want to thank the Senate and you, the representatives, for taking the welfare of Canadians so seriously and starting this discussion from the rural perspective.
Lucille Harper, Executive Director, Antigonish Women's Resource Centre: You can give me the high sign and I will not take it personally. We come from a rural community and we are storytellers. You are really challenging the rural communities when you limit the presentation time to one hour.
First, I want to say thank you for coming to rural Nova Scotia, and thank you Bill Casey for spearheading the initiative. In Atlantic Canada, we have particular issues that are similar to and different from what is happening in rural areas across Canada.
At our women's centre, we work with women who live in deep and persistent poverty, poverty that is often generational and racialized. We work with women and adolescent girls who live in rural communities and who are trying to put their lives together to establish economic independence in a region where there are few opportunities for employment. They are trying to provide and care for children and family members with limited access to child care and support services. They are struggling to further their education and seek training opportunities without a public transportation system. On top of this they are holding their communities together by performing many hours of unpaid community labour on top of their household and paid labour.
While out-migration has been a way of life in many parts of Nova Scotia for decades, really since Confederation, the increased numbers of people leaving for other parts of the country has increased significantly. This out-migration is dismantling our rural infrastructure. Out-migration has taken the heart out of many of our communities and left us with an aging population that is less educated, has poor physical and mental health outcomes, shorter life expectancies and a higher risk of living in poverty.
We are seeing a change in our family structures in our rural communities, as well as men seeking work in the West, leaving their wives behind, to not only care for the children but also to do all of the other work that holds rural communities together.
I think you have articulated well that poverty is gender based. I will not go into that. What I do want to say is that poverty is policy created and policy maintained. It does not just happen. One of the policies that creates and maintains poverty is low minimum wages, and certainly, in Nova Scotia our minimum wage is set at a rate that leaves someone working full-time, full year, earning significantly less than the poverty line.
Employment insurance benefits do not cover the people who are working in Nova Scotia, so not only is the insurance inadequate but only 30 per cent to 40 per cent of the workforce is eligible to collect the insurance. You may know or have heard of the story of Margaree where out-migration has been so significant that the unemployment rate has dropped. While not one more job has been created, the unemployment rate has dropped due to out-migration, and the number of weeks for people to be eligible for employment insurance has increased. The people who are left behind who are doing the part-time, seasonal work and have been able to sustain their families because they have been eligible for employment insurance, are no longer eligible. Those policies create and perpetuate poverty.
Provincial social assistance rates are inadequate across the country and we have some of the lowest here in Nova Scotia. While some of what I am talking about falls under provincial mandates I think we have to take responsibility for the fact that when we cut the Canada Assistance Program in 1995, moved to the CHST, and cut billions of dollars from the provincial coffers that provinces responded by cutting social assistance rates. Those rates have not increased significantly since then. Public pensions also leave women living in poverty. When we add a rural lens to all of this the situation becomes significantly bleaker.
We have a lack of jobs and sustainable employment in our rural areas. In Nova Scotia, we have relied on forestry, fishing, agriculture and primary industries. We are losing those sources of employment and we are not replacing those jobs. Plus, the jobs that are in rural areas tend to pay less than those in urban areas. Not only are we losing jobs, we are losing a way of life.
Just looking at recent unemployment rates for northern Nova Scotia, the unemployment rate in the last year rose 2.1 percentage points to 10.6 per cent. The reduction in full-time employment was two and one-half times larger than the reduction in part-time employment. We are losing our full-time jobs and that is having a huge impact in this area. Between 1991-01, the number of low-income families living in Antigonish County increased by 10 per cent. We do not have the recent 2006 statistics, but I am sure we will see another significant increase. Families living in poverty accounted for 20 per cent of all families in Antigonish County and 23 per cent of families in Guysborough County are low-income families. That is huge. That has huge implications for a tax base. It has huge implications on how people can support their communities because as you all know, doing community work costs money, whether volunteer work for church groups or community fire departments, caring for neighbours, or driving someone to get groceries. We have a large, low-income population that does not have the means to eat and hold their communities together. Out- migration is a huge issue.
I have to tell you one story. Recently, I ran into someone that I have known for a number of years. He was the warden of the municipality in Antigonish for 10 or 12 years, and was an MLA. His family had been there for generations. They were in a Catholic community; they had 12 children. The family owned a farm and a small business. His family was at the heart of the community. I saw him the other day and remarked that it had been a while since I had seen him. He replied that he and all of his family had moved to Calgary. I was shocked. He said that he and his wife sold the farm and the business and all of the children and he and his wife moved to Calgary. The gentleman was a stalwart member of our community, a founding member of the community, and 14 members of that family left. What they took with them, I am sure you can imagine.
Out-migration is a huge issue. In Guysborough County, there was a 16.2 per cent decrease in population between 1991-01. Most of out-migration concerned young people, and the increase in population of people over the age of 65 years increased by 26.7 per cent. The face of our community is changing. It has not been quite as dramatic in Antigonish, yet the number of youth has decreased by 38.4 per cent and the number of people over 55 years has increased to 62 per cent. The different face of our community is not sustainable.
I think you have talked about loss of services and infrastructure in your report. In our small communities, we have seen the closure and centralization of schools, hospitals, loss of post offices, banks, grocery stores and gas stations, which means that people living in rural communities have to travel even farther to obtain essential services. This is difficult. We have also seen a reduction or a complete withdrawal of mental health services, social services and employment support services from the most rural areas, which have left those communities without support. Add to that the situation of living in a low income, no public transportation system, and the transportation that you do have is probably one vehicle in the family and it is probably unreliable, and you have a picture of isolation and immobility.
People will not move into a community without a school or access to services. Public transportation is a huge issue and so is the problem with the lack of education and training opportunities.
Some of our communities in rural Nova Scotia are racialized communities so that we have some particular communities that we really need to pay attention to, because policy makers have ignored these communities forever. With the current crisis in rural communities, these communities are even more disadvantaged, and some of those communities are African Nova Scotian and Aboriginal communities.
In the Guysborough area, we have an African Nova Scotian community that has been there, literally, for hundreds of years. The community is extremely isolated and extremely poor. We had segregated schools there until the 1950s, and the problem of racism is deep and it is significantly impacting and deepening the level of poverty in those communities.
Urban centre policies and programs are no solution. Population-based policies and programs under serve and disadvantage people who are living in rural communities and rural areas. We need program-based funding rather than population-based funding.
