Recession Relief Coalition/actions

We will post notices on this page about Upcoming Events such as public forums, rallies, meetings of our committees and media release meetings. If your organization is planning a related event and would like it posted on this page, click here

Upcoming committee meetings for the Recession Relief Coalition 

Steering Committee:

Tues March 23

5:30pm

199 Bay St. 45th floor

Communications Committee:

Indicators Committee:

added Feb 28 

The Recession Relief Coalition would like to invite you to a Budget Watch at the Meeting Place

Meet people who are concerned about the government response to the recession and participate in a lively discussion as we analyze what the budget will mean to main stream Canadians, particularly those who have been affected by the recession.

Date: March 4, 2010

Time: 3:45pm

Also, Woodgreen is holding an open house for the opening of a new transitional housing building for homeless seniors at
650 Queen St E from 5 to 7pm (just West of Broadview)
I'll be attending both events. After the budget watch you might attend the open house.

added Feb 27 

Best Start Toronto forum on Child Poverty for Service Providers:
Big Picture ↔ Local Action:
Working with Families and Young Children
Living in Poverty

Sheraton Toronto Airport Hotel and Conference Centre
801 Dixon Road 
Toronto, ON M9W 1J5
http://www.starwoodhotels.com

Tuesday March 9, 2010
Time: 8:30 am to 4:30 pm

For:
This full day forum is designed for service providers who work with young children, with parents of young children, or who have the opportunity to influence the health and development of young children.

Description:
The Best Start Resource Centre team is pleased to announce a Province-wide Forum on Child Poverty in Toronto, Ontario.  This Province-wide Forum will address pertinent information for service providers working with families with young children (0-6 years old) living in poverty.  It will share information about rates of child poverty, consequences of child poverty, strategies that influence the impact of child poverty, and strategies that influence the rate of child poverty.  Registration will start at 8:30 am and the forum will end at 4:30 pm.

Agenda:

8:30 – 9:00 am            Registration

9:00 – 9:15 am            Welcome

9:15 – 9:45 am            Breaking the Cycle Strategy

9:45 – 10:15 am          Child and Family Poverty in Ontario: The Big Picture
Jacquie Maund, Coordinator, Ontario Campaign 2000

10:15 – 10:30 am        Break

10:30 – 11:00 am        Constructing the Architecture of the Brain: Early Experience Matters.
The Impact of Poverty
Dr. Jean Clinton, Associate Professor, McMaster University: Child psychiatrist; associate member Offord Centre for Child Studies  

11:00 – 11:30 am        Racialization of Poverty
Uzma Shakir, Atkinson Economic Justice Fellow and Colour of Poverty Campaign 

11:30 – 12:00 pm        Urban Aboriginal Families and Young Children Living in Poverty

Peter Dinsdale, Executive Director, National Association of Friendship Centres

12:00 – 12:30 pm        Families’ Perspectives

12:30 pm – 1:30 pm    Lunch                  

1:30 – 3:15 pm            Moving Forward to Eliminating Poverty in Ontario – Policy and Practice Strategies to Reduce the Impact and Effect of Child Poverty

Dr. Jean Clinton, Associate Professor, McMaster University: Child psychiatrist;

associate member Offord Centre for Child Studies

Laurel Rothman, Family Service Toronto/Campaign 2000

Paul Johnson, Hamilton Roundtable on Poverty Reduction

Sandra Laclé, Health Promotion Division & EXTRA Fellow (2008-10) Sudbury &

District Health Unit

3:15 – 3:30 pm            Break

3:30 – 4:15 pm            What is Needed to Support Local and Provincial Strategies to Address Child Poverty in Ontario?

Facilitated Discussion/Action Groups

4:15 – 4:30 pm            Closing

Participants are invited to bring relevant resources and information to the Forum TO SHARE.

Display Space:
There will be space available for programs to bring material that is relevant (research, programs and services, policies) and relates to the issue of working with families and young children (0-6) living in poverty.

For more information, or to register for this event:

http://www.beststart.org/events/detail/poverty/poverty.html

added March 4 

14 March, 2010
11:00am (meeting expected to run 2 hours)
25 Cecil Street (Steelworkers Hall)

Community based organizers and activists from across Ontario and Quebec
are invited to an open planning meeting focusing on Toronto's response to
the G8/G20 Summits on March , 2010.

The Community Mobilization Network is organizing the community based
outreach, independent media, convergence and days of action leading up to
and during the G8/20 Summits in Ontario (June 25-27,2010). Our previous
meeting had over 150 people present.

