The number of impoverished children is growing

Canada is, unfortunately, beginning to look like the land of poor prospects for its children.

The country saw an increase in child poverty for the third straight year in 2023 — the most recent available public data — according to an annual child poverty report card recently released by Campaign 2000, a non-partisan coalition dedicated to ending child poverty in Canada.

It doesn’t matter which measuring stick you use: according to the official Market Basket Measure, child poverty has more than doubled since 2020, to 10.7 per cent — or 802,000 children. Meanwhile, the Census Family Low Income Measure, After Tax — which Campaign 2000 uses and claims is a better indicator — put the number at 18.3 per cent, or 1.4 million children.

According to 2023 data, Manitoba was the second-highest in child poverty rates based on the CFLIM-AT measure, at 26.9 per cent (Saskatchewan had the highest, at 27.1 per cent). Winnipeg was sixth-highest among large urban centres for the same year, at a rate of 22 per cent.

The report is exhaustive, and its warnings grim. In short: Canada’s efforts to eliminate child poverty are failing.

“…Progress is not only stalling but reversing,” the report’s executive summary states. “Rates are now approaching levels last seen in 2017, signalling an erosion of the gains made after the introduction of the Canada Child Benefit in 2016. At the current pace of progress, ending child poverty would take nearly 400 years.”

Campaign 2000’s report lays out some straightforward reasons the problem is intensifying. For one, the rich are getting richer, and the poor are getting poorer.

“Depth of poverty surged in 2023. Families with children were $15,182 below the low-income threshold on average,” the report states. “At the same time, income inequality among families with children widened. The top 10 per cent of families with children had an after tax income of nearly 19 times more than the bottom 10 per cent of families with children, larger than in previous years.”

Both federal and provincial governments have struggled to make great strides on the issue. Earlier this year, critics noted Manitoba’s own poverty-reduction strategy “lacks substance, doesn’t include firm numbers in its poverty-reduction goals and doesn’t include a list of initiatives,” the Free Press reported in January.

Federally, there are a few programs helping out low-income families, such as the Canada Child Benefit and the Canada Workers Benefit. However much these benefits may alleviate the financial pressure on struggling families, it is obvious more needs to be done.

It is not quite as simple as cutting parents a cheque, although we have seen the benefits of that in recent history — the report notes child poverty in the country dropped during the days of pandemic benefits. It also lays out myriad recommendations, among them: greater financial benefits to families in need; taxing extreme wealth; and committing to universal pharmacare for Canadians.

It is unlikely the federal government or its provincial counterparts will currently be willing or able to do most of what Campaign 2000 recommends. There are, unfortunately, plenty of crises for governments to manage. But that doesn’t mean it is acceptable to let this issue fall by the wayside.

There are many reasons adults can find themselves struggling financially, sometimes through no fault of their own. But in the case of children it is never their fault, and a decent society should commit to supporting them.

Perhaps the lives of these children cannot be festooned with every luxury through public largesse, but there is a baseline of dignified living — warm beds, clean clothes, a safe home and nourishing, healthy food — to which every child in this country should be entitled.