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Seniors of Nova Scotia and
Canada-u kick the bucket who does family call Canada?/Dying suddenly what about
ur pets?/bagged tagged and burnt- getcha will done babe/Nova Scotia
Gov./Federal Gov/Blogs/how 2 make it easy with wills if u die suddenly vs no
will /When u die-what happens 2 ur websites/ stories and humour/4 those u give
a sheeet about/FUN-GAMES AND HUMOUR- HEY WE'RE OLD
BLOGGED:
WHEN U DIE IN NOVA
SCOTIA- CANADA- laws, regs, insurance and SUE- WHAT YOUR FAMILY AND LOVED ONES
SHOULD KNOW- IF U DESIGNATE AT YOUR BANK INSURANCE PAYMENTS- on death-
accidental or otherwise (NO WILL PER SE) - IE. YOUR SONS.... SONS ARE ENTITLED
2 ALL THE RIGHTS AND PRIVILEGES OF YOUR REMAINS AND ESTATE.... DO NOT LET
ANYONE F**K U UP ON THAT.... even - Euthanasia, Aiding Suicide and Cessation of
Treatment,-Oh and legal timeline no more than 100 days for all funds and $$$
paid 2 estate or Gov.s will pay u $$$ for desecrating a Canadian deceased
Citizen... july 2015
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CANADIAN SENIORS ARE GETTING RIPPED OFF-12 Monthly 4wk cheat 2 full weeks- same 4 poverty systems- O Canada- Nova Scotia?? This is soooo 60s and this is 2014!!1 Fix it or lose our votes in 2015/Sept 25- Holy Sheeeeet Sherlock -Linda McQuaing's IPOLITICS article- real war over inequality isn't between old and young- awesome/Sep. 25- OLD AGE... POPULATIONS GLOBALLY- AND YOUTH - GLOBAL MAPS OF AGES 2014... O Canada, Africa has all the young ones and a bit Middle East - world is changing
http://nova0000scotia.blogspot.ca/2014/09/canadian-seniors-are-getting-ripped-off.html
AND..
BLOGGED:- some fun from all the crappy bullshit and beans on the news spews these days...we had good days 2 and our young are just beautiful
BETTE DAVIS- OLD AGE AIN'T NO PLACE 4 SISSIES- FOLKS OVER 55 ONLY PLEASE- middle age and seniors ONLY- some smiles, some music- life - every day is a good day
http://nova0000scotia.blogspot.ca/2014/01/folks-over-55-only-please-middle-age.html
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SENIORS- PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES- Nova Scotia Canada- Global hits-NOVA SCOTIA SENIORS How 2 prepare4disaster/International Disability and Senior Links/Mental Wellness/Wheelchair/coping with disabilities proudly- RECYCLE- how 2 separate your householdgarbage and electronic waste (thanks Kings Co. Nova Scotia) - let’s git r done Canada... and world.... Seniors and Disabled matter- all links provided- thx Canada-USA-UK-Aussies-Europe etc.
Canadian Government Programs for
www.longtermcarecanada.com/canadian_
Canadian Government Programs for Seniors
including up to date ... How does the Canada Health Act treat ...
Wages and conditions differ from province to province for ..
OLD AGE AND DYING- WONDERFUL REFRESHING AND GREAT...ARTICLE
It’s silly to be frightened of being dead
At the age of 96, the legendary editor Diana Athill writes, the idea of death has never been less alarming. The process of dying is another matter
Diana Athill at the old people’s home where she has lived for several years. Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian
Diana Athill
Tuesday 23 September 2014 05.59 BST
Back in the 1920s my mother never went to a funeral if she could help it, and was horrified when she heard of children being exposed to such an ordeal, and my father vanished from the room if death was mentioned; very much later, in the 1960s, when the publishers in which I was a partner brought out a beautiful and amusing book about the trappings of death, booksellers refused to stock something so “morbid”. I was born in December 1917, so was fully immersed in this refusal to contemplate death. Indeed it was not until more than 30 years later, when I had to visit a coroner’s office to identify a woman who had been found dead, that I thought for the first time how extraordinary – indeed how ridiculous – it was to have lived for so long without ever having seen a dead body. I have heard it suggested that this recoil from the subject was a result of the first world war filling everyone’s minds with an acute and appalled awareness of death, but my own explanation was, and still is, that it was a pendulum-swing away from the preceding century’s obsession with the subject – the relish for mourning, ranging from solemn viewing of the corpse by young and old alike, to passionate concern about the exact degree of blackness to be worn, and for how long (for the rest of your days if you were a widow). A mood so extreme surely had to result in a strong reaction.
It seems to me that what influences the consciousness in wartime is not death. It is killing. And no, they are not the same thing.
Mountains wear down from jagged peaks to flatness. Even planets decay. That natural process is death
Death is the inevitable end of an individual object’s existence – I don’t say “end of life” because it is a part of life. Everything begins, develops – if animal or vegetable, breeds – then fades away: everything, not just humans, animals, plants, but things which seem to us eternal, such as rocks. Mountains wear down from jagged peaks to flatness. Even planets decay. That natural process is death. Killing is the obscene intervention of violence, the violation which prevents a human being or any other animal from reaching death as it should be reached. Killing certainly did affect the minds of those exposed to the first world war. It shocked most of them into silence: many of the men who survived fighting in it never spoke of it, and I think it had the same effect on most of those the men returned to. It was too dreadful. They shut down on it.
My maternal grandparents’ house, in which the children of my generation spent all their holidays, and where we stayed if our empire-serving parents were abroad in some place inhospitable to the young, was typical of those times in that the only music-making objects in it were an upright piano and a small wind-up record player that had belonged to my uncle when he was a boy: a condition probably unthinkable to children today. There was no pop music because there were no teenagers, only children and grownups. Certainly once the children had turned 12 they began being restive (the grownups called it “the awkward age”) but there was little to be done about it. There were music-hall songs and dance music, but they could only come into a home via sheet music and if there was someone there who could play the piano, and the limit of adult piano-playing in our family was nursery rhymes to amuse the little ones. A hint of the future might have been detected in the eagerness with which we children fell on Uncle Billy’s little “gramaphone”, which had been forgotten by the grownups. We listened over and over again to the few records that went with it – some Gilbert and Sullivan songs and two or three spirituals sung by Paul Robeson. Right at the back of the cupboard where they lived I once found another record, which turned out to be a wartime song, a comic and rather witty version of Who Killed Cock Robin called Who Killed Bill Kaiser. Although I was born before the war’s end, it was as remote and unreal to me as the wars of the roses, so I was as thrilled as I would have been if I had dug up a medieval helmet, and ran to show the record to my mother. All she said was, “That old thing – is it still there?” It was a shock to come up so suddenly against the fact that what to me was history, to her was just something from the day before yesterday. Absolutely no trace of that day before yesterday had been injected into my consciousness by my elders, so whatever I was to feel about death, it had nothing to do with war.
My own experience of the second world war confirmed this. Before it started, during the horrible months when we could all feel it coming, I said to a friend: “If it does start I think I’ll kill myself.” (Although the preceding war had been little talked about, poets and novelists had written about it, so we were fully aware that a repetition ought to be unthinkable.) My friend replied, “Killing yourself to avoid being killed would be a bit silly,” and I felt sadly that she was being obtuse. It was not the prospect of being killed that was distressing me, it was having to know this obscenity about life. And that, not fear of death, was what polluted one’s consciousness all through the war, so that the moment it was over we too shut down on it.
Because we did shut down. “It’s over!” That knowledge wiped out any other feeling. Although I have never doubted (heaven knows why) that we were going to win the abomination, there had been times when I had not thought – perhaps “thought” is wrong – when I had not felt it possible that it would ever end. In one’s twenties a year is a very long time, and there had been so many of them. It astounds me now when I hear or read people describing the 1950s as dreary, because to me they were wonderful. What did it matter that rationing dragged on? We were getting more for our coupons every day – it was slow of course, but how could it be otherwise after what we had been through? Now we had our new Labour government, we had the National Health Service (how can anyone forget what a miracle that was?), we had Dior’s ravishing New Look, we could travel again and who cared if we could take no more than £25 with us when it was so amazing what one could do on £25 in France or Italy or Greece. I could see no reason to be anything but happy, and death was just something that would occur when I was old – and which was not, and never had been, frightening.
Diana Athill at Oxford, just before the second world war Diana Athill at Oxford, just before the second world war. Photograph: Ramsey and Muspratt
That this was true, I owe to Montaigne. I can’t remember when I read, or was told, that he considered it a good thing to spend a short time every day thinking about death, thus getting used to its inevitability and coming to understand that something inevitable is natural and can’t be too bad, but it was in my early teens, and it struck me as a sensible idea. Of course I didn’t set out to think about death in a regular way every day, but I did think about it quite often, and sure enough, it worked. Why coming to see death’s naturalness should have caused belief in an afterlife to melt away, I am unsure, but it did. Probably that belief had been no more than an unexamined acceptance of something said by a grownup: in a child’s life there are many things more important to question than the probability of reuniting after death with other dead people – ideas that are tucked away on a back shelf of the mind like some object for which one has no use at present.
***
When I was 16, I had my appendix removed: an operation common in those days which seems to have gone out of fashion. Going under the anaesthetic, which was chloroform, caused an interesting confrontation with that particular idea. As a little girl I had occasionally suspected that there was a monster under my bed waiting to come out and get me, scaring myself so much that I had to be calmed down and assured that I was imagining it. Presumably the anaesthetist preparing me for the operation diminished the flow of chloroform too soon, because I became conscious, without the least idea of where I was or what was happening: all I knew was that I was lying on my back, on a bed, with a stifling claw clamped down on my face. They had been lying! The monster had been there all the time and now it had come out and got me, I was dying! The dying felt like tipping over the edge of a cliff into black nothingness. I was hanging desperately on to the rim of the cliff. I was staring into that black nothingness – and horror of horrors, understood that it was not nothingness: there were shapes swimming about, things happening, creatures at large out there, and I was about to be pitched in among all that, unprepared, ignorant, totally incapable of coping. It was terrifying – surely one was supposed to change in some way at death, but I was still unchanged, still just my miserably inadequate self. Into my mind there came the thought, “If I start to believe in God perhaps I’ll be allowed to change so that I will know what to do?” At which – and I’m still proud of this – I answered myself: “No! That would be too shameful, just because I’m frightened.” I let go, and down into the black nothingness I slid.