We need a fair equalization formula. If we are going to try to address poverty in Nova Scotia then we need to have some funding, some of that funding has to come from the federal government, and it has to come through a fair equalization formula. We want a Canada Social Transfer that is strengthened and sufficient to ensure adequate funding for programs and services that are designated under it, and that have standards and conditions attached. A Canada Social Transfer is very important because it is designated for social programs and so if there were some conditions attached and governed by a stronger Canada Social Transfer act it would be hugely helpful.
We need a federal poverty reduction strategy; we need a poverty line that reflects and accounts for rural realities; we need a viable public transportation system for all rural communities; we need an affordable housing strategy that meets the particular needs of rural communities; we need to work with small farmers to develop and implement programs that encourage, support and make available local produce. We could strengthen our rural areas by supporting our small farmers rather than spending huge amounts of money on shipping food into the community.
We need programs that work with rural communities to develop and implement community economic development issues; one could be alternative energy. We must ensure that the policies and programs introduced to revitalize rural communities are linked to improving women's equality. I think we cannot go back. We need to go forward.
What can we do in our rural communities to ground those communities and begin to bring in some funding? We can implement a federal minimum wage, implement a guaranteed liveable income and continue to provide research that is specific to rural communities. One of the best reports I have read in a long time is your interim report Understanding Freefall: The Challenge of the Rural Poor. The report is written in a way that makes it good reading; it is a storytelling report. I have distributed the report to many people because it reflects what we are seeing here today.
Senator Mercer: Thank you very much to the presenters, and I welcome my colleagues again to day two of our Nova Scotia trip. Welcome to my province and I hope that like yesterday, we learn some new things here today.
Claudia, you focussed on housing, and you suggested that the government help upgrade existing private housing stock. I understand how we can help fix existing social housing stock and perhaps provide more housing. What type of program do you envision to help the private housing stock in rural Nova Scotia?
Ms. Jahn: I was thinking of home ownership. I think the RRAP program really does not cover it for the people I met. The single mothers, for instance, rent trailers, they have no other options, but these trailers, even if they are rented, need upgrading. We should not abandon all this stock; we should invest in it.
Senator Mercer: Bernadette, in my briefing of my colleagues on the way here I forgot to mention the small community you live in, Scotsburn, Nova Scotia, where they manufacture the best ice cream in the world.
You talked about a guaranteed liveable income. We have been using the term ``guaranteed annual income,'' which we used yesterday in Annapolis. This term is getting some legs. You have switched the title to ``guaranteed liveable income.'' Have you changed the terminology on purpose?
Ms. MacDonald: Yes.
Senator Mercer: Can you tell me why you have made the change? Can you give me the objective of the change in terminology?
Ms. MacDonald: Our concern is that if it is called ``annual'' then it could be at a very low rate, just like the social assistance rates. People who live on very fixed incomes live on very low income. I think it has to be liveable so that it matches the low-income cut-offs, LICOs, and those sorts of measures that are out there now. That is why we would like to see it as ``liveable,'' so it covers those basic needs.
Senator Mercer: I think one reference in one of your papers was a very important point and I hope that will get in the report. In the report, it says if you work full-time at minimum wage, you are still below the poverty level in the province of Nova Scotia.
Ms. MacDonald: That is correct.
Senator Mercer: My last question is, Lucille, you talked extensively about racism, particularly in the Black community in Nova Scotia, and you referred to Guysborough County. This is Black History Month; it is very important that we go back and ask ourselves this question. How bad is the racism in rural Nova Scotia? This is always disturbing when we hear that we still have racism in Nova Scotia. I grew up here, I know it exists, and I know it has for many years.
I live in a small village of Mount Uniacke but spend most of my time in big cities like Halifax and Ottawa. How bad is that racism in the small communities like Guysborough County?
Ms. Harper: Well, the impact of racism is complicated because people tend to think of overt racism as opposed to systemic racism. When we look at systemic racism and we look at the numbers of African Nova Scotian students from that area who actually graduate from high school and then are able to go on to post-secondary education, we see reduced numbers. We see exclusion in some ways from ability to participate in extracurricular activities because they have to bus to school, and they live in an isolated area and do not have the supports in the area to be able to get rides back and forth to school, et cetera. Much of what we see is reduced education outcomes. For the people themselves we see the inability to secure employment because they are living in a very isolated area without a public transportation system. An ongoing lack of attention is systemic that continues to perpetuate that exclusion, and is racist in and of itself.
Senator Mercer: It seems that your answer is the uniqueness of the isolation as opposed to the uniqueness of the race.
Ms. Harper: It is both and that is why I say it is systemic. It is the isolation in part, the fact that it is rural, that complicates so much the ability to be able to move out of it, and that becomes perpetuated. When we are working in the schools, we hear the stories from the students all the time, around the slurs, the comments, and everything else that happens. The exclusion from the workforce and the inability to go on to post-secondary education and training is the systemic piece that is so profound.
Senator Gustafson: Thank you, Madam Chairman. We are pleased that your member of Parliament is here to welcome us. Mr. Casey remarked that this project would need a fair amount of money.
One of the biggest challenges is that our commodity prices are not up-to-date with what is happening in the global economy, or the economy of Canada for the rest of Canada. Obviously, many of the rural people were involved in agriculture, some in the forestry industry and some in the fishing industry and I suppose these were the primary areas.
Is this poverty directly related to those industries or is it related more to farm labourers?
Ms. Harper: It is both. We have seen the closing of various fisheries and as a result the closure of many fish processing plants. That means that the fishers are unable to pursue their income and they have to keep looking for alternative fisheries. Although having said that, we also have some lucrative fisheries in lobster and crab, so it is not across the board. However, when a fish plant closes in a small community that is a primary source of work for the people who are living there it is not easily replaced. Neither is any of that work in the primary industries. What we are seeing is that people who can leave do leave. The people that remain in the small community are the people that have lower education levels.
Generational communities have been built around a particular way of life, whether it is fishing or mining in Cape Breton, which is a very hard way of life. You cannot just come into those communities and train people to work in a call centre. Many of the solutions have not been reflective or adequate for the change in that loss of a way of life.
I appreciate that some of the people here are rural and come from rural communities, and I think that is a strength of this committee, but when we think about solutions it is not about getting the person a job and any job will do, it is about what is his or her way of life? How has their life been structured? How do we create something that is going to continue to support the way of life so that it becomes vibrant, people feel as though they are continuing to be productive and able to build and maintain their communities? I think we have gone to the idea that, find them another job, it does not matter what it is, and that will work. It does not.
