(TORONTO – June 7, 2010) --
Children’s Aid Society workers in five
communities will be operating lemonade
stands and hosting BBQs today to demonstrate
the desperation facing many agencies by the
government’s refusal to fully-fund services
for vulnerable children.
“It’s come to this,” said
Warren (Smokey) Thomas, president of the
Ontario Public Service Employees Union,
which represents staff at many of the
cash-strapped agencies. “That fundraising of
this sort has to take place in Ontario – one
of the wealthiest jurisdictions in the world
– is shameful.”
Fundraisers will take place
in Kitchener-Waterloo, London, Brockville,
Sudbury and Cornwall. Across Ontario CAS
workers will be lobbying their local MPPs
for sustainable, long-term funding.
The fundraising events are
intended to illustrate how the provincial
government’s funding formula to support
programs for at-risk children is miserably
out of date. Queen’s Park introduced
welcomed amendments to the Child and Family
Services Act in 2006. More than 200 new
directives were issued as a result of the
government’s Transformation agenda, but they
have not been resourced.
As a result, some agencies
faced bankruptcy last year while many others
face operating deficits this year. Some have
been force to negotiate lines of credit with
local banks simply to keep operating because
of the failure of the government to
adequately fund their programs.
“The McGuinty government
needs to get its priorities straight,” said
Thomas. “Billions of dollars in badly-needed
revenue are being handed back to corporation
in the form of tax cuts, but in the meantime
his government is deliberately turning its
back on some of the most vulnerable young
people in Ontario.”
Many of the programs
delivered by the CAS are
legislatively-mandated. Yet, CAS offices
have laid off workers, cut programs and in
some instances forced employees to pay
out-of-pocket to cover expenses.
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