If you are unable to attend but would like to participate in one of the
committees, get more information or host a G8/G20 related event, email
community.mobilize@resist.ca

To join the announcements list, visit:
https://masses.tao.ca/lists/listinfo/community.mobilize

Web: http://g20.torontomobilize.org

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=236150947036

added March 3 

Next meeting of The Peoples Summit Steering Committee: 

Tuesday March 16^th, 5:30 -7:30pm, Steelworkers Hall 33 Cecil St.

• People’s Summit is the Legitimate People’s Voice
• The People’s Summit will be the legitimate summit, the true voice for global justice
• Running in parallel to the G20 summit in Toronto, the People’s Summit will educate, empower and ignite positive change we would like to see in our world.
• We are people working for solidarity, self-determination, human rights, justice, peace, a healthy planet, and transformative social change.
• We are groups that question the status quo and the supremacy of global capitalism. We are a movement of many movements; organizing collective action in solidarity for the other world we know is possible.
• The People’s Summit is building solidarity across movements to ensure all voices are at the table, and unlike the G20, this is what democracy looks like
• System Change
• System change not climate change
• We need system change not a G8 rebranding. Going from G8 to G20 still excludes most of the world even though the actions and policies of the G8/G20 and their member-states have significant impact on millions of lives the world over
• We need a just transition to a sustainable and peaceful economy, which puts people and the planet before profit
• Global Justice
• Economic justice: We need to question capitalism and the roots of the crisis, reclaim the commons for a people’s economy, and challenge corporate rule
• Environmental Justice: The climate crisis requires climate justice and repaying the ecological debt that the Global North owes to the Global South. We stand in solidarity with the earth, the air, and the water, to protect it from the policies of the G20.

• Social Justice: We stand united in solidarity, for human rights, civil liberties, and peace. We call for a full accounting of the real costs of war and social injustice – the human, ecological, and economic impacts. We assert indigenous autonomy, dignity, and self-determination, and demand migrant justice.

-          Liasons with TCMN, rabble, and other PS subcomms

added Feb 27 

March 22 Anti Poverty Action Conference for front line agencies:

On behalf of CASSA (Council of Agencies Serving South Asians), I would like to invite you (frontline workers, managers, executive directors of not-profit sector as well as students in social work and social services

field) to join us at a conference on various topics related to Poverty Reduction Strategies. The day will focus predominantly on information, practices, policies and strategies that could be used by agencies and staff at the frontline level.

The Conference, titled "Anti-Poverty Action Conference: Agencies Exercising Agency in Poverty Reduction" will take place on Monday, March 22nd, 2010, from 9am to 5pm at Oakham House, Ryerson University: 55 Gould Street, Toronto, Ontario (M5B 1E9). If you wish to provide your suggestions or to explore possibilities of partnerships, please contact Tulsi Naik at tulsi@cassa.on.ca

More details on registration and program to be released shortly: Mark your Calendars!

Please visit CASSA's website www.cassa.on.ca to find out more about our current projects and priorities.

Sincerely,

Neethan Shan

Executive Director

Council of Agencies Serving South Asians (CASSA)

neethan.shan@cassa.on.ca

www.cassa.on.ca

added Feb 20 

OFL-CLC Pension Summit

Can You Retire With Dignity?

The bad news:
- Employers are not keeping their pension promises
- More than 60 percent of Ontarians don't have a workplace pension
- Almost half a million seniors in Ontario live on less than $15,000 per year

The good news:
- It doesn't have to be this way
- Canadians can have a fair and secure pension system
- This is our "Medicare moment" to get the pension reform Canadians need

That's why the Ontario Federation of Labour, in co-operation with the Canadian Labour Congress, is holding a one-day Pension Summit in Toronto!

We will host a diverse audience and let the best ideas guide us!

added March 5 

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See Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifeyMhTLWU4

On Thursday, February 25th, 2010, diners at a lavish Ontario Party Liberal fundraising event, which cost attendees $950 per plate and $9,500 a table, did not finish their meals in comfort.

Members of the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) organized to crash the fundraiser, at which Premier Dalton McGuinty was scheduled to speak, in an act of outrage at the fact that rich Liberal Party supporters could spend more on a meal than people on welfare and disability have to live on for a month. While the Liberals feast, literally thousands of people in this city go without food or shelter.

At about 7:00 p.m. at the Metro Convention Centre, 50 low income people and OCAP supporters managed to disrupt the fine dining and cocktails, walking past police and security and proceeding right to the front of the banquet hall. Just as hundreds of dinner attendees gathered in the reception area sipping on champagne, OCAP occupied the centre area chanting Raise the Rates and We are hungry, we’re angry, we won’t go away!. The group was loud, energetic and determined despite physical
attacks by Toronto Police and Liberal Party members. While they promise ‘poverty reduction strategies', the Liberals are doing
all they can to eliminate Special Diet access, a benefit people can access to limit their poverty, if a medical provider considers it necessary. They have sent memos to welfare and ODSP offices giving untrained staff the right to evaluate and reject the diagnoses of health providers. This is leading to a huge reduction in access to this vital benefit. The loss of Special Diet income for the poor in Ontario will be a major cut in people's income. The reality is that people on social assistance live on incomes that have lost at least 40% of their spending power since 1995. People are even poorer today than they were under Mike Harris.