Senator Gustafson: The same thing is true on the Prairies. We have people that are sustaining their farms, by working at jobs in other areas and it makes for a very, very difficult way of life because they are working double time. It puts an awful lot of stress on the families. It is a very serious situation and there has to be way through commodity prices or otherwise to get more money into these communities.
Ms. Harper: I am not sure it is all commodity prices, at least not in Nova Scotia. There are some exciting initiatives to try to keep the people who are left in communities. That is the number one critical issue right now. We cannot tolerate any more out-migration without the whole piece completely collapsing. We need some immediate short-term measures, and then we need to work with communities on some of the longer-term measures, but they cannot come from an urban way of thinking. It really has to be based on rural thinking. We keep seeing urban solutions applied to rural communities and they do not work. We need to step back and create rural solutions. They look different, and they are, in the way that people piece together their lives in rural communities, as you so well said, by working two and three different jobs. The solutions need to be that way as well.
Ms. Jahn: I would like to add that it is not all economic. It has much to do with attitude. To be poor is very depressing. You need money. If you are struggling just to survive, you cannot think about your future, about the next day, or about taking the initiative to improve your life skills, your employability. When we brought the local mothers together to develop a housing model we gave them hope and that hope was reflected in energy in the community, in the children, because they had hope to do something for some changes. We need to change the attitude.
Senator Mahovlich: You mentioned housing and single mothers. Is there any help for single men? Are there any single men left, or did they just get up and leave? If we want to keep the people here we are going to have to think of the single men.
Ms. Jahn: Unfortunately, rural homelessness is under research and our focus was on single mothers. But when I called with advertisement for interviewees I had a couple of calls from men as well. ``Nobody is talking about us. We lose our homes from family break-ups. When we began our study, we received some calls from men who were concerned that their problems were not being addressed. These men were homeless because of family problems. They had to find apartments to live in. Many of these men were minimum wage earners who had to hitch hike each day. They hitch hike from the Eastern Shore into town because they like to stay in their communities. In Bridgewater, on the South Shore, we heard that there are approximately 100 single men living in homemade shelters in the woods. They do not like to leave the community. They stay there and they even accept these housing conditions. There are many homeless single men but we do not have precise numbers.
Ms. MacDonald: Anytime we raise the status of women we are raising the status of everyone. I absolutely agree with you Senator Mahovlich. We do not want to exclude any group from our analysis and from our vision of moving forward. We see that the higher percentage of poverty is with the single mothers. When we increase the status of women, we increase the status of everyone.
Senator Mahovlich: I just want to tell you a success story. Back in 1964-65, I was asked by a friend of mine to go and open up a doughnut shop. That was in Hamilton. His name was Tim Horton. We opened up this doughnut shop, and I wondered who was making the doughnuts. Ron Joyce was in the kitchen making the doughnuts. He has a book out and I think everybody should read it. Here is a man that worked 12 hours a day. It is an amazing story. Tatamagouche, I believe, was his hometown. I think the parents separated, and he gave all of his credit to his mother. She was a strong woman. He left and came back, opened up a centre in the Tatamagouche area, a golf course, and it is a real success story. It shows that people can come back and contribute to Nova Scotia. I am sure there are other stories.
Ms. Harper: With all due respect, Senator Mahovlich, he pays minimum wages. Many of the women working at Tim Hortons are part-time employees who do not have benefits. They work for very low wages and their children are living in poverty. His community, just outside of Tatamagouche, is a gated community into which the people who are making his fortune are not allowed to enter. He is a success story, but he has not passed that success along in a fair way to the people who are working in Tim Hortons across Canada.
Senator Mahovlich: I think you should read his book. And there are always two sides to a story. It was not easy for him, and business is business. Is McDonald's better?
Ms. Harper: No.
Senator Mahovlich: It is an experience. The kids get in there, they work, they learn all about business and management. They learn. A lot of those people are young people that probably work in there, too.
Ms. Harper: Yes, there are young people employed there but many single mothers also.
Senator Mahovlich: I know it is a difficult situation. My parents came from Croatia in the 1920s. Why did they come here? There was no work in Croatia and so they had to leave. My dad came first, left my mother there. She came three or four years later. He made some money, brought her over and started a family. It was not easy for anybody, but there are some success stories.
Senator Callbeck: Claudia, you talked about affordable and suitable housing in rural Canada. This is something that we have heard from several other witnesses as we have travelled throughout Atlantic Canada. Senator Mercer questioned you about for private homes for low-income families. We have a program on Prince Edward Island; the only problem is has a six-year waiting list. I think the program is working fine. You say that previous attempts to access funding from the existing programs failed. Now, you say that the bilateral Housing Agreements are urban focussed. Can you give me some examples?
Ms. Jahn: Yes. For instance, this model is for the Eastern Shore. When I met with the provincial government right after the first phase was introduced and I introduced my project, it said that the focus would be on urban areas. If you look at the numbers from the first phase most of the affordable housing units were built in the urban area. They said they would consider Musquodoboit Harbour because it is within the HRM, but in areas further east, the policy will not cover it because that area is rural. The thinking is that rural Nova Scotia cannot be sustained and that the majority of people will move to Halifax anyway. That was the internal policy. Why invest in more housing when we know people are moving away? For me, this is the wrong thinking. People cannot stay in their community if they do not have the housing. Build the housing and they will stay.
Senator Callbeck: Bernadette, please explain recommendations 11, 12 and 13. In addition, you referred to changes in the terms and conditions of the Status of Women Canada, how it is affected, and the ability to address public policy. Please explain.
Ms. MacDonald: When the Status of Women Canada announced cuts to numerous programs back in September they also changed the terms and conditions for Status of Women Canada meaning that we could no longer address public policy with federal dollars. Much of our work has been looking at social assistance policies in Nova Scotia, housing policies, and other policies that are often provincial, in particular, but also federally driven. We would examine that through the eyes of women living that experience, and then we would put recommendations forward. That would be done through Status of Women Canada funding. They will no longer allow that and it is a real shame and a real loss. Through that program, we were able to illustrate to government the impact of their policies. They write it and they try to implement it, with the best of intentions, but often it needs fine-tuning and it needs an analysis, and with that funding, we were able to do that analysis. Now we are no longer able to do that. It is a loss.