So, when many years later I really was near death as a result of a haemorrhage after a miscarriage, and heard a doctor saying “She’s very near collapse – call the lab and tell him to run” and understood that the “him” was the person fetching the blood they were going to pump into me, I was not in the least alarmed as I dimly wondered if I had the strength left to think some suitable Last Thought, concluded that I hadn’t, and said to myself the words: “Oh well, if I die I die.” I was sure, then, that nothingness was just that.
I live now in an old people’s home with 42 others, our average age being 90, or perhaps a little more. When one makes the difficult decision (and difficult it is) to retire from normal life, get rid of one’s home and most of one’s possessions, and move into such a place (or be moved, which doesn’t apply here I am glad to say) it means that one has reached the stage of thinking, “How am I going to manage my increasing incompetence now that I’m so old? Who is going to look after me when I can no longer look after myself?” Death is no longer something in the distance, but might well be encountered any time now.
You might suppose that this would make it more alarming, but judging from what I now see around me, the opposite happens. Being within sight, it has become something for which one ought to prepare. One of the many things I like about my retirement home is the sensible practical attitude towards death that prevails here. You are asked without embarrassment whether you would rather die here or in a hospital, whether you want to be kept alive whatever happens, or would prefer a heart attack, for instance, to be allowed to take its course, and how you wish your body to be disposed of. Though when a death occurs in the home it is treated with the utmost respect, and also with a rather amazing tact in relation to us survivors, so that I doubt if anyone has ever been disturbed by such activity as I suppose surrounds the moment of a death, and the removal of a body: a carefulness of our peace of mind which must involve very well-planned management.
Diana Athill Diana Athill: ‘The body can fail in many ways that are extremely distressing, slowly and painfully, demanding much stoicism, or it can switch off with little more than a flash of dizziness.’ Photograph: Sarah Lee
These matters have become discussable with one’s friends, not, of course, as a frequent part of gossip over lunch in the dining room (our only communal occasion) but from time to time, perhaps when admiring someone’s stoicism if their frailty is becoming painfully apparent, or feeling sad at someone else’s inability to accept what seems to be imminent. As a result of this openness, I think that most of the people here would consider it foolish to be frightened of being dead. All of us, however, feel some degree of anxiety about the process of dying.
That process depends on what you are dying of. The body can fail in ways that are extremely distressing, slowly and painfully, demanding much stoicism, or it can switch off with little more than a flash of dizziness. In my family we seem to have been uncommonly lucky in that respect. There was the 82-year-old uncle who was at a meet of the Norwich Stag Hounds, enjoying a drink with friends, when crash! And he fell off his horse, dead. There was the cousin in her eighties who fell dead as she was filling a kettle to make tea, and the other cousin, 98, who slipped away so gently that the sister who was holding her hand didn’t realise that she had stopped breathing. There was my mother, a week before her 96th birthday, who had one nasty day which, to my relief, she couldn’t remember the next morning, then slept her way out after speaking her last words, “It was absolutely divine,” about a recent drive to a beloved place. My father, alas, had a whole week of unhappiness after a blood-vessel in his brain had ruptured. He looked up as one came through the door, obviously about to greet one, then when he found he couldn’t speak, his expression became one of pain and puzzlement: he understood that something was badly amiss but he didn’t know what it was. The moment of his dying, however, was sudden and painless. My brother was the only person near me who clearly resented death, and that was because he had achieved a way of life which suited him so perfectly that he wanted more. He was not frightened of it. “No one after 80 has any right to complain about death,” he had said to me not long before.
Although it would be unwise to expect an easy dying, it is not unreasonable to hope for one
That fortunate record makes me believe that although it would be unwise to expect an easy dying, it is not unreasonable to hope for one. As for after it, I feel quite strongly that I would like my ashes to be scattered or buried in a place I love (I scattered my mother’s in her garden – and the old man who tended it for her when she could no longer do it herself said “Cor! That won’t half make the flowers grow”). But such a feeling, though strong, is really absurd, because what does it matter to the dead how their bodies are disposed of? It is for the mourners to do what suits them best.
***
A little while ago I took part in a television programme about death that was designed by the photographer Rankin, to help him overcome his fear of it, to which he bravely admitted. Whether it served his purpose or not I don’t know – possibly not, because that fear is brewed in the guts, not in the mind – and I remember a man I once knew who suffered from it so badly that he told me he used to wake up in the night and have to telephone his sister and beg her to come round. “What did she do?” I asked, and he said she made tea and talked sense, but it didn’t do much good because the thought of all those bloody silly birds still twittering and those bastards walking up and down the street when he wasn’t there to see them drove him mad. But even if Rankin’s programme failed to make him feel better, which I hope was not the case, it was excellent, and many viewers responded to it with enthusiasm. I had already understood from the response to my own book, Somewhere Towards the End, that the taboo on the subject of death, so heavy in my youth, was evaporating, and this was a striking example of how true this is. Even teenagers joined willingly in discussion of it.
The contributor to the programme I remember with the most pleasure is the man who said that not existing for thousands and thousands of years before his birth had never worried him for a moment, so why should going back into non-existence at this death cause him dismay? Everyone laughed when he said that and so did I, and as I laughed I thought: “Dead right!”
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/sep/23/-sp-diana-athill-its-silly-frightened-being-dead
comment:
I'm no bible basher but I have a faith of sorts. This, I believe, is my comfort which will help me to die when my time comes.
There's also a conviction (could be wrong) that I will see lost loved ones again. In short I think that if you assume something else follows death it becomes another adventure instead of a scary end and nothingness.
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Holy Sheeet Sherlock- Writing our own Obit
How to Write Your Own Kick Ass Obituary
Let's be honest, most obituaries are not all that good. The worst part about them is that you are never around to read your own obit and see what a great person you were. Here are some great ideas if you want an exciting obituary that everyone will enjoy reading. As a bonus, you can get even with the people that made fun of you in high school and make a few bucks.
1. Write your own obituary
It is imperative that you write your own obituary or have a trusted friend do it BEFORE you die. If you do not, your Aunt (who has her own blog and fancies herself as a “writer”) will type it up and it will suck and you’ll be stuck with an awful summation of your life.
Once you do finish writing your own obit, make sure you send a draft copy out to all your family and friends so that they can miss you while you are still alive. They will then have the opportunity to pay to be included in the obituary (see section #5) or pay to be excluded from the obituary (see section #8.)
2. Don't give them the satisfaction
Most people will suggest you start off an obit with the person’s name, the date they died and how they died. I suggest you start off with “You are not going to believe this!” or “Guess what that fat f*ck Bob did now” or “You were right.” Don't include your age so that your friends don't get the satisfaction of outliving you.
3. Doug who?
No one knows you by your real name so why die by that name? Nicknames that were used independently of your name go in quotation marks in the middle of your real name.
Robert “Stacks” Gutfruend
Joan “Cookie Monster” McCreedy
Nicknames that were part of your job or the reason you went to jail go before your real name:
“Handsy” Jim Handland
“Luscious Diamond” Tina Ralph
“Tea-Bag” Bill Billingsworth
Or if you don’t want anyone to know you died, just post a fake nickname.
John “Two-Sack” Christopher
If you didn’t have a nickname in real life, make sure you make one up or tell your obit writer your suggestions before you die. And don’t post your middle name. We’re not monogramming a sweater here.
4. Rhyming and haikus make for great obituaries
I suggest trying them together.
You smoked like a fire
Now you're atop a pyre
No flowers please, Thanks!
5. No one cares
No one cares about who died before you or how many cousins you have that are still alive. If your relatives want in your obit, charge them $5 - $10 a mention.
No one cares where you went to school or where you earned your associates degree. List your favorite bars or hang outs. People are more likely to remember Johnny “Cantaloupes” Mullroy from the bowling alley, rather than a graduate of Lancaster High School class of 1988. (Go Gales!)
6. People like excitement
Don’t die of cancer. Die of a space borne alien parasite.
Don’t die in a car accident. Get hit by a meteorite.
Die a hero (stolen from Royal Tennebaums) "Died Tragically Rescuing his Family From the Wreckage of a Destroyed Sinking Battleship."
And do not fail to give a reason for why you died or people will assume it was from something embarrassing. Everyone knows that a non-mention means "bled to death from a masturbation accident."
7. Get donations now
There are services that will “loan’ you a lump sum of money now and get that money back when you die through the "Please donate to" charity suggested in the obituary. The loan companies have names like, “The Amerikan Heart Foundation” and “The Redd Cross” and “Amway.” At the bottom of your obit, have money sent to them in lieu of flowers. If you can’t come up with enough donations to cover your loan, they will take your suit/dress, coffin and body parts to make up the difference.
8. Let those jerks have it
An Obituary is the perfect time to get back at all the people who have pissed you off your entire life. Being dead is the perfect cover for a lie or to let out a really stinky truth. Here are a few examples:
-I never loved you (insert family member’s name here.)
-Coach Rogers touched me on my pee pee after baseball practice.
-I had herpes. Now I have worms.
-Aunt Tina, I was and always will be a Red Sox fan.
-My G-mail and MySpace password is clicktowin34. Go ahead and read my e-mails, honey.
This is also a perfect opportunity for relatives to make “pre-donations” to be excluded from this portion of the obituary. For $10 now, Uncle Bob won't get outted. For $50 neither will your Uncle Lou whom you found with Uncle Bob.
Here is my Obituary, just so you know:
Doug “Holyjuan” Messerschmit
Well, you can all stop placing your bets. Doug is dead. You won’t see him at B-Hampton’s or at Skully’s anymore, but you can see him Ray’s Funeral Home this Wednesday from 6 – 8pm. The parts of his body that were not destroyed when he dove on top the improvised nuclear device and thus saved the city will be on display. HolyJuan liked to dance poorly, drink quickly, tell the same stories and flirt with the ladies. He owned two bowling shirts and 12 pairs of Converse. He is survived by his parents ($20) and one sister ($5.) Donations can be made to the American Kancer Society and my brother used to stick Legos in my butt while I slep
http://www.holyjuan.com/2007/07/how-to-write-really-really-good.html
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Cost of living? What about the cost of being dead?
