Politics blamed for plight of poor

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This article was published 23/10/2011 (5416 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Under grey skies, about 50 people with banners and placards that called for an end to poverty rallied on the steps of the Manitoba legislature Saturday.

The fourth annual Four Directions Walk to End Poverty saw groups of a dozen or more gather at each of the four cardinal points of the Perimeter Highway and walk through the city to meet at the government seat.

“I came all the way from the Perimeter at Headingley,” said Neil Adams, a community worker from the North End. “I told people on the way here, who were honking their horns on Portage Avenue, to honk for better housing, better water and more wages.”

The annual event draws together a coalition of anti-poverty groups that believe it is a lack of political will that keeps welfare rates low and the working poor dependent on food banks.

“The problem is the government wants to keep people poor so they’ll have a pool of cheap labour,” organizer Cheryl Ann Carr said.

“We’ve talked to hundreds of people and put together a justice charter, and we can eliminate poverty in this province and we can do it quickly, ” Carr said.

The charter is a six-point plan that calls for housing, expanded health care, jobs and annual incomes to be human rights. It also calls for an end to racism, sexism and all forms of discrimination. The sixth demand is for proportional government and pay cuts to match “the average worker’s wage and benefits” for all MLAs.

The Lutheran Urban Ministry collected sweaters, coats, shoes and boots to distribute at the rally.

Another group was handing out food next to a sign that read, “Feed My Lambs.”

Walkers began at St. Mary’s Road and the Perimeter in the south, Portage Avenue at the Perimeter in the west, Main Street at the Perimeter in the north and Pembina Highway at the Perimeter in the south.

“The major problem we face in this city and in this province is poverty… What it requires is for some level of government action to do something about it,” Coun. Harvey Smith (Daniel McIntyre) said.

He pointed to municipal housing programs in cities like Calgary that could be adopted in Winnipeg to cut the rate of homelessness.

Longtime poverty advocate Nick Ternette said he puts the blame for a lack of political will squarely on the shoulders of the provincial government.

“The NDP has paid no attention to poverty issues in an effective way. During the election campaign, I asked one cabinet minister (if he supported) a guaranteed annual income and he said ‘No.’ A single person on social assistance gets $481 a month; that’s $4 a day for food. It hasn’t increased in over a decade,” Ternette said.

alexandra.paul@freepress.mb.ca