Senator Callbeck: Yes. That would be a big piece of your work.
Ms. Harper: It is a huge piece of our work because we do not always want to be just a service. We want to be looking at society and how to improve the status of women.
Recommendation 11 of the House of Commons report Canada: Competing to Win recommends that the federal government adopt a target of reducing child poverty in Canada. Recommendation 12 refers to the reinstatement of funding cuts in the areas of literacy, social economy, youth assistance, assistance to museums, Status of Women, volunteerism, the Law Commission of Canada and the Court Challenges Program. Recommendation 13 concerns housing. It recommends that the federal government, on a priority basis, extend the Supporting Communities Partnership Initiative and the Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program.
Senator Callbeck: Lucille, I want to ask you about economic development. What about the Community Futures Program? Are you familiar with that program offered through ACOA?
Ms. Harper: I am not familiar enough with the Community Futures Program.
We are trying to work with the small, very isolated communities in Antigonish, Pictou, Guysborough, the women's centres, with the RDAs and with some of the First Nations and the African Nova Scotian communities, to bring some of the informal economic activities into the formal economy. We are trying to do that in ways that are cost efficient to the local townspeople. We are also looking at those communities, and looking at how we can reframe them and bring them into a more formal economy, whether through tourism, the economic development of cranberries, or whatever is already there. We can work in these small ways to help people to stay in their communities.
If you are interested, we could talk about the initiatives that we are trying to get underway because they take what are seen as the barriers in the community and makes them into attractive elements. We want to market the fog in Canso. We are trying to think of ways to maintain what we already have and build on it.
Senator Callbeck: Are you seeing an increase in women entrepreneurs?
Ms. Harper: Yes, we are seeing an increase, absolutely, but not necessarily women entrepreneurs who are able to live above the poverty line. What we are seeing is that there is a real struggle. Women are incredibly hard workers, industrious, intelligent and creative, so we are seeing an increase.
Senator Callbeck: The success rate is very high for women entrepreneurs.
Ms. MacDonald: Could I just add something about women entrepreneurs? One of the fastest growing areas in our small communities is women entrepreneurs. Unfortunately, many women put off child bearing and child rearing because they cannot pay into an EI fund so that they can have some replacement income so that they can actually have children. The EI maternity benefits need to be so that women in business can pay into that fund. That is a very important piece of public policy that Lucille mentioned. Often poverty is created because of public policy, and this is a very good example.
Senator Callbeck: That was a major recommendation that we made on the Prime Minister's Task Force on Women Entrepreneurs and hopefully it will pass.
Ms. MacDonald: Good. I hope it goes through.
The Chairman: We have now a panel of three, which includes Anna Parks from the Colchester Regional Development Agency, Sharon Murphy from the Poverty Action Committee and Bill Casey, Member of Parliament.
Sharon Murphy, Chair, Poverty Action Committee: My name is Sharon Murphy and I am from Amherst in Cumberland County, Nova Scotia.
According to the 2001 data from Statistics Canada, 1,350 families in Cumberland County are living below the low- income cut-off level of 13.8 per cent. We have an unemployment rate of 13.4 per cent compared with 10.9 per cent for Nova Scotia. Two-thirds of the 30,000 people on income assistance are rural based. I want the committee to pay close attention to that because, to me, it speaks of the importance of designing and developing policies that would take into account that over 20,000 people on social assistance live in a rural area. There are 90,000 low-income families in the province. Given that two-thirds are on income assistance, in all probability, there are no statistics; it is much the same for low-income families.
A common theme keeps coming through with those working with the poor in Cumberland County, and that is difficulty with transportation to access needed services. To gain an appreciation of this difficulty you need to understand the unique geography of Cumberland County, which has a geographical expanse of 4,288 square kilometres. To give you a visual perspective this is a little less area than the province of P.E.I.
A transportation committee has been formed to develop a low cost taxi system to help the disabled, the elderly and the poor. We are in the beginning stages of this process and we have a long way to go.
There are three main disincentives in our area to coming off income assistance. Affordable, safe child care is a disincentive. The other two disincentives are the lack of insurance to cover medications, and although it may seem difficult to understand, people on income assistance find it discouraging to advance themselves when 70 per cent of their earnings from a paid position are clawed back. You really have to understand the psyche of a person that has been marginalised and living on low income. They struggle to get ahead, they finally see themselves getting ahead, and all of a sudden, somebody says, ``Well, we want 70 per cent of that back.''
Recently, the people in Cumberland County and Northern Nova Scotia found their 2007 property assessments went up 11.2 per cent. For Nova Scotia in general, they went up 9.6 per cent. This has come on the heels of a 4.8 per cent increase by Nova Scotia Power. This concerns the poor because landlords may find it necessary to pass on this increase to tenants who are already on the financial edge.
In speaking with single mothers, they spoke with passion about living on minimum wage jobs at Tim Hortons as the other witness said before me. Buying groceries, especially milk, was a common theme. Milk seems to be a big issue for mothers. What is difficult for single mothers is that they feel they have to carry the load without much help from their ex-husbands. There seems to be a problem with enforcing child support orders. Because rents are expensive, many of the poor take money from their food budget to make ends meet. As a result they have diets with empty calories. This leads to obesity and the concomitant health problems. I was actually shocked to find out that our local food bank serviced 4,835 people in 2006. To me, that is staggering and it really speaks to the increasing dependence on food banks.
The mentally ill face unique challenges also. There is a double stigma of mental illness and poverty. They are often in a double bind because if they come off of social assistance they cannot afford their medications. They are stuck in a rut so they remain on social assistance or disability pensions.
We need an increased support for the chronically mental ill in the form of psychosocial rehabilitation programs. A model of such a program is the Clubhouse model, which prepares people for employment. We need a tailored program like this to meet the needs of the rural community. We may not be able to have the same kind of a Clubhouse program that they have in downtown Montreal but we need something tailored to our needs.
Youth are impacted by poverty. I was reminded by, and I reiterate what the YMCA youth worker said, that many of the programs for youth and teens lose money every year because many of these programs, and the children in them, have to be subsidized because their families cannot pay for their children to be involved. Mentoring programs and recreational programs like those held at the YMCA are an investment in the future.
In closing, I want to make a plea for a coordinated, united approach to alleviating poverty. There is federal money, there is community service, there are faith-based initiatives, and there are anti-poverty groups, who are all working in their own way. Reverend Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life says we have not eradicated poverty because we have not dealt with it together and we all need to form a united front.