The spiralling price of funerals is a symptom of the triumph of the market and the accompanying poverty of civic life
There is 'always the tacit suggestion that if you cared a tiny bit more, you would pay a tiny bit extra. It is, again, the things we don't talk about that cost us the most, the reckoning that happens in the dark.' Illustration by Belle Mellor
"F uneral poverty" – that's the phrase they use at the National Association of Funeral Directors. Like "fuel poverty", "heat poverty" and "child poverty", this is just a long way of saying "poverty": another way to express the situation in which an event or thing that everybody will sometime need is nevertheless hopelessly out of reach of a fair proportion of them. One in five people can't afford funerals – given that the "cost of dying" now averages £7,622, the number of people who are knocked sideways by it financially, for years afterwards, probably considerably exceeds 20%.
That phrase "the cost of dying" has sacrificed accuracy for tact. This is the cost of being dead: the funeral, the cars, probate, the flowers that say "Best Dad Ever", the burial or cremation. If you factor in the costs before death, it's eye-popping. People rarely drop down dead. They have protracted illnesses, they seem like they're going to die and then don't; all emergencies are real, and to count the cost of anything would be sacrilege, and a fast track to bankruptcy.
This inability to tether the process to reality is an offshoot of being unable to talk about death: any discussion of the realities around it is seen to cheapen it. Death, when it eventually arrives, comes at the end of galloping spending, like typhoid at the end of a winter of malnutrition. If they say it costs seven grand, that is a good deal less than it has actually cost.
Why is this news? Because it's not simply expensive, it is "inflation busting", having gone up by 80% since 2004. It sounds like a lot; in fact, energy costs are still worse, having more than doubled over the same period. But that comparison doesn't help, merely ramming home the unaffordability of life in a world where costs soar and wages plateau.
There are a couple of reasons specific to the funeral business for these price rises, however, and both say something about the market generally. First, the cost of a burial plot has increased, as the cost of land has gone up. This makes it a postcode lottery, in which a death in rural Wales will be slightly less crippling than one in Wimbledon; but all postcodes have stayed in the slipstream of inflation, whether their land value has gone up or not. This is at the outermost ripple of the situation we've created for ourselves in which our land is worth much more than anything we earn or do or produce. Can we afford to be buried? Can we afford town halls? Zoos? Can students afford to live near universities?
Basically, no. Those days when a city was built to serve its inhabitants, with the commonly used areas in the middle and the private housing round the edge – those days when the centre of town contained things useful to a population, things like fire stations and schools? Those days are over. Those days have been sold to a Russian oligarch, whose nationality is, of course, not relevant from a racist point of view; it is there to underline how physically distant are the people whose interests are being served by the new equations.
An interesting side point is that councils, ratcheting up burial costs to keep pace with the value of the land, rack up cremation costs at the same time. Well, duh, why wouldn't you? You're in charge; it's not as though anyone can shop around. And here, bad ethics have chased out good ethics, since the latter are the instincts from which the private sector protects itself with competition. Councils shouldn't have to dream up checks and balances to stop themselves ripping off the communities they serve.
But even where competition does thrive, in the funeral industry itself, you see the spectacle of the ceremonial rip-off, wedding economics done sotto voce. Everybody makes poor financial decisions when they're recently bereaved. We put a notice in the Times for my dad, saying, "After a short and ultimately quite half-hearted fight with cancer, Mark Williams has died". Dropped 400 quid making a weak joke at a dead man's expense. And in the Times!
But that doesn't excuse the relentless upselling of the funeral director, the stupid lacquers and extra-price finishes, and always the tacit suggestion that if you cared a tiny bit more, you would pay a tiny bit extra. It is, again, the things we don't talk about that cost us the most, the reckoning that happens in the dark.
"What do people do," John Humphrys asked on BBC radio's Today programme, of Kate Woodthorpe from the University of Bath, "if they just can't afford a funeral?" The council does it, naturally – someone has to. The deceased themselves are too dead to fail. Humphrys and Woodthorpe then reminisced, briefly, about the days when a "pauper's funeral" was a source of shame, when people's own sense of propriety prevailed.
This is a classic manoeuvre – you take financial pressures that are quintessentially modern and then nostalgically lament the fact that people don't deal with them as they would have in the olden days. Expensive heating? In the olden days, they would have worn more jumpers. Unaffordable funerals? They would have saved harder. Food poverty? They would have eaten more potatoes.
All those things may be true, but that era was never characterised by acquiescence. The same people who were too proud for a pauper's funeral would have been too proud to be priced out of their own civic space, out of their own life cycle.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/21/cost-of-living-what-about-the-cost-of-being-dead
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How to Write a Will in Canada
By Laura Hageman, eHow Contributor
A will is a legal document by a person who wants to make sure that personal items and assets go to specific people or to a group upon his death. In Canada, you can write a will without a lawyer, but legal advice is recommended if you have an expensive home, a lot of valuable items to give away or a significant amount of money to bequeath.
Instructions
1
Begin the will stating your full name and where you live in Canada. Continue by stating that you are of sound mind and memory and declare that this will be your last will, then date the document.
2
Name all of your living relatives. For example, if you have a spouse, mention the person's full name and address. Continue with any children, parents and siblings. Make sure to follow their names with their addresses. Then list relatives who are no longer alive. Finish up by listing any potential beneficiaries who are not relatives (friends, business associates, charitable organizations).
3
Develop a list of assets, property, investments and personal belongings that you would like to distribute to people. Specify the item, its approximate worth and whom it goes to.
4
Appoint an executor. The executor will be responsible for making sure that your wishes are carried out. In Canada, you can appoint a family member as the executor. Include the person's full name and address, even if it has already been mentioned in a previous paragraph. In case the person you selected is deceased or unable to carry out your wishes by the time of your passing, list alternative executors in order of preference, and include their addresses.
5
Have two witnesses sign the will. In Canada, you are required to have two witnesses, either when the will is signed by the author or when the witnesses are signing and the author acknowledges their signatures. You should have a total of three signatures at the end of the will, along with the date.
6
Place your will in a secure place such as a safety box in a bank or a safe in your home. Make sure that the executor knows where you have left the will. You can also keep a copy of the will in your home in case the original will can't be found.
http://www.ehow.com/how_5173466_write-canada.html
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Does Canada have death taxes or inheritance taxes?
Posted by Lynne Butler
Readers please note: Due to the number of comments added to this thread, the site won't let me read all of the questions. 200 comments seems to be the limit. I would like to see your comments and questions though, so please feel free to add them to any thread on this blog
- lynne.
No, Canada does not have a specific tax that is levied against beneficiaries inheriting under an estate.
So if there is no death tax, why is there so much talk about planning ahead to pay for taxes in an estate?
There are plenty of tax consequences when a person passes away, even if there is no specific tax on dying. This is because a person's assets are deemed by law to have been disposed of by the deceased one minute before he or she died.
For example, everyone who owns an RRSP knows that we do not pay tax on the money we put into our RRSPs until we take it back out. In other words, the money is not tax-free, it is tax-deferred. Every time we take out a portion of the funds, we pay the tax on that portion. So if you were to dispose of your entire estate one minute before you died, and as part of that you took all of the money out of your RRSP (or RRIF), then you would have to pay the taxes on it.
In practice, your estate would pay those taxes, even though the person named as the beneficiary of your RRSP or RRIF is not your estate. You can avoid paying those taxes if the beneficiary you designate is your spouse or a disabled child.
Another tax liability that arises when a person passes away is capital gains tax. This is a tax on capital property (some examples of which are real estate and shares in private corporations) that has increased in value since the day you acquired it.
For example, if you bought a cabin at the lake for $50,000 years ago, and by the time you die the cabin is worth $90,000, then the value of your property has gained $40,000. Half of that gain is taxable. Your executor would then have to include $20,000 (half of the gain) on your last tax return as income.
This tax is also payable out of your estate.
There is an exception to this rule as well. Your estate does not have to pay any capital gains tax on your residence. This is referred to as a capital gains exemption. If you have a home and a cabin, or a home and a rental property, you can claim the exemption only on one property, that being your usual place of residence.
There are some tools that can be used to address tax liability, such as life insurance policies, beneficiary designations, trusts and restructuring of the ownership of assets, depending on your situation.
For this reason, it's worthwhile to sit down with an experienced estate planning lawyer to make sure that you're aware of all of the possible tax consequences of your death and that of your spouse.,You also want to make sure you're aware of ways to reduce taxes and to have cash flow to pay the portion that can't be reduced.
http://estatelawcanada.blogspot.ca/2010/03/does-canada-have-death-taxes-or.html
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What happens to my Canada Pension when I die?
All my life, I have contributed to Canada Pension. It will be a small fortune when I retire. When I die, I know some of it goes to my spouse, spousal allowance or something like that, and viceversa. When he dies, say shortly after me, what happens to the balance of my Pension, which would be a nice little sum of money? Does it go my kids or what?
ANSWER:
Throughout your life you have been contributing to CPP, but you have also been receiving a tax credit for your contribution throughout your life. A surviving spouse and any children under 18 continue to receive benefits in the event of your death. There is no lump sum, since you have received credit for the amount of your contributions.
COMMENT:
thanks...helps me understand just how it works. I can say I really don't agree with the system, but thanks.
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PENSION
What Happens to Your Superannuation When You Die?
By Kris Kitto | Submitted On August 21, 2010
I normally try to keep my articles positive - but with this particular topic it is going to be a little difficult; however it is very important that you know what happens to your super when you die.
One common mistake people make is the assumption that the assets in their super fund will be controlled by the Will. Let me clarify this right now - super is not controlled by you Will.
The reason for this is that your superannuation is regulated by Federal Laws (i.e. the SIS Act) while the other personal assets of your estate are controlled by the individual laws of each state.
So if you have a SMSF and you die, what happens to the assets inside the fund?
It depends....