On Thursday OCAP organized to stop the attack on welfare and disability recipients, and to expose the hypocrisy of the Provincial government and their 'poverty reduction' veneer. Poverty is not comfortable - nor should rich supporters of McGuinty's Liberals be.

In the midst of this economic crisis attacks on poor people have increased, and the potential of social cuts in the upcoming Provincial budget is very real and will mean an explosion of Poverty in Ontario. That's why, On Apr 15, 2010 OCAP will hold a large mobilization against the Provincial Government. We won’t pay for their crisis or their deficit. We demand the right to decent income and a future free of poverty. Raise the Rates by 40% Now! Join us on April 15 and fight for the right to decent income!

Get Involved:
Ontario Coalition Against Poverty
www.ocap.ca
ocap@tao.ca / 416-925-6939
Fight to Win. 

added Feb 3 

A visitor here sent this important Feedback

Medicare Threatened by Canada Europe Trade Agreement

I know this goes a bit beyond recession relief, but for all those people on relief, their Medicare is now being threatened by the Canada Europe Trade Agreement (CETA)/ Google CUPE CETA for the details or the Council of Canadians. You may wish to query the government and opposition on this!

added Dec 14 

We Need Stories

of how the recession is affecting our people so that we can help to convince governments at all levels to take strong action NOW to shore up the social safety net. please download the pdf files and post where people can see them and send to anyone you think may have a story to tell. The Handout pdf is designed to print on a 4x6 card with a white border &the Flyer pdf is 8.5 x 11. Thanks for your assistance,

Recession Relief CoalitionOutreach
Are you suffering as a result of the recession?
Is it FAIR?
We can tell your story to the politicians
Help us make them listen
Tell your story NOW
ronzig@recession-relief-coalition.org 416 820-6036
http://www.recession-relief-coalition.org 

added Dec 12 

added Feg 2 

One of the most pressing economic issues requiring attention in our world today

G20 Transparency Petition sign here

Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services…

--Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Research shows that developing countries are losing $1 trillion every year due to crime, government corruption, and tax evasion. These illicit monetary outflows are roughly ten times the amount of aid money going into developing countries for poverty alleviation and economic development.

The loss of money from poor economies that would otherwise go to provide health services, infrastructure, and other critical needs exacerbates poverty and leads to the deaths of millions of people. The annual loss of hundreds of billions of dollars from the world’s poorest and most vulnerable economies constitutes one of the most pressing human rights issues of the new decade.

The key to tackling this problem is transparency in the global financial system. After these stolen or otherwise ill-gotten gains exit their country of origin they vanish into an opaque financial system comprised of tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions. The most effective deterrent to criminals, corrupt officials, and tax evaders is to create a global financial system where illicit money cannot hide.

When the world’s 20 largest economies – the G20 – meet in Toronto on June 26-27, 2010 they will have an unprecedented opportunity to institute changes to create a transparent global financial system that is open, accountable, fair and beneficial for all.

Toward that end, we call on the G20 leaders to:

• • Recognize the link between illicit outflows of capital from developing countries, absorption of those resources by tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions, and the adverse impact those flows have on poverty alleviation and economic development.
• • Call on the Financial Action Task Force to amend its recommendations 33, 34, and VIII to provide that the beneficial ownership of all companies, trusts, foundations and charities be made a matter of public record.
• • Instruct the International Accounting Standards Board to recommend that all multinational corporations report their income and taxes paid on a country by country basis.”

Is being held in Huntsville, Ontario, from June 25-27, 2010. Below, you will find a pdf primer I created to give you much of the information you should know.

added Dec 2 

Support Bill C-304

Canada is the only G8 nation without a national strategy to ensure everyone has access to quality, affordable housing. The result? A growing homelessness crisis that the UN has described as a "national emergency".
Bill C-304, An Act to ensure secure, adequate, accessible and affordable housing for Canadians, would help put an end to this national shame. You can send a postcard to Minister Finley asking him to support Bill C-304 here.

The Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario (ACTO)

is suing the government of Canada and the government of Ontario. The case will be about The Right to Housing and will be a Charter of Rights challenge. See the 3 PDFs below for details and information on how you can join the suit or get involved.