Anna Parks, Community Economic Development Officer, Colchester Regional Development Agency: Good morning. I am Anna Parks and I work as a community development officer at Colchester Regional Development Agency.
Thank you for providing an opportunity for the Colchester Regional Development Agency, CoRDA, to participate in the discussion about rural poverty. This report has been prepared in consultation with the Colchester Anti-Poverty Network, a not-for-profit organization composed of social service providers, community organizations and persons experiencing poverty.
On reading the committees interim report Understanding Freefall: The Challenge of the Rural Poor, I note that our situation in Colchester reflects many of the concerns experienced throughout rural areas, and certainly falls within the potential circle of declining rural regions, as illustrated in the report.
Tackling the cyclic problems of low population density, lack of critical mass for services and infrastructure, low rates of business creation, few jobs, and out-migration of citizens, are integrated into CoRDA's commitment to address rural poverty and rural economic decline. Today, I am here to talk about some of the priorities and strategies that are underway.
CoRDA's mission to drive sustainable economic growth, creating healthy communities, prosperous business, and opportunities for our citizens, is addressed by our primary goal to improve the quality of life for the citizens of Colchester. We are committed to achieving this goal through increasing disposal income for people who live and work in Colchester, and by increasing the population and reducing the percentage of people unemployed and underemployed.
From a number of recent indicators, Colchester is showing clear signs of economic growth; building permits doubled from 2004 to 2006 and wages increased, on average, by 25 per cent for entry-level positions, both signs of a healthy economy. From December 2004 to December 2005 the unemployment rates dropped from 10 per cent to 7.2 per cent, however, we have other alarming facts and figures that indicate that many dimensions of rural poverty do exist and require our immediate attention.
In Colchester County, there are over 750 families with children relying on the welfare system for support. In the Truro area there are 1,905 households headed by lone parents who have an average of 2.5 children and an average income of $23,440. The share of people in Colchester living below the low-income cut-off is a 7,270 population out of a population of almost 48,000, or 15.2 per cent of private households. The median average income for a person 15 years of age and over is $18,177. Countywide, over 33 per cent of the adult population has not completed high school, and 30 per cent has low literacy skills.
Truro has the second highest rental market in the province, and the tightest rental market conditions. Outside of Halifax, Truro has the highest average market rents for one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartments.
In 2002, Colchester Anti-Poverty Network, CoRDA, and the Institute for Early Childhood Education, organized a forum on poverty that provided an opportunity for persons experiencing poverty to tell their stories. This forum brought a much-needed face to local poverty, taking that important step in removing the veneer that ensures that poverty remains invisible.
The forum on poverty provided the impetus for the Anti-Poverty Network to move forward to become an incorporated organization. The issues and concerns that persons experiencing poverty shared through their stories were instrumental in shaping the Anti-Poverty Network's mission: seeking action to educate the public about issues surrounding poverty; seeking action in reducing poverty in areas such as unemployment, food security and affordable housing.
In CoRDA's 2003-04 business plans, priority was given to working with housing developers and landlords to develop more affordable housing in Colchester. Through two concurrent calls for tenders from CMHC and the Nova Scotia Department of Community Services five local developers were approved for the Affordable Housing Program, resulting in a total of 104 subsidized rental units. Eighty of these were in Truro and 24 out here in Debert, just across the road. Another call for tenders closed recently and we are hopeful of attaining more approvals.
Although the need for affordable housing in the central area is being addressed, we are seeing very little development of rental units in the more remote rural communities. For the most part, any development is to accommodate seniors and tends to stay clear of building units for families. Often families limited to renting have to move into the Truro-Bible Hill area to find housing.
The policy in place for the affordable housing proposals needs to be reviewed to address housing needs in the more remote areas, not just for renters, but also for low- income homeowners who often are restricted to living in substandard housing. We also need to see more variety in the design of rental dwellings, especially for families.
Colchester also has some challenges in addressing issues of homelessness in our region. The Chignecto-Central Youth Homelessness Youth Project interviewed 42 young adults who are absolutely or relatively homeless, with another 19 on their constantly growing referral list. Plans are now in place to develop a safe house system where homeless youth may access temporary shelter and support.
In working to improve the quality of life of our citizens in Colchester, CoRDA is working in partnership with numerous service providers and agencies in developing our human resources by engaging all people in acquiring knowledge and skills to create opportunities for themselves, their communities and employers.
The Innovative Communities Project is a good case study on the value of effective partnerships. The project exists to address innovation through attempts to decrease the number of citizens in the region without high school completion, to connect those in the community ready to work with work opportunities, and to develop leadership in the workplace.
Community groups in Tatamagouche, Upper Stewiacke and Great Village are working to establish local learning networks where the execution of community-identified programs can occur in partnership with employment service agencies and local employers. The models that the communities are adapting include a strong participatory approach, tapping into the strengths and talents of rural citizens, including the rural poor.
The Colchester Adult Learning Association will continue to deliver academic upgrading programs throughout the region. Presently over 100 adults are enrolled in academic upgrading, many of whom plan to acquire a high school completion diploma. For many of the rural poor this is a bright ray of hope in moving into the workforce and gaining some economic independence.
Through the Innovative Learning Communities Project persons seeking employment will be able to acquire essential skills training in their own community. The Innovative Learning Communities initiative is a dynamic approach to nurturing a can-do attitude in a community and in our region.
Over the past year CoRDA has partnered with Women for Economic Equality and the Nova Scotia Department of Community Services to deliver an IT Works for Women project to more than 100 women in the Colchester region. Over 75 per cent of the women are income assistance recipients. This program permits women to develop computer skills, do job searches and learn to write resumes and submit applications. There are many heartwarming stories of women who have taken this program and are now employed in the workplace. There is no cost for taking the program and because it is offered in the more remote rural areas there are minimal transportation costs. Plans are now underway to continue the program for another year.
Like so many other regions of Atlantic Canada, Colchester is experiencing an out-migration of young adults, reducing the number of young people that will enter our labour force. This out-migration is impacting on our rural communities, leaving an aging population. In order to address this out-migration situation CoRDA has initiated a youth attraction and retention program that uses community strengths and resources to enhance awareness of employment, entrepreneurial, educational and recreational opportunities for youth in Colchester.
Some of the things I have not touched on are the issues around the lack of child care in the rural areas; health services tend to be centralized and very few are delivered to the more remote areas; and the high cost of transportation challenges facing the rural poor.