If you die without leaving any instructions then whoever is the remaining trustee has full control over the assets in the SMSF. In the case of a husband and wife where the husband dies leaving the wife as the sole trustee (or sole director of the trustee company) this may be fine. The wife can decide to draw a pension, lump sum or leave the monies / investments in accumulation phase.
In the case where a pension has already been commenced and the person dies, then chances are the documentation will allow the pension to simply 'revert' to the remaining spouse. This is called a reversionary pension.
The good thing about reversionary pensions is that the tax treatment will be the same - so if the husband was age 68 and drawing a tax free pension, if he dies and the pension reverts to his 54 year old wife, then she can continue to draw it tax free.
What happens if you are the only trustee (director of the corporate trustee) and you die? Who controls the SMSF? If you have a Will, the executors / trustees of your estate can step in and take control and payout your benefits as they see fit or as per any instructions you leave.
If you don't have a Will typically the public trustee in the state you reside will step in and take control of your SMSF assets. This (in case you haven't realised) is a very bad thing. Do you like the idea of a government owned department controlling things when your gone?
A public trustee will typically sell all the assets (at whatever price they can get) and pay out the monies to the first person who comes along and claims. They will also charge significant fees for making such a great job of managing your estate!
So what if you want to rule from the grave and have some control over what happens to the assets in your SMSF? You have three options:
Non-binding nomination
Binding nomination
Death benefit rule (also called a SMSF 'Will')
A non-binding is simply that - you nominate what you want to happen and the trustee(s) take it into consideration when deciding what to do with the assets in the SMSF. They are not bound by it.
By comparison a binding nomination has to be obeyed by the trustee. The downside of binding nominations is that they lapse every three years. In addition what you nominated a few years ago may not be the most advantageous in terms of the current tax regime. Tax laws are constantly changing - so a binding nomination that forces the trustee to do something may also force your beneficiaries to pay more tax than they need to.
The third option you have is a little more complex. It basically involves putting in an additional rule or rules into the trust deed of your SMSF which force the trustee to make something happen when you die. This rule cannot be changed by the new trustees and if correctly written should allow for some flexibility in terms of how the rule is achieved.
For example if your SMSF owns the business property that your family business operates from, you would want this asset transferred to the family member who would be running the business.
What about tax?
If benefits are paid from your SMSF, there is only tax on the 'taxable' component where it is paid to non-financial dependants. The taxable component is made up of contributions where a tax deduction has been claimed (i.e. employer contributions) and the earnings associated with those contributions.
Who are financial dependants?
a. Spouse (regardless of age and gender)
b. Child under the age of 18
c. Child under the age of 25 (if financially dependent - e.g. full time student living at home
d. Child who has a disability and requires care
Non-financial dependants are every one else - namely adult children.
The following example illustrates how the taxation on the payment of death benefits from a super fund works:
Craig passes away leaving $400k in a SMSF. Craig has two children - Emily who is 26 and who is a non-financial dependent and Nathan who is 17 and jut finished school.
Craig's $400k balance is 75% taxable ($300k) and 25% tax free ($100k). If an equal death benefit of $200k each was paid to Emily and Nathan they would be taxed as follows:
Nathan - $0 tax as he is a financial dependent
Emily - $200k x 75% taxable = $150k taxable component x 15% = $22,500 tax
There is also the possibility that the SMSF itself incurs tax when it sells down assets to enable death benefits to be paid. Using the previous example, if Craig's $400k balance was made up of a property that had an unrealised capital gain of $100k, then in some instances the SMSF will be liable for 10% tax on the realisation of that gain.
The theory behind this is that when a member dies, their membership ends - so if they are in pension phase (and hence the income and capital gains on the assets used to support that pension is tax exempt) then the pension ends - meaning the tax exemption on the capital gains ends.
I disagree with this theory - it is my professional opinion (supported by many others) that if your trust deed allows it, the membership (and so also the tax exemption) does not end until the members benefits have been entirely paid out.
Summary:
Thought should be given to what you want to your super when you die. Any plan put in place should take into consideration all your assets - both inside and outside super.
There are ways to reduce or eliminate the 'death tax' that your family will have to pay when you die - but the solution for each family is different so you need to seek appropriately qualified professional advice from a SMSF professional.
http://ezinearticles.com/?What-Happens-to-Your-Superannuation-When-You-Die?&id=4904545
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Nova Scotia - Death Certificate Request
This secure internet transaction service is designed for Internet Explorer 6.x or Mozilla Firefox 2.x and above (click here for full details).
You may use this quick, convenient service to make an application for a Nova Scotia death certificate and pay the required fees using a credit card, or bank account via the Interac® Online service.
Requesting a death certificate is a simple four step process:
Step 1 Review and Complete Application Form
Review the information required to complete the transaction. Using the electronic application form, enter all required information.
Step 2 Verify and Confirm
After completing the electronic application form, you will have a chance to check the information and confirm the details of your transaction.
Step 3 Payment Information
You will then be asked for your credit card information or directed to the Interac Online service to complete payment for the transaction.
Step 4 Transaction Confirmation
The results of your transaction will be confirmed, including details of your payment, which can be printed for your records.
Important Notes
Requests for certificates are usually processed by the Vital Statistics office in 10 days or less, provided the death has been registered and no other information is required.
All applications made using this service are subject to verification by the Registrar of Vital Statistics.
Before You Start
You should:
1) Have any personal information (e.g. date of death, place of death, etc.) close by for reference.
2) Be sure that the death occurred in Nova Scotia.
3) Have one of the following payment methods:
Note : Enhanced security features are performed for the processing of this Credit Card transaction. Credit Card verification will be performed by the use of the Card Verification Value (CVV) and the Address Verification Services (AVS). The CVV is a 3 or 4 digit number located on the back of your Credit Card and the AVS is the address which corresponds to the Cardholder’s billing address on record at the issuing bank.
For more information regarding CVV, please select Help
For more information regarding AVS, please select Help
* Interac Online service is a payment option that allows you to pay for goods and services on the Internet directly from your bank account. Learn More
In order to enable the Interac Online payment method you will need to enable cookies in your browser. Payment by credit card does not require cookies.
If you have any questions about this service or require information about making an application for Nova Scotia Vital Statistics documents, please select Help to access contact information.
By continuing this secure transaction you are in agreement with our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy, and that you consent to the completion of this transaction with the Province of Nova Scotia.
https://isd.acol.ca/isd/vs/DeathCertificate/Start.do;jsessionid=1401810B2E012D8CDB0677DDDE10438C
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PENSION AND DEATH
What happens to my Superannuation when I die?
Written on the 3 February 2010 by Natalie Power
What happens to my Superannuation when I die?
Superannuation After Death
Did you know that some types of assets are not usually able to be distributed in accordance with the terms of your Will. One of these assets is your Superannuation.
You might ask, well what happens to my Superannuation upon my death? The answer is that it is distributed in accordance with the terms of the Trust Deed that governs your superannuation fund.
The Trust Deed will usually allow you to put into effect a Nomination of Beneficiary Form, which could be either Binding or Non-Binding. The person that you nominate on that form needs to be a dependent of yours i.e. your spouse, your child, a person with whom you have an interdependency relationship or any other person financially dependent on you. If you nominate someone other than a dependent then the payment of your superannuation to that person would not be guaranteed.
If you wish your superannuation to be paid to someone other than a dependent, then you would need to nominate your Legal Personal Representative on the Nomination of Beneficiary Form, which would then result in your superannuation being paid into your estate and distributed in accordance with your Will. So if you wish to leave your superannuation to someone other than a dependent, the nomination of your Legal Personal Representative as beneficiary is the way to go, and a clause in your Will providing for your superannuation to be paid to a particular beneficiary, is necessary.
Creating certainty in regard to the payment of your superannuation upon your death is important. The only way this can be achieved is if your superannuation fund allows you to complete a Binding Nomination of Beneficiary Form. This form needs to be updated every three years to remain valid. Many superannuation funds have a binding nomination form that you can complete; however there are some superannuation funds that do not. If the form is non-binding then the trustee of the superannuation fund has discretion in determining what happens to your superannuation upon your death, taking into account any nomination form you may have completed.
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NOVA
SCOTIA...
... be possible because
of death, bankruptcy, permanent ... of what
the actual financial arrangements are ... does cohabitation affect my income assistance? ...
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women.gov.ns.ca/.../files/documents/WelfareRightsGuide.pdf
- 235k - 2013-12-19 - Text
Version
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Employment
Support and Income Assistance Act
Employment Support and Income Assistance Act
CHAPTER 27
OF THE
ACTS OF 2000
NOTE - This
electronic version of this statute is provided by the Office of the Legislative
Counsel for your convenience and personal use only and may not be copied for
the purpose of resale in this or any other form. Formatting of this electronic
version may differ from the official, printed version. Where accuracy is
critical, please consult official sources.
An Act to Encourage
the Attainment
of Independence and Self-sufficiency
through Employment Support
and Income Assistance
of Independence and Self-sufficiency
through Employment Support
and Income Assistance
WHEREAS independence and self-sufficiency, including economic security
through opportunities for employment, are fundamental to an acceptable quality
of life in Nova Scotia;
AND WHEREAS individuals, government and
the private sector share responsibility for economic security;
AND WHEREAS some Nova Scotians require
help to develop skills and abilities that will enable them to participate as
fully in the economy and in their communities so far as it is reasonable for
them to do;
AND WHEREAS the Government of Nova
Scotia recognizes that the provision of assistance to and in respect of persons
in need and the prevention and removal of the causes of poverty and dependence
on public assistance are the concern of all Nova Scotians;
AND WHEREAS it is necessary that income
assistance be combined with other forms of assistance to provide effectively
for Nova Scotians in need;
AND WHEREAS employment support and
income assistance must be effective, efficient, integrated, co-ordinated and
financially and administratively accountable:
2 The purpose of this Act is to provide
for the assistance of persons in need and, in particular, to facilitate their
movement toward independence and self-sufficiency. 2000, c. 27, s. 2 .