Added Nov 15 

There is so much new information on the Canadian Social Research Nerwork website that I feel it should be noted here. Go to http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/new3.htm

subscribe to their exceptional news letter

1 in 6 people worldwide go hungry everyday.

With the recent financial crisis, poverty is skyrocketing, but our governments are failing to take significant action.

In a few days, leaders meet at the World Food Summit in Rome to tackle this growing crisis. The best solution is funding to boost sustainable agriculture in poorer countries, but France, Germany, UK, Italy and Japan are backing out on a $20 billion promise made earlier this year.

Millions of lives are on the line and this is our chance to hold them to their word. Sign the petition below and it will be delivered directly to world leaders and through a spectacular stunt at the Roman Colosseum on the eve of the Summit:

The economic crisis has poverty and hunger skyrocketing in poor countries. World leaders meeting in Rome next week are in danger of backing out on a $20 billion pledge to fund life-saving food production -- sign the petition calling on them to keep their promise:

See the whole story in the pdf

On Monday afternoon, we sent the email below to Fair Vote Canada supporters. We’re delighted that more than 1,000 people signed in just the first 24 hours. We hope you will sign too. Let’s make sure our voices are heard!

This is Not Democracy – Silence is Not an Option!

Sign the Declaration of Voters’ Rights

 Are you fed up with voting in federal elections where seven million of us cast ballots that elect no one? Are you tired of Parliaments that don’t represent the people of Canada? Are you angry that a party can win a majority of seats even when 60% of us vote against them?

You’re not alone.

Several weeks ago, Fair Vote Canada held a press conference at Parliament to launch the Declaration of Voters’ Rights (see the article, photos and video on our website).

This document is not a petition. It’s not a request. It’s a people’s declaration. Canadian voters have a fundamental right to equal votes, fair election results and legitimate majority rule.

Between now and the next election, we intend to circulate the Declaration as widely as possible.  

How many signers can we get? How loud will our voices be? That depends on you and other citizens.

If you sign today, and pass it along to just five friends, we can jumpstart this campaign and build real momentum.

At our press conference, the first three signers were Nathalie Des Rosiers, General Counsel, Canadian Civil Liberties Association; Ed Broadbent, former NDP leader; and Dr. John Trent, former secretary-general of the International Political Science Association.

Many others have since joined them. And now we need you.

Please sign the Declaration of Voters’ Rights today and forward it to your friends.

Yours for a democratic Canada,

Bronwen Bruch

President

Fair Vote Canada

Fair Vote Canada
26 Maryland Blvd.
Toronto, ON M4C 5C9
Canada

Toronto Media co-op

Media coverage for your events

Not controlled by elitist media corporations

I am writing to tell you about a new media project in Toronto.  Toronto Media Coop (toronto.mediacoop.ca) is a local of mediacoop.ca and has recently started up to write about under-reported issues in Toronto.

Unlike most media outlets, mediacoop.ca is funded and owned by members who set the mandate of coverage of the organization and also suggest content.  To ensure that we have the best access to stories which need to be told we are trying to put the word out about ourselves and the site.

On toronto.mediacoop.ca, you can sign up for free and post news, events for your organization, photos, audio, video and blogs.  Selected pieces are then chosen to go on the national site mediacoop.ca from Toronto and from the other mediacoop.ca locals in Vancouver and Halifax.  You can also e-mail toronto.mediacoop.ca and ask our small army of journalists, photographers, bloggers and media folks about stories which you think should be covered.

If you want to know more about mediacoop.ca, go here: www.mediacoop.ca/about

If you want to know more about the kinds of stories we cover, go here: toronto.mediacoop.ca

To sign up for a mediacoop.ca account or to become a member, go here: http://www.mediacoop.ca/join

Thanks!

The Toronto Media Coop Collective

Joseph Farrell, the chef at The Central has taken it upon himself to help reduce hunger in Toronto. He is instituting a  program at the Central called Soup Kitchen on Sundays. You can help by spreading the word and posting the flyer below where people in need can find it.

On Nov 11, John Andras spoke at a forum presented by the Social Planning Network 

Here's an excerpt from his speech. Full speech on pdf below.

What about stimulus spending? It was supposed to spur the economy right? The collapse of new car sales in the wake of the cash for clunkers program in the US could in fact be echoed in Canada when the Home Renovation Tax Credit Expires in February. Stimulus cannot last forever. When stimulus is withdrawn will there be another economic downturn and a resumption of recessionary conditions? Will Central banks around the world be able to do whatever it takes to stimulate economies if current growth is illusionary? Time will tell.

We have been through a sharp recession and there are concerns, some of which I have presented, that we may be in the first stage of a multi stage recession.

If so, God help us all!

You can see information about our previous events in our archives

Would you like to volunteer to help out, endorse our declaration, read our newsletter or make a donation?