In closing I think it would be very beneficial if a region such as Colchester were to develop an actual strategic process for reducing poverty. Some of our strategies are targeted, certainly affordable housing, but I think an actual strategic process would be beneficial.
The Chairman: Well, one thing that I have just been looking at, following you along, is that I am delighted to see you, in your presentation, which we all will read fully, is the focus on early childhood reading and family literacy programs, which has been such a big issue in the last while, and coming along better I think.
Ms. Parks: It is, and it will be interesting to see the 2006 results from the census to see what gains we have made since 2001, because the figures I am using here today are really ancient in that sense. We are looking forward to the release of the census information.
The Chairman: Thank you, and please keep us posted. All of us have your paper, and that was a wonderful presentation and one that has to be of great concern to us.
Bill Casey, Member of Parliament for Cumberland—Colchester, Nova Scotia: Thank you very much. And thank you for coming. I really appreciate it.
I have a few things I want to say. The previous presentations make me want to talk about a whole bunch of other things, but I will not. The presentations have been very enlightening and very powerful.
I want talk about the phenomenon of rural decline and then the plight of farmers and the disabled.
My riding is virtually rural with only two towns of consequence, Amherst and Truro. We have many small communities and they are treasures. I love every single one of them, I really do. I say that because they are full of such wonderful people. I just remembered a minute ago that last Sunday I was to a fundraiser for a family in a place called Tignish that manages to get on the map but is a tiny place. A family had a fire and I went to the fundraiser, and the fundraiser in the community centre was mostly women with a fashion show to raise money. At the site of the fire, the men were building a new house for the family. It would be a long time before you ever saw that happen in Ottawa. That is the value of the community and that is why I like the people in them.
If government invests an ounce in one of these small communities, they lever it into a tonne of benefit. I can think of community after community that gets a little bit of help for a museum or a community centre or something and it levers a whole bunch of people, many of them seniors. Just a little bit of help can help these communities survive and prosper.
The Chairman: We are counting on you to keep that going, Bill.
Mr. Casey: Well, I will do my best because I believe in it and I value them so much.
As a Member of Parliament, every problem eventually comes into my office, and I love every challenge, but I do not think we have any idea what is going to happen to the farmers. I think there is a pent up disaster with farmers in my area. Most of them that I know of, except a small sector or two have lost all of their equity; they are borrowed to the hilt. The banks are not foreclosing for two reasons; they do not want to foreclose on the farmer, and the farmers are not worth that much if they do foreclose. I believe there is a pent up problem that is going to be realized here soon.
I see farmers and fishermen, as many other presenters have mentioned, men who are going out West to work in the oil fields to make money to buy groceries for the family. In fact, very close to here there is a volunteer fire chief who has left home, left his community and gone out West to earn a living to help pay for the family. That is a loss to the community when the fire chief goes.
I talked to some farmers at the fundraiser in Tignish last weekend and they are so distraught because their children are not going to be able to take over the farm. The farms have been in the family for years and years and years and they are going to be lost now because children cannot take them over. There is no money in it and they cannot make a living. It is not their fault. These are mostly problems beyond their control; BSE, international trade prices, quality, all kinds of things.
There are things we can do to help. For one thing, we need to improve the research available to streamline their product and improve the product here so we can compete with that Alberta beef and put them out of business. There are many government rules that could change to help the farmer's right here. We need retail cooperation or cooperation from the retailers. One promising opportunity is alternative energy, and the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture has an application into the Minister of Agriculture to do a study on this and to develop a project for Atlantic Canada through, or in cooperation with the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture and the Nova Scotia Agricultural College, which is very close to here.
I will drop you a note on that and you might decide to support that application because it would be very helpful, and it does present opportunities. There is no research in Atlantic Canada on alternative energies now. It is going on all across the country but it is not here and we need that research.
It is not just a business to the farmers, it is their way of life; it is their culture. So many farmers are so embarrassed to have lost the family farm after it being handed down from their grandfather to the father to them; it is a great personal tragedy.
Second, I deal with many people with disabilities, and the first thing that seems to happen when a person becomes disabled is he or she goes broke. The income stops and Canada Pension is very slow to kick in. It is there if the person can get through all the hoops and hurdles. It takes too long to access and it creates poverty. It creates the most difficult poverty because these people already have more problems than they can handle. It is the same thing with Workman's Compensation if somebody is injured on the job. It is very cumbersome. If you are disabled in a rural area, transportation is almost impossible and health care is very hard to access. In my community those are some of the things that I run into.
What has to be done? As I mentioned to Senator Gustafson, I think we need to have a philosophical recognition that rural communities are worth something. They mean something to our country, and it does mean that we are going to have to invest. Like I said before, if you invest in rural communities, a small amount of money levers a lot of effort. I think we can do something.
One thing that really hurts rural communities is when the schools close. When a school closes the community dies. There is a tremendous trend to consolidate schools and close schools in communities, and it is really tough on the community. It creates an aging population because the young people go out and the average age in the community goes up. It dooms a community.
Health care has to be available, literacy services have to be available and economic development has to be available for small communities. We do have great resources here in CoRDA, and in Cumberland County. It is called CREDA, Cumberland Regional Economic Development Agency.
One thing I have seen happen lately in my riding is that the Internet has allowed people to stay in rural communities and small places. It has made people change their decision to move. They are going to stay there now because they have access to the Internet. So high speed Internet is critical for small communities and it is critical that it be available at a reasonable cost because that will help small communities. It is one thing that creates a level playing field for the Tignish's and the Advocate's and the Stewiacke's, with the major cities and centres. They all have the same access and many businesses can be done by Internet now. I encourage you to promote that and ensure that the Government of Canada maintains an interest in high-speed Internet access to everywhere. I think it was one of the best decisions that was made for rural Canada, and it was made about 10 years ago. I think John Manley made it when he was Minister of Industry he decided that he was going to have every community in Canada hooked up. And people did not realize the importance of it but I see it first hand. People say, ``I am not going to move now.''
One last thing I want to point out is that there are economic cycles, and because a community is in a down cycle now it does not mean it always will be. This little port of Parsborough once shipped more goods than the Port of Halifax. That was 150 years ago. Parsborough has 1,000 people and Halifax has 800,000 people. However, Parsborough has an opportunity with tidal power, with the higher cost of energy, and the possibility of tidal power. It is not generated yet, it has not happened yet, but it is going to. More water flows through there than all the rivers in the world, twice a day, and it is a tremendous opportunity. It is just a matter or time before it happens. Parsborough could end up booming again. M message is, let us not abandon our small communities because of a temporary down cycle.