(b) "deferred income"
includes retroactive pay, retroactive pension or other benefits and any form of
compensation for loss of income, including compensation paid for insufficient
notice of termination of employment;
(c) "employment services"
means services and programs to assist recipients in enhancing their
employability and quality of life, including programs provided by other
departments, agencies or governments in partnership with the Minister;
(e) "municipality" means a
regional municipality, incorporated town or municipality of a county or
district;
(f) "overpayment" means any
assistance paid pursuant to this Act that was paid in error, was overpaid or
was paid based on false or misleading information supplied by an applicant or
that otherwise ought not to have been paid according to this Act and the
regulations, and includes sums paid to a person who receives deferred income
with respect to any period for which assistance was provided and sums paid to a
person that were agreed to be repayable, whether out of the proceeds of the
deferred sale of an asset, from deferred income or otherwise;
(g) "person in need" means a
person whose requirements for basic needs, special needs and employment
services as prescribed in the regulations exceed the income, assets and other
resources available to that person as determined pursuant to the regulations. 2000, c. 27, s. 3 .
(2) The Minister may delegate in
writing to any person or class of persons in the public service any of the
duties, powers or functions of the Minister pursuant to this Act, except the
powers and duties set out in Sections 5 and 11, and shall, when so delegating,
specify the powers, duties or functions to be exercised by the person or class
of persons and any conditions imposed on the exercise of the powers or the
performance of the duties or functions. 2000, c. 27,
s. 4 .
5 The Minister may make and enter into
agreements on behalf of the Province with the Government of Canada or the
government of another province of Canada or any minister or agency of them with
respect to any matter pursuant to this Act. 2000, c. 27,
s. 5 .
6 (1) The Minister may, from the funds
from time to time appropriated by the Legislature, provide programs that are
intended to
(a) assist in the development of
individual, family and community capacity to become self-sufficient;
(d) provide support services to allow
persons who may otherwise be in need to avoid dependence on public financial
assistance; and
(2) In providing programs pursuant to
subsection (1), the Minister may provide for pilot projects, demonstration
projects and innovations in assistance, programs and services in all or part of
the Province. 2000, c. 27, s. 6 .
7 (1) Subject to this Act and the
regulations, the Minister shall furnish assistance to all persons in need.
(iv) advise the
applicant of the amount of financial assistance that will be provided, the
other forms of assistance that will be available for the applicant and the
conditions to be met to ensure the continuation of the assistance provided,
(v) advise the
applicant that the applicant has the right to appeal determinations made
pursuant to this Act, and
(vi) from time to
time review the assistance provided to a recipient, and in particular whether
any conditions imposed have been met, and promptly advise the recipient of any
changes in eligibility and of the right to appeal the change.
2000, c. 27, s. 7 .
8 Any information acquired pursuant to
this Act with respect to any person who has applied for or received any assistance
pursuant to this Act may be provided to
(a) a person who requires the
information to perform a duty pursuant to this Act, to similar legislation in
this or other provinces of Canada, or to a statute of the Parliament of Canada;
(b) a person performing similar duties
pursuant to similar legislation in other jurisdictions that have entered into
reciprocal arrangements with the Government of the Province with respect to
information exchange and the protection from disclosure of any information so provided. 2000, c. 27, s. 8 .
9 Assistance provided pursuant to this
Act is not assignable and is not subject to seizure or garnishment except as
may be required in order to recover an overpayment. 2000, c. 27, s. 9 .
(b) is or is likely to use any
assistance otherwise than for the purpose for which the assistance was granted,
the Minister may direct that any
assistance paid pursuant to this Act be paid to a trustee, other than the
person's landlord within the meaning of the Residential Tenancies Act or a
member of the landlord's family, agreeable to the Minister for the benefit of
the person in need or be applied by the Minister, in whole or in part, to such
purposes as the Minister may direct. 2000, c. 27,
s. 10 .
11 The Minister shall establish such
appeal boards for the Province as the Minister considers necessary. 2000, c. 27, s. 11 .
12 (1) Any person who has applied for
or who has received assistance pursuant to this Act may appeal any decision
related to the person's application or assistance received.
(3) An appeal may be filed with the
Minister at any time within thirty days after the decision complained of is
communicated to the applicant or person who received assistance.
(4) The Minister shall review the
appeal and, within ten days after the receipt of an appeal, advise the person
appealing whether the decision complained of is upheld, varied or reversed, and
the reasons for upholding or changing the decision.
(5) Within ten days after receipt of
the notice pursuant to subsection (4), the person appealing shall advise the
Minister whether the person will continue the appeal and, where the appeal is
not continued, the decision set out in the notice is deemed to be satisfactory.
(6) Where the appeal is continued, the appeal
shall be set down for hearing before an appeal board. 2000, c. 27, s. 12 .
13 (1) An appeal board shall hear an
appeal in camera, permitting access only to a representative of the Minister,
the appellant, the appellant's counsel or agent and such other persons as the
board may determine.
(2) The board shall determine the facts
and whether the decision made, on the basis of the facts found by the board, is
in compliance with this Act and the regulations.
(3) Where the board determines that the
decision is contrary to this Act and the regulations, the board shall vary or
reverse the decision in accordance with this Act and the regulations.
(4) A decision of the board shall
contain the facts found by the board, a statement of the issue in the appeal,
the applicable provisions of this Act and the regulations and a statement of
the reasons for the board's decision. 2000, c. 27,
s. 13 .
14 (1) An overpayment may be recovered
from the person to whom it was paid or from that person's estate.
(2) An overpayment is a debt due by the
recipient, or the estate of a recipient, to Her Majesty in right of the
Province.
(3) Where the overpayments were paid
notwithstanding full disclosure by the person in receipt of them of all
relevant information required by the regulations, the recovery of them is
limited to the overpayments for the six months immediately before the making of
a demand for the recovery of the overpayment.
(4) Subsection (3) does not apply to
assistance paid on condition that it would be repaid from the deferred sale of
an asset or otherwise, to sums paid to a person who receives deferred income
with respect to any period for which assistance was provided or to assistance
that was agreed in writing to be repayable.
(5) Where funds are to be recovered
from a person in receipt of assistance pursuant to this Act, the amount may be
recovered from the assistance otherwise payable to that person. 2000, c. 27, s. 14 .
(a) is not possible because of the
death, bankruptcy, permanent absence from the Province of the person or other
cause;
the Minister may direct that the
overpayments, or part of them, were properly paid and shall not be recovered
from the person. 2000, c. 27, s. 15 .
16 (1) Where the Minister determines
that a person has received an overpayment and has failed to comply with a
demand to repay the overpayment, the Minister may register in any registry of
deeds a certificate setting out the amount of the overpayment or other payment
that may be recovered pursuant to this Act and the name of the person liable to
repay or pay it and, upon registration, the Minister's certificate has the same
effect as a judgment registered pursuant to the Registry Act.
(2) A registrar of deeds shall register
any certificate purporting to be signed by the Minister or a person acting for
the Minister without further proof. 2000, c. 27,
s. 16 .
17 (1) Where the Minister determines
that a person has received an overpayment, has failed to comply with a demand
to repay the overpayment and that the person or the person's estate is about to
become entitled to any property, the Minister may demand in writing that the
person liable to make the payment or transfer the property pay or transfer it,
or so much of it as is necessary to recover the anticipated overpayment, to the
Minister.
(2) The Minister's receipt is a good
and sufficient discharge of the liability of the person liable to make the
payment or transfer the property to the extent of the amount stated in the
receipt.
(3) A person who fails to make the
payment to the Minister required by subsection (1) is personally liable to the
Minister for the amount of the payment required by the Minister, as a debt due
to Her Majesty in right of the Province, to the extent of the payment due or
the value of the property to be transferred. 2000, c. 27,
s. 17 .
18 Where any child under nineteen years
of age seeks assistance or is given assistance pursuant to this Act, the
Minister is subrogated to that child's right to support from the child's parents. 2000, c. 27, s. 18.
19 (1) No person shall knowingly
obtain, receive or retain any assistance pursuant to this Act for which that
person is not eligible pursuant to this Act.
(2) No person shall make any false or
misleading statement in any application made pursuant to this Act.
(3) No person shall provide any false
or misleading information to the Minister or to a person assisting the Minister
in the administration of this Act.
(4) No person shall knowingly aid or
abet another person to apply for, obtain, receive or retain any assistance
pursuant to this Act for which that person is not eligible pursuant to this
Act.
(5) Any person who violates this
Section is guilty of an offence and liable, on summary conviction, to the
penalty provided in the Summary Proceedings Act. 2000, c. 27, s. 19 .
20 The Minister may prescribe any forms
required for the effective administration of this Act. 2000, c. 27, s. 20 .
(f) prescribing the manner in which
moneys paid in trust shall be dealt with and accounted for by the trustee;
(i) respecting the powers, duties,
composition and quorum of appeal boards and the qualifications of board
members;
(j) prescribing the material to be
provided by an applicant or recipient for the purpose of confirming eligibility
and means to verify the information so provided;
(k) respecting the form in which
assistance may be granted including money, goods, shelter, health care
services, social services, training or other form, or any combination of them;
(l) respecting eligibility for
assistance or for any program or service provided pursuant to this Act;
(m) respecting the determination of the
income, assets and other resources that are available to a person in need and
respecting the exclusion of a principal residence from such assets;
(n) respecting the amount of income or
assets that may be retained by an applicant for or recipient of assistance;
(p) respecting rates of forgiveness for
overpayments where the person liable for repayment of the overpayment has
become employed and has ceased to be in receipt of assistance, in whole or in
part;
(q) prescribing methods by which the
amount and forms of assistance to be provided pursuant to this Act are to be
calculated or determined;
(r) providing for supplementary
assistance in addition to any maximum amount of assistance that may be provided
in the regulations and prescribing maximum amounts for supplementary
assistance;
(t) providing for any matters necessary
or desirable in respect of the transition from assistance pursuant to
enactments in force before the coming into force of this Act and the provision
of assistance pursuant to this Act;
(u) respecting any other matter or
thing that is necessary to effectively carry out the intent and purpose of this
Act.
(2) The exercise by the Governor in
Council of the authority contained in subsection (1) is regulations within the
meaning of the Regulations Act. 2000, c. 27, s. 21 .
23 Chapter 158 of the Revised Statutes,
1989, the Family Benefits Act, is repealed. 2000, c. 27,
s. 23 .
