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Apr
27
Written by:
Sen. Art Eggleton
Monday, April 27, 2009
A recent report by the UN Special Rapporteur for Housing, Miloon Kothari, called on Canada to develop a “comprehensive and coordinated national housing policy.” Mr. Kothari expressed concern about the rise in the number of the homeless in Canada, the three million Canadian households that are in “core housing need” (spending 30% or more of monthly household income on housing), and the inadequate amount of affordable housing available for Canadians living in need.
A home anchors the family, provides the foundation for greater stability in the workforce and gives people a stake in their community. It is also a key determinant of health and long-term health outcomes.
Providing adequate housing is as much an economic issue as it is a social one. In British Columbia, a 2001 study showed that costs for services for the homeless were 33 per cent higher than for those who were housed.
So to those who say that we can’t afford to provide decent housing, I’d say that if you want to look at dollars and cents, prisons, psychiatric hospitals and emergency shelters are many times more expensive than providing affordable housing.
We have so much to gain if we start now to develop a national housing strategy. I believe we have a moral obligation to do so. And it also makes economic sense.
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2 comment(s) so far...
Re: Why we need a National Housing Strategy
Dear Senator Art Eggleton, I am going to tell you, the way I think is fair to resolve the difficult problem like Housing, for all the people living under the welfare system, making again the comparison between Canadian social system and German social system regarding housing. In Germany the Social Services and Housing department who belongs to the City Hall, is the only one who is negotiating, signing the contracts and pay directly to the owners the rent and also the utilities…so all the people living under the welfare system they don’t have to worry to pay for the rent and also for utilities because the government is taking care about this very stressful problem for them. I worked for the Community Services and Housing Department for York Region and I was a Collection Accounting Clerk, every day I talked and meet with those people in need, I was looking in their eyes and I saw the pain and discomfort, 95% of them, people who are working very hard to make a living and for so many of them, was not even their fault at all, because they were in that difficult situation, so many of them ask me: what I am going to do if I have to choose between feeding my kids or paying the rent and the utilities…a very disturbing question to ask…nobody ever suppose to be in this situation to choose between feeding their kids or paying the rent(just not to be evacuated from a social home because they can’t afford to pay the rent). I really think that the German model is much better because they are eliminating this dilemma, to choose between feeding your family and having a place where you can call home. I think that also economic make more sense, not just morally because if the Social Services and Housing department is the one who is taking care about everything including the payment, more owners are going to be interested to rent their apartments because is 100% safe to do so(the government always pay) more social houses are going to be available for the people in need, so they don’t have to wait 5 years on the list, they can even choose where they want to live. If more apartments are going to be on the market for rent than the offer is going to be greater than the need so the price for the rent is going also down because is going to be more competition and also the people in need who are waiting right now around 5 years on the lists to receive a social house are going to have enough houses to choose from, not to wait 5 years in the line.I am talking with so much admiration about Germany because when we arrived in Germany because we were political refugees they give us money for food (450DM/mounth/person and 250DM/mounth/child), they pay the rent for a house to live and the utilities, everything we needed in the house, money for clothes (2 times per year: spring and winter clothes), they paid the doctor for us, the transportation, the lawyer, they give us in addition to those benefits a social job paid by the City Hall, minimum salary per economy/per hour/I worked in their community library. I heard so many positive comments about how the German government is taking good care about their welfare people from the people who worked for the City Hall and they told us with pride the fact that they have in their Constitution a very important human right: every person living in Germany has the right to live a decent life.Thank you again for your time and I really hope that I can help you to help other people because every person who lives in Canada deserves to live a decent life.I wish you a very nice weekend and I will write something else to you next week.Best Regards,MZ
By MZ on
Thursday, June 25, 2009
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Re: Unfair TV adds against Ignatieff!
Dear Senator Art Eggleton,
under Harper leadership so many people are loosing their jobs, their homes, their life time savings, their pensions, the Health Care System is too costly for so many people today, so many kids can’t afford to complete their education in College or University (to expensive to afford), so many people are forced to live in poverty, so many homeless out there, so many kids in Canada are going to sleep hungry, so many Canadian companies are closing their doors, filing for Bankruptcy and for so many Canadian people the Government is just not there for them. What Harper is doing about all this? He is paying very expensive adds from the tax payers pockets to attack Ignatieff but what he is really doing to stop Canada for falling? I am telling you…Nothing. He seems like he doesn’t really care. He is just a SPECTATOR not a LEADER.
Best Regards Mariana Z.
By Mariana Z. on
Thursday, June 25, 2009
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