Joggins and River Hebert were coal-mining towns 100 years ago and they were some of the most prosperous communities in our area, certainly in Nova Scotia. When the coalmines died they died, but now they are coming back for other reasons. They are coming back because of investments by the Government of Canada and the Government of Nova Scotia to recognize the Joggins Fossil Cliffs as one of the most valuable fossil deposits in the whole wide world. We hope UNESCO will recognize the cliffs.
These communities are going in cycles. I know when I talk to people, the members of Parliament from Alberta, for instance, where they are in the cycle where Parsborough was 150 years ago, they do not understand how a community can go through a cycle and now be on the decline. We cannot give up on them, we cannot just say, ``Well, move away and go where the jobs are.'' The communities are there, the roots are there, the next cycle is coming, and we do not want to abandon these small communities.
Anyway, that is my presentation. I am awfully glad you came. Rural communities in Canada are valuable and that is the message. We have to recognize philosophically that there is value in keeping our rural communities.
The Chairman: Thank you very much, Bill. I should just note that when you were talking about how people talk about Alberta as the place that has the jobs, well, they do to a point, but I can assure you that when the BSE happened it was devastating.
Mr. Casey: It was devastating here too. We felt the same thing.
The Chairman: It was absolutely devastating, and yet there is a spirit that comes from the people on our land, wherever they are in Canada, that they simply do not give up.
Mr. Casey: No, they do not.
The Chairman: It is sad but it is an amazing thing to watch how they do pull up.
When you mentioned the schools, there was one small town outside of Lethbridge surrounded by small towns, and the indicator, at the peak of the mad cow issue, was often communicated to him by the school boards saying that we have lost `x' number of students this week, and that is because the family has closed up and left town. When something goes wrong on the land then something goes wrong in the towns, and we do not want to lose those towns. Not anywhere, and not here.
Senator Mercer: I want to thank the presenters for being here today.
One of you spoke of coordinating an approach for the eradication of poverty, and that is a theme that we have started to see. Strategic planning is another theme.
Newfoundland and Labrador, and Quebec have both put out formal plans. This is Newfoundland's Reducing Poverty: An Action Plan for Newfoundland and Labrador, written in June of last year. Some people are addressing this report. We need to talk about it in Nova Scotia, and we need to talk about it on a national basis.
All three of you said the word transportation, but nobody talked about it at any length. One of the problems that we have identified is the lack of public transit in rural areas. Yesterday was the first time that we heard a good news story when we were in Annapolis Royal. Kings Transit operates a bus service between Meteghan and Middleton, I think — I could be off by a community or two — that operates daily.
Is that a problem? I know it is a problem but are there any public transit services outside of the two major towns in Cumberland and Colchester counties?
Ms. Murphy: We have a number of taxi businesses. We have developed a transportation committee and we are working with two of the taxi businesses to have a system where the poor or handicap pays a flat rate for the year and can call a taxi. That means of transportation is not a good solution because there are time constraints; they may not be able to get the taxi all the time.
We have had to confine ourselves to Amherst and the immediate area, because we are just getting the service started. We intend to expand into other areas in Cumberland County. To answer your question, we have taxi service and that is it.
Our hospital is outside town now and people, especially poor people, need some sort of a shuttle bus to take them to the hospital. We are working on solutions to this problem.
Ms. Parks: A few years ago in Colchester we started a pilot project and a cooperative was formed, the Colchester Transportation Cooperative. The idea was that not only would it operate in the central area but would go to the remote areas, and it was mostly to address persons with disabilities, getting to appointments and so forth. It is still working in the central region, and I think there are enough cost recoveries that it can operate, but it was not feasible for the rural areas so it is probably going out within maybe a 10-kilometre radius of Truro. The rest of the area is not served.
Senator Mercer: Yes, I agree, that what they are doing in the Valley is worth examining. They have an advantage in that everything is nicely in a line in the Valley, whereas in Cumberland and Colchester counties things do not go in straight lines.
Senator Gustafson: I am a dry land farmer and I know that area pretty well. I do not know much about the fisheries. What is happening in the fisheries here?
Mr. Casey: That is a good question, and an interesting question that goes to my point of cycles. I am fortunate to have two completely different fisheries in my riding. The fishery in the Northumberland Strait between Prince Edward Island and the mainland is mostly a lobster fishery. It is declining. The lobsters are maybe 10 per cent of what they were in good times. There is another fishery, which harvests lobsters, scallops and ground fish. It is doing quite well, in fact, very well in some parts. It is cyclical.
We have not figured out yet where the lobsters have gone — it is amazing what we do not know about lobsters — but some years the lobster fishery is good on the Island side and poor on this side, sometimes it is vice versa. In the last few years, it has not been good at all and it is declining. In fact, the fishermen on this side of the bay are so committed to conservation that they have adopted their own conservation standards. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans requires them to throw back a lobster of a certain size. They do not think that is good enough so they have adopted their own limits, and they have all signed an agreement to adopt lobster sizes bigger than the Department of Fisheries and Oceans requirement. So they, in effect, throw money back in the water every day. They throw legal lobsters back in the water because they do not think they should be caught. However, because of the cycles, they are really suffering, and some of the fishermen here have now gone west to help pay their groceries. The fishermen down here are doing really well; they are having a good season. So, again, I come back to cycles. No one knows why this is happening.
Senator Gustafson: We used to hear about the big trawlers that would sweep the ocean between Russia and so on. Is that still happening?
Mr. Casey: We do not have any Russians or Swedes, but we did have trawling up in the bay here and it completely wiped out the ground fishery. They have stopped it within a certain limit of shore now and the fish are coming back fast, and amazing. I hope they continue that restriction and maybe even increase it, because it has made a very big difference.
Last summer was the first time we have seen a catch by hand lines along this coast. The big fishery was wiped out but now it is coming back. I cannot speak with any knowledge about the fishery down here. I do know this one really, really well. And I know this one well because I deal with them.
I have been over to the Island with the Ministers of Fisheries from Nova Scotia and P.E.I. and nobody knows why the lobsters come and go. There are some theories they are working on but it takes more research.