25 (1) Municipalities shall contribute
to the cost of providing assistance pursuant to this Act as provided in the
Memorandum of Understanding entered into between the Province of Nova Scotia
and the Union of Nova Scotia Municipalities dated April 7, 1998, as
supplemented by agreements between individual municipalities and the Minister
providing for the administration of the social assistance responsibilities of
municipalities by the Minister.
(2) On and after April 1, 2003,
municipalities are not required to contribute to the cost of providing
assistance pursuant to this Act. 2000, c. 27,
s. 25 .
26 (1) On the coming into force of this
Act, no benefits are payable pursuant to the Family Benefits Act and all
persons in receipt of benefits pursuant to that Act and all persons whose
eligibility for benefits pursuant to that Act is under consideration, review or
assessment, shall have their eligibility for assistance determined, reviewed
and assessed and assistance provided pursuant to this Act and the regulations
made pursuant to this Act.
(2) On the coming into force of this
Act, no assistance is payable pursuant to the Social Assistance Act, except
such assistance as is payable pursuant to that Act as amended by this Act, and
all persons in receipt of assistance that is no longer paid pursuant to that
Act and all persons whose eligibility for assistance that is no longer paid
pursuant to that Act is under consideration, review or assessment, shall have
their eligibility for assistance determined, reviewed and assessed and have
assistance provided pursuant to this Act and the regulations made pursuant to
this Act. 2000, c. 27, s. 26 .
27 (1) Overpayments of benefits under
the Family Benefits Act and overpayments of assistance under the Social
Assistance Act made before the coming into force of this Act may be recovered
on the same basis and in the same manner as provided in this Act for the
recovery of an overpayment.
(2) An overpayment of benefits under
the Family Benefits Act or an overpayment of assistance under the Social
Assistance Act, made before the coming into force of this Act, whether discovered
before or after the coming into force of this Act, shall be calculated
according to the enactments in force when the overpayment was made. 2000, c. 27, s. 27 .
(b) a decision made in relation to
assistance applied for or provided before August 1, 2001, under the Social
Assistance Act.
(2) Notwithstanding subsection (1),
where after the coming into force of this Act an overpayment under either the
Family Benefits Act or the Social Assistance Act is determined to have been
made before the coming into force of this Act, and no appeal in respect of the
overpayment was made, the determination of the overpayment may be appealed
pursuant to this Act within thirty days after the recipient has been advised of
the determination of the overpayment.
(3) Where an appeal board appointed
pursuant to Part II of the Social Assistance Act is seized with an appeal immediately
before the coming into force of this Act, the appeal board appointed pursuant
to that Act shall hear the appeal and render a decision according to the
enactments in force at the time the decision appealed from was made.
(4) Where no appeal board appointed
pursuant to Part II of the Social Assistance Act was, immediately before the
coming into force of this Act, seized with an appeal of a decision made under
the Family Benefits Act or the Social Assistance Act, the appeal of the
decision shall be heard by an appeal board constituted pursuant to this Act
according to the enactments in force at the time the decision appealed from was
made. 2000, c. 27, s. 28 .
This page and its contents published by the Office of the Legislative
Counsel, Nova Scotia House of Assembly, and © 2004 Crown in right of Nova
Scotia. Created February 26, 2009. Send comments to legc.office@gov.ns.ca.
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Nova
Scotia
Basic
Income Assistance Rates
Basic
Income Assistance Rates
You may be eligible for basic Income Assistance if you have a budget deficit. Having
a budget deficit means that the income you have to pay for your basic needs is
less than the amount you may receive on income assistance. The amount of
assistance you receive depends on your circumstances.
Shelter Allowance
Family Size
|
Rent or Own a Home
|
Boarding
|
1
|
$300*
|
$223
|
2
|
$570
|
$242
|
3+
|
$620
|
$282
|
* Up to $535
under certain circumstances
Personal Allowance
Shelter situation
|
Adult
|
Dependent child
age 18 to 20 |
Dependent child
to age 18 |
Rent, own home, board
|
$255
|
$255
|
$133 *
|
In hospital 30 days or more
|
$105
|
$105
|
Not applicable
|
In a residential rehabilitation
program
|
$81
|
$81
|
Not applicable
|
* If you do
not get the Nova Scotia Child Benefit or the National Child Benefit for a
dependent child under the age of 18, you can ask for a Child Benefit Adjustment
(CBA). You must file your income tax each year to get your Child Tax Benefits.
Ask your caseworker for more information.
Other sources of income
In addition to the Income Assistance Program, there are a number
of other sources of income that we can help you to access. These include:
------------------
Federal-Provincial/Territorial
National Child Benefit Program Initiative
Plans, Spending and Results
Name of lead department: Human Resources and Skills Development Canada
Lead Department Program Activity: Income Security
Start Date:
1998
End Date:
Ongoing
Total Federal Funding Allocation (from start date
to end date): Statutory
Description of the Horizontal Initiative (including
funding agreement):
Through the
Federal-Provincial/Territorial (F-P/T) National Child Benefit initiative, the
Government of Canada is working with provincial and territorial governmentsSee footnote1 to
provide income support, as well as benefits and services, for low-income
families with children. The initiative also includes a First Nations component.
Shared Outcomes:
The National Child
Benefit initiative has three goals:
- Help
prevent and reduce the depth of child poverty;
- Promote
attachment to the labour market by ensuring that families will always be
better off as a result of working; and
- Reduce
overlap and duplication by harmonizing program objectives and benefits and
simplifying administration.
Annual F-P/T National
Child Benefit Progress Reports include information on the level of spending by
all jurisdictions. There is a data collection process to which all participating
jurisdictions contribute in order to present comparable information on National
Child Benefit-related programs and services for low-income families with
children. The data submitted by each jurisdiction is reviewed jointly to ensure
consistency in reporting. To obtain the most recent Progress Report or for
further information, please visit the F-P/T National Child Benefit website: www.nationalchildbenefit.ca.
Federal Spending:
The Government of
Canada contributes to the National Child Benefit initiative through a
supplement to its Canada Child Tax Benefit called the National Child Benefit
Supplement. In addition to the base benefit of the Canada Child Tax Benefit,
which is targeted to both low- and middle-income families, the National Child
Benefit Supplement provides extra income support to low-income families with
children. Federal spending on the Canada Child Tax Benefit, including the
National Child Benefit Supplement, is tracked by the Canada Revenue Agency,
which is responsible for its administration and delivery. As a tax benefit,
Finance Canada is responsible for policy related to the Canada Child Tax
Benefit and the preparation of spending forecasts.
In 2010-2011, total
annual federal support delivered through the Canada Child Tax Benefit,
including the National Child Benefit Supplement, was projected to reach
$10.09B, including a projected $3.79B through the National Child Benefit
Supplement.
Provincial and territorial and First Nations
Spending:
Under the National
Child Benefit initiative, provinces, territories and First Nations provide
benefits and services that further the goals of the initiative. The National Child Benefit
Progress Report: 2007, reports that in 2006-2007, provinces,
territories, and First Nations spending was estimated at $833.6M in programs
and services in key areas such as child/day care initiatives, child benefits
and earned income supplements, early childhood services and children-at-risk
services, supplementary health benefits, and youth initiatives. This includes
First Nations reinvestments in programs and services which were estimated to be
$52.7 million in 2006-2007 and $54.8 million in 2007-2008.
Indicators and Impacts:
The F-P/T National Child Benefit
Progress Report: 2007 includes an analysis
of both societal level indicators, which measure areas such as low income and
labour force attachment and do not infer that any changes are the result of the
initiative, and direct outcome indicators, which measure only those changes
that are directly attributed to the National Child Benefit initiative.
With respect to
societal level indicators, the report shows that the proportion of families
with children living in low income has declined significantly since the
mid-1990s, decreasing from 17.6 percent in 1996 to 10.5 percent in 2005, based
on Statistics Canada's post-tax low-income cut-offs. During this period, the
number of children living in low income decreased from 1,304,000 in 1996 to
787,894 in 2005, a decrease of 516,106 children.See footnote2
With respect to
direct outcome indicators, the report estimates that in 2005, as a direct
result of the National Child Benefit initiative:
- 171,000
children in 78,800 families were prevented from living below the Market
Basket Measure (MBM) low-income thresholds, a reduction of 13.7 percent.
This means that in 2005, there were 13.7 percent fewer families with
children living in low income than there would have been without the
National Child Benefit. These families saw their average disposable income
increase by an estimated $2,400, or 9.5 percent.
- For
those families with children who remained in low income, the National
Child Benefit improved their disposable income by an average of $1,900
(10.7 percent). This means that the low-income gap (the additional amount
of income needed by low-income families to reach the low-income line) was
reduced by 20.4 percent in 2005.
In addition, in June
2005, F-P/T governments released a comprehensive evaluation of the first three
years of the National Child Benefit initiative (1988-1999, 1999-2000,
2000-2001). The evaluation compiled evidence from a number of studies and showed
that the National Child Benefit initiative is meeting its goals. In addition,
another evaluation is underway. Results are expected to be published in 2011.
For a complete
discussion of indicators, please see Chapters 4 and 5 of the National Child Benefit
Progress Report: 2007. For a discussion of evaluation
results, please see theEvaluation
of the National Child Benefit Initiative: Synthesis Report. These reports are available free of charge on the
National Child Benefit website, at:www.nationalchildbenefit.ca.
Governance Structure(s): The National Child Benefit initiative Governance and Accountability
Framework outlines the key characteristics of the
F-P/T partnership: cooperation, openness, flexibility, evolution and
accountability. As a co-operative effort among governments, the National Child
Benefit initiative combines the strengths of a national program with the
flexibility of provincial and territorial initiatives designed to meet the
specific needs and conditions within each jurisdiction.
With respect to
accountability, under the Governance
and Accountability Framework,
F-P/T Ministers Responsible for Social Services have committed to sharing data
on reinvestment initiatives and reviewing results and outcomes achieved in
order to identify best practices. F-P/T governments have also agreed to report
annually to the public with a primary focus on performance of the initiative.
To date, nine annual progress reports have been published, as well as a
synthesis report on a comprehensive evaluation of the first three years of the
initiative.
The Federal Role:
Under the National
Child Benefit initiative, the Government of Canada provides additional income
support to low-income families with children via the National Child Benefit
Supplement component of the Canada Child Tax Benefit. Canada Revenue Agency
delivers these benefits to families.
Human Resources and
Skills Development Canada is responsible for policy development with respect to
the F-P/T National Child Benefit initiative, and the Minister of Human
Resources and Skills Development represents the Government of Canada in this
F-P/T initiative.
The Canada Child Tax
Benefit (including the National Child Benefit Supplement) is a tax benefit, and
is administered by Canada Revenue Agency. Aboriginal Affairs and Northern
Development Canada and Citizenship and Immigration Canada have roles in
reinvestments and investments.
The Provincial and Territorial Role:
Under the F-P/T
National Child Benefit initiative, provinces, territories and First Nations
provide benefits and services that further the goals of the initiative. The
initiative is designed so that provinces, territories and First Nations have
the flexibility to develop and deliver programs and services that best meet the
needs and priorities of their communities. As part of this flexibility,
provinces and territories may adjust social assistance or child benefit
payments by the full or partial amount of the National Child Benefit
Supplement. This approach has resulted in families on social assistance being
no worse off in terms of their level of benefits, while providing additional
funds for new or enhanced provincial and territorial programs benefiting
low-income families with children.
It is important to
note that, as the National Child Benefit initiative has matured, the majority
of provinces and territories no longer recover increases to the National Child
Benefit Supplement. This means that the vast majority of children living in
low-income families, including those on social assistance, are currently
receiving some or all of the National Child Benefit Supplement.
Under the F-P/T
National Child Benefit initiative, provincial and territorial governments,
along with First Nations, have committed to re-allocating available social
assistance funds into benefits and services for children in low-income families
that further the goals of the initiative. Jurisdictions have focused
reinvestments primarily in key areas:
- Child
Benefits and Earned Income Supplements;
- Child
Care;
- Early
Childhood Services and Children-at-Risk Services;
- Supplementary
Health Benefits;
- Youth
Initiatives; and
- Other
Benefits and Services.
First Nations Role:
The federal
government is responsible for ensuring programs for First Nations children on
reserve are comparable to those available to other Canadian children. Under the
National Child Benefit, First Nations have the flexibility to reinvest savings
from adjustments to social assistance into programs and services tailored to
meet the needs and priorities of individual communities. Some 500 First Nation
communities participate in the National Child Benefit and implement their own
programs.
Contact information:
François Weldon, Acting Director General
Social Policy Directorate
Strategic Policy and Research Branch
HRSDC
(819) 994-3184
Contact François Weldon by email:francois.weldon@hrsdc-rhdcc.gc.ca
François Weldon, Acting Director General
Social Policy Directorate
Strategic Policy and Research Branch
HRSDC
(819) 994-3184
Contact François Weldon by email:francois.weldon@hrsdc-rhdcc.gc.ca
Return to footnote reference1 The
Government of Québec has stated that it agrees with the basic principles of the
National Child Benefit. Québec chose not to participate in the initiative but
has adopted a similar approach to the National Child Benefit. Throughout this
text, references to joint F-P/T positions do not include Québec.
Return to footnote reference2 Statistics Canada’s post-tax low-income cut-offs (LICOs) are used to examine historical trends in low income as data using the Market Basket Measure (MBM) is only available since 2000.
Return to footnote reference2 Statistics Canada’s post-tax low-income cut-offs (LICOs) are used to examine historical trends in low income as data using the Market Basket Measure (MBM) is only available since 2000.
------------
THE
EVOLUTION OF THE CANADA ASSISTANCE PLAN
by
John E. Osborne
Special
Adviser on Policy
Development
National Health and Welfare
1985
THE EVOLUTION OF THE CANADA ASSISTANCE PLAN
by John E. Osborne
Special Adviser on Policy
Development National Health and Welfare
1985
NOTE:
The Appendix to the Nielsen Task Force report on the Canada
Assistance Plan is reproduced below. It's an insider's perspective
on the birth of CAP and the program's first 20 years, and it's one of the
more comprehensive chronicles I've seen. The text was scanned from the hard
copy, but I didn't correct some of the errors (mainly hyphenated words and
page numbers).
Gilles Seguin Canadian Social Research Links |
I. Antecedents of CAP
Caring for the poor in Canada has traditionally been the responsibility
of either the Church or the community. In Quebec the Church until about 30
years ago was considered to be responsible for social welfare, whereas in the
Maritimes, the application of Elizabethan Poor Law gave the responsibility to
the local authorities. Upper Canada rejected the Poor Law approach and instead
relied upon voluntary agencies like Children's Aid Societies, fraternal orders,
and hospital boards to care for the poor, the sick and the helpless. As
collective self-help was essential to survival in sparsely settled pioneer
communities, the Western provinces relied on public programs run by
municipalities for health care and aid to the poor. Mothers' allowance programs
in Manitoba and British Columbia towards the end of World War I were the first
provincial measures to aid the poor.
The Federal Government did not recognize that it had any responsibility
towards the poor until 1927 when the Old Age Pension Act was passed providing
for a 50 percent federal contribution to provincial plans offering pensions to
residents over 70 with limited means. This set the pattern for later
shared-cost programs through which the federal government strove to achieve
national objectives in fields under provincial jurisdiction. During the Great
Depression of the 1930's local communities and even some provinces found they
could no longer cope with the cost of relief needed in the hardest hit
communities. Voluntary aid from more fortunate areas was not enough to fill the
gap, and so in each year from 1930 to 1939 a federal Relief Act or Unemployment
Relief Assistance Act was passed to allow the Federal Government to make
payments to provinces to help them provide relief for the unemployed. The
Rowell-Sirois Commission later concluded that such conditional grant programs
were the cause of much federal-provincial disharmony because of their
administrative headaches. It recommended the establishment of a federal
Unemployment Insurance Act which was introduced in 1940 after a Constitutional
amendment which avoided the jurisdictional pitfalls of the Employment and
Social Insurance Act of 1935, later found "ultra vires".
Between 1935 and 1950 five provinces introduced health care programs for
their welfare recipients, and the Federal Government introduced Unemployment
Insurance and Family Allowances. Leonard Marsh's "Report on Social
Security for Canada" and Dr. Heagerty's "Health Insurance
Report" were both released on 16 March 1943. The former provided a
blueprint for a Canadian social security system and the latter for a health
insurance system. The Whitton Report and the Cassidy Report, also published in
1943, both put greater emphasis on the need to build up a public assistance
system (as Australia has done), than on social insurance. In 1945 the Federal
Government in its Green Book proposals to the Conference on Reconstruction
offered, conditional upon acceptance of its tax rental proposals, to assume
full responsibility for pensions at 70, to share the cost of assistance for the
needy at 65, to assume financial responsibility for assistance to unemployed
employables, and to share the costs of health insurance. Specifically, it
proposed a federal unemployment assistance program to care for those who had
exhausted their unemployment insurance benefits at 85 percent of the latter
rates. This offer was rejected along with the tax rental proposals.
In the period 1951 to 1954 three "categorical" welfare
programs were introduced - Old Age Assistance, Blind Persons' Allowances and
Disabled Persons' Allowances - whereby the Federal Government offered to share
at least 50 percent (seventy-five percent for blind persons) of provincial
expenditures on allowances for residents who fell into the appropriate category
(aged 65 to 69, legally blind, or totally and permanently disabled) and who
passed the means test. The eligibility conditions for these three programs were
tight and inflexi- ble and were intended to assure the public that only
"legitimately" needy and "deserving" poor people qualified,
but they also meant that many equally needy poor were denied benefits, and they
made for complicated administration. The fixed rates set for these allowances
took no account of varying family needs, and the dollar-for-dollar reduction of
the means test left no incentive for recipients to try to augment their
incomes.
With the rise in unemployment in the mid-fifties, pressure mounted on
the Federal Government to provide relief for those who had exhausted their
unemployment insurance benefits. A more orderly and effective way of helping
the provinces cope with poverty than the former Relief Acts was called for, and
so in 1956 the Unemployment Assistance Act was passed, retroactive to 1955,
whereby provinces with agreements were reimbursed for half their expenditures
on assistance to needy unemployed people, with no ceiling on individual
benefits or federal expenditures. Until January 1958 payments for the first
0.45 percent of the provincial population were not shared as they were
considered non- employable this feature was removed under pressure from
Ontario, Alberta, and Nova Scotia. Until April 1966, payments for Mothers'
Allowance recipients were not shared. Expenditures for health care or for
provincial administration were not shared. Needy unemployed persons in
"homes for special care" were eligible for assistance. One more
categorical" program was thus added to the welfare system.
Two important innovations of this program are worth noting. The means
test (of income and assets) was replaced by a needs test which assessed the
applicant's budgetary needs as well as income and assets, and gave assistance
to fill the gap between needs and resources. The onus was on the province to
assess needs realistically so that benefits would be adequate. The concept of
residence was altered to mean residence in Canada. Provinces would no longer
require a year of residence in the province for needy persons to become
eligible, as long as they had lived in some province during the previous year.
This was intended to eliminate the practice of transporting people out of the
province rather than paying them assistance. This program was more
comprehensive than any previous program; it was flexible and open-ended and
gave provinces the incentive to be more generous. To be able to participate in
this plan, Quebec for the first time introduced an assistance program for needy
persons who were not in hospital. All provinces had signed agreements by 1959.
During this same period the Hospital Insurance and Diagnostic Services
Act was passed in 1957, removing one of the major causes of poverty that had
previously to be contended with - the burden of indebtedness incurred by hospital
patients.
II. Preparatory Consultations
Even before all the provincial agreements under Unemployment Assistance
were signed, the Canadian Welfare Council in its 1958 policy statement
"Social Security for Canada", called for improvements in three areas
of income maintenance - old age security, public assistance, and unemployment
insurance. This statement was largely the work of Fred MacKinnon and Norm
Cragg, the former a provincial Deputy Minister of Welfare and the latter a CWC
staff member who later became the first Director of the Canada Assistance Plan.