Senator Mahovlich: I would like to talk about alternative energy. I had a visit up in Sydney, which is Roger Cuzner's area I believe, and they were talking about wind farms. There are a couple of people up there investing in wind farms. I have been over to Ireland and I have seen them, and in California, it is a major industry. Have you heard anything about this area? Is it suitable for wind farms?
Mr. Casey: There are many experimental towers, and there are two proposals to build major wind farms, like 20 units a piece. It all depends on whether the Nova Scotia Power Commission will buy the power. They control this thing, and they have been very reluctant in being involved. I believe that in the next week or so they are going to have a call for proposals for 50 megabytes of power from wind power. I am not sure what it will be but I think we are all expecting the call to come soon.
There will be many proposals because Nova Scotia Power is one of the dirtiest producers of power in Canada. It is almost all coal generated and it is very dirty so we have to find ways if we are going to be a part of cleaning up the air quality and dealing with global warming. Nova Scotia Power will be a part of that; it has to be.
At the moment, it is all experimental. You need many towers to generate a lot of electricity. We have a very windy province. In many cases, the wind comes right up the bay and all of the sites along this area are good. And in Roger's area in Cape Breton there are a lot of good sites.
Senator Mahovlich: We were around that area, I believe, yesterday, and we felt the effects of it.
Mr. Casey: Yes, I am sure you did.
Senator Mahovlich: Sharon or Anna, I know that there have been many school closings. What about churches? In my home town of Schumacher where the churches closed, the elderly ladies from that town have to go all the way to Timmins, which is a good mile or two, to church. Are many churches closing here?
Ms. Murphy: I am of the Roman Catholic faith and in my community of Amherst, we have had two Roman Catholic parishes, since the 1950s, and one of them recently had to close. It was very traumatic for everybody and we have had to go through a very painful process of closing the Nativity Church. We now have the Holy Family Church. We have had to go through a whole process of integrating the CWL, and all the different committees, and it has been a very painful process.
Senator Mahovlich: It is difficult for everyone.
Ms. Murphy: Oh, yes, of course. The African Methodist Episcopalian Church has a very small congregation, too.
Ms. Parks: In the deep rural area outside Truro, what we are seeing, especially with the United Church where we have pastoral charges for four churches in one area, one will close and then another. They will probably go down to one church so they will have a larger congregation, but still a church in the area. The other thing that is happening is that many of our rural churches do not have ordained ministers. They are going with more lay ministry. There are not enough ordained ministers or they cannot afford them.
Senator Mahovlich: I am a Roman Catholic and we have the same problem. There are not enough priests. This is another reason why the churches are closing.
Ms. Murphy: Deacons have taken on a whole new role and the lay faithful have had to step up.
Senator Mahovlich: Are fewer people going to church?
Ms. Murphy: Fewer youth, I would say. It is really hard to get the young people out to church.
The Chairman: On the question of wind power, we may lose many things in Southern Alberta but boy, do we have wind just coming down from those Rocky Mountains. It all began in a little place called Pincher Creek, and there was one big bird, as we call them, and everybody was worried that it was going to scare the cattle, the cattle loved it. And now that whole southwest area is covered with wind mills.
Senator Callbeck: I think Alberta is the only province that allows the wind electricity into the grid.
Mr. Casey: That is the key.
The Chairman: Anyhow, it does work.
Senator Callbeck: I am from Prince Edward Island I can tell you that we are investing in wind power. P.E.I. is supposed to be one of the best sites for producing wind power in North America, so we are looking at our power coming from that source in the future.
Sharon, you said that 4,000 plus people make use the food bank. Is that number going up tremendously every year?
Ms. Murphy: That is the statistic for 2006, and I was in a rush to get it. I cannot answer that question honestly, because I was not able to get the statistics from other years. I know it is increasing every year and is certainly not slacking off.
Senator Callbeck: When you talked about social assistance, you talk about a 70 per cent claw back if somebody goes out to work. Is that regardless of whether they make $100 or $2,000?
Ms. Murphy: Yes, as far as I know. I should not really answer that question because I am not involved in the program. I was speaking yesterday evening with the communications officer from Community Services and he went through their policy manual and verified this because it was information I received.
Senator Callbeck: Anna, you were talking about the Innovative Learning Communities project for academic upgrading and upgrading skills, which is so important in rural Canada.
On Prince Edward Island and in New Brunswick we heard about the lack of respect for education. In other words, many people in rural Canada really do not see the value of an education. That lack of respect makes it difficult to get people motivated to take these courses. Are you having that difficulty in this area?
Ms. Parks: That is a timely question. In our Innovative Learning Communities, and we have three up and running in more remote, rural communities, we are trying to connect education to the workforce. We are creating learning communities, and each community can develop their own blueprint. They are celebrating the learning that takes place in their communities so that people start to think of learning beyond formal learning. In other words, if you are in a fire department learning CPR, that is learning, or maybe a community garden, a gardening club, that kind of thing. Each community is celebrating past, present and future learning.
They are going to have kick-off events in the next few months where the entire community comes out and does an exposition on the learning that takes place, like the Historical Society, churches and so forth. We are putting a more positive spin on learning.
You are right, that attitude exists for many people. Unfortunately, many adults have had very negative experiences in the school system and they do not get over it quickly. We have to find some very innovative ways of engaging people.
Ms. Murphy: That has not been my experience with the single mothers that I run into every day. These mothers are struggling to go back to school, going to upgrading, and trying to take care of their kids. From my experience there is a lot of respect and people are really struggling to get an education, especially single mothers. These are my anecdotal experiences.
Mr. Casey: I second that motion. It is difficult for a lot of people to go back to school because they just cannot afford to buy groceries and pay their rent in the meantime. There are some programs on employment insurance that will help but they are hard to access and I think they should be opened up and freed up for people who want to improve themselves and upgrade their education. When they are employed, they cannot apply for this education. It would be very beneficial if they could.
Senator Callbeck: I agree. I think we have to do a lot more in rural areas to make education and skills upgrading more available and accessible.
Coming from a rural area, I agree with what you say about the farmers and the disabled. I certainly, wholeheartedly, agree that there is great value in keeping our rural communities. It has been good to have you here.
I thank you all for coming.
The Chairman: Yes, indeed. On behalf of the whole committee, we have been delighted to have you here. Your last conversation, about upgrading and learning, is a foundation issue and everyone deserves a chance. That is just the same in a tiny community in Nova Scotia as it is in Southern Alberta or as it is in the big cities. It is a big issue.
Once again, thank you all for your attendance here today.
The committee adjourned.