The seventh recommendation in this statement reads as follows:
"There should be a federal Public Assistance Act which would be, in
effect, an extension of the Unemployment Assistance Act and which would enable
the Dominion government to share the aggregate costs to a province, and to the
municipalities in a province, of providing financial assistance to all persons
who are in need. The Old Age Assistance Act, the Blind Persons' Allowances Act
and the Disabled Persons' Allowances Act should be incorporated as specific
sections of this general Public Assistance Act. The proposed Act should, under
these sections, provide the provinces with the option of continuing old age
assistance, blind persons' allowances and disabled persons' allowances as
separate programs, or of incorporating these categories in a generalized public
assistance program with the same provisions respecting the sharing of costs as
in the Unemployment Assistance Act.
The Act should also stipulate that:
a. Length of residence shall not be a condition for the receipt of
assistance.
b. The proportion of cost carried by the Dominion government shall
progressively increase as the total number of persons on public assistance in a
province mounts beyond predetermined percentages of its population.
In effect, this recommendation became the blueprint for future
federal-provincial discussions of the federal role in the assistance field.
From the time it was first created in 1962*, the National Council of
Welfare - consisting of the 10 provincial Deputy- Ministers of Welfare and 10
representatives of welfare agencies or schools of social work, chaired by the
federal Deputy Minister, and charged with advising the federal Minister on
matters of national welfare concern - focused attention on the deficiencies of
the Unemployment Assistance plan, and urged that its scope be expanded. Similar
concerns were expressed by the Welfare Grants Review Committee, a small group
of social work academics and professionals who met periodically to advise the
Department on the thrust of the National Welfare Grants program created in
1962. Quebec's Study Committee on Public Assistance, set up in December 1961
under the chairmanship of J. Emile Boucher, voiced many of the same concerns in
interviews it held with federal officials in Ottawa in the spring of 1962.
It was clear from these consultations that most provinces wanted the
restrictions and limitations of the Unemployment Assistance program removed. It
did not cover needy persons eligible for mothers' allowance (i.e. single-parent
families), children in need of assistance who were not in their own families,
or fully employed people in need of income supplements. The costs of health
care, child welfare, and other welfare services, could not be included in the
calculation of the family's "expenditure needs". And it left support
for the aged, blind and disabled to the categorical means-test programs with
their fixed rates, income and asset ceilings and strict eligibility rules. In
effect, what the provinces wanted was a stronger federal fiscal commitment to
social welfare.
In June 1963 the Boucher Report recommended a General Social Assistance
Act for Quebec, based on the principle that any individual in need is entitled
to state assistance, regard- less of the cause of need. Under it, financial
assistance at home would be based on the budget method (i.e. needs test) and
not on fixed rates. In addition welfare services should be provided to persons
and families threatened with social dependency. These thrusts reflected the
consultations the Committee had had with federal and other provin- cial
officials. In addition, Boucher recommended the withdrawal of the Federal
Government from joint social assistance programs, and the compensation of
increased Quebec expenses through extension of the taxation fields. This
proposal was given effect in 1965 in the adoption of the Established Programs
(Interim Arrangements) Act. Under this Act a province could agree to assume
full responsibility for the administration and financing of specified
shared-cost programs in exchange for a tax abatement of a specified percentage
of federal provincial income tax on provincial residents, an equalization
payment, and an operating cost adjustment.
In July 1963 at a Federal-Provincial First Ministers' Conference where
the proposed Canada Pension Plan was first discussed, several provincial
premiers noted the importance of joint Federal-Provincial action on behalf of
all needy persons in Canada, in addition to the retired persons for whom the
CPP was designed. At a September 1963 Conference of Ministers responsible for
pensions, the categorical programs and the possibility of broadening the
application of the needs-test approach were discussed and a joint re-examination
of the whole field of social assistance was called for by all ministers, in the
hope of developing one general assistance program based on need, as a
"safety net" for those inadequately protected by the other social
security programs
When the Premiers again met in November to discuss the CPP, they set up
a Federal-Provincial Working Group to review the operations and terms of
priority of all joint welfare programs and to report back on ways of improving
them. This group of Deputy Ministers met in February 1964 to explore views as
to the overemphasis on detail and the inflexibility of the existing
cost-sharing agreements for welfare programs.
The Problem
The Working Group identified a number of concerns they had with the
existing "categorical" programs:
1. The failure to share in mothers' allowance costs was inequitable
since all but two provinces had merged this program with their assistance
plans; different formulas had to be developed for each province to exclude the
mothers' allowance category from the general program and these had not worked
fairly. Several provinces urged the merger of all programs into one assistance
cost-sharing plan, and all supported 50 percent sharing on mothers' allowances.
2. The criterion of "unemployment" should be removed from the
assistance plan so that partially or fully employed people with heavy family
responsibilities could receive supplements; an incentive to return to low-paid
work from the welfare rolls was needed.
3. The inequitable treatment of the costs of child care should be
corrected. Children who were eligible for and receiving public assistance in
their own right were excluded from the Unemployment Assistance program because
they were not "unemployed". If they were in their own family homes
they could be covered as part of the needy family, but if they were in foster
homes or living with relatives who became needy because of their presence they
were not eligible. The Group concluded that all child welfare costs should be
covered under a broadened assistance program.
4. Medical Services and medications should be recognized as shareable
expenditures of needy families until such time as health insurance relieved
families of such costs. Non-insured health care costs were a legitimate item in
a family's expenditure budget.
5. Income maintenance payments should not be over- emphasized to the
exclusion of rehabilitation and preventive services, which had the potential
for reducing the welfare caseload. Assessment services, vocational
rehabilitation, training, placement, and transportation, room and board
associated with these should all be eligible for cost-sharing as they could
lead to savings in future assistance costs.
Provinces urged that administration costs be shareable in order to make
the new program effective, and to encourage provinces to initiate programs
involving good welfare policy. Training and developing staff, extending
coverage to a broader population, introducing innovations to the welfare field
as well as counselling and determining eligibility of applicants were all
essential parts of a soundly administered program in which the federal
government would have a large stake. Quebec warned that any attempt to
associate shared administration costs with qualitative standards would meet
provincial resistance.
7. Concepts of community development were considered, and pilot projects
were recommended, particularly in areas where employment opportunities were
scarce, such as the Newfoundland outports and among the Indian population.
In discussing "work for relief" a distinction was made between
punitive programs designed to punish those who wouldn't do menial work in
exchange for assistance, or municipal efforts to get greater provincial sharing
for municipal projects at low wages, and specialized work projects where
unemployed persons worked on projects that helped themselves and their
communities under direction and supervision that improved their skills and
their motivation while awaiting other employment. Ontario, Quebec and Nova
Scotia all spoke favourably about supporting such work activity Projects.
The Working Group concluded that provinces should be given an option.
Those who wished to encompasss all their cate- gorical programs in one large
assistance plan for all needy persons should be allowed to do so under a broad
general assistance act. Other provinces would have the option to carry on their
categorical programs and eliminate them as experience allowed. (As it happened,
a few provinces continued to operate these programs until well into the '70' s)
The Solution
These proposals were reviewed at Ministerial Conferences in May 1964,
April 1965, and January 1966. The Federal Cabinet agreed in February 1965 to
proceed with new legislation encompassing these features, and accepted Judy
LaMarsh's proposed title for it, "the Canada Assistance Plan", to
complement the Canada Pension Plan then at third reading. In the same month
Cabinet agreed to proceed with the Medical Care Insurance Plan.
The bill enacting the Canada Assistance Plan was assented to in July
1966, retroactive to 1 April 1966, and all ten provinces had signed agreements
under Part I of this Act by August 1967. Mothers' allowance cases and child
welfare cases were no longer excluded from eligibility, and welfare services
that would prevent people from becoming needy and non-insured health services
became shareable items of a family's expenditure budget. The costs of extending
provin- cial welfare administration beyond the level available in the base year
became shareable. The provisions in the Unemployment Assistance Act for meeting
a family's budgetary requirements (needs-testing), for supporting needy persons
in homes for special care, and for prohibiting a provincial residence
requirement were repeated in this Act. Among the innovations of this Act were
the requirement that an effective appeals mechanism against decisions by
program adminis- trators on applications for assistance be provided within a
year, and the provision that assistance could be used to supplement the incomes
of fully-employed people (the working poor) and people already in receipt of
benefits like old age pensioners. Other innovations were the extension of
welfare services to people "likely to become" poor and the offer to
share in provincial administration costs.
Welfare services: Services whose object is the lessening, removal, or
prevention of the causes and effects of poverty, child neglect, or dependence
on public assistance - like day care, homemaker services, rehabilitation,
counselling, community development, adoptions, referrals, etc.
The provisions of the Established Programs (Interim Arrangements) Act
were extended to cover this Act, and Quebec was granted further federal income
tax abatement to cover most of its annual entitlement to contributions under
CAP. The establishment of actual rates of assistance and of eligibility
conditions other than residence was once again left to provincial
administrations.
Part II of the Act made special provision for sharing in the costs of
assistance and welfare services provided by provinces or municipalities to
Indians with reserve status. Part III made provision for sharing in the costs
of work activity programs - sheltered work programs designed to increase a
person's capacity to take advantage of employment-oriented programs, or to
provide socially useful work for unemployable persons.
The Original Objectives (See Hansard, House of Commons Debates,
April 1966, pp. 6407-6410, 6922-6925, 7198).
In his 1969 confidential report on Social Security Programs, Dr. Joe
Willard, the Deputy Minister of National Welfare, summarized the original
objectives of the Canada Assistance Plan as follows:
1. To support the provision of adequate amounts of assistance to persons
in need.
2. To encourage the development and extension of welfare services
(protective, preventive, rehabilitative and developmental) to help prevent and
remove the causes of poverty and dependence.
3. To encourage the development of integrated, comprehensive, general
assistance programs so that one program could meet the varying requirements of
different groups of people.
4. To ensure access to assistance without provincial residence
requirements
5. To provide a framework for federal-provincial collaboration in
developing more effective assistance and welfare programs across Canada.
6. To encourage the extension of provincial assistance and welfare
services to Indians on the same basis as to the general population.
7. To support the efforts of provinces to prepare and motivate
assistance recipients to take advantage of vocational rehabilitation, training
and placement services designed to get them into full employment.
In view of the appeal provisions of the Act, he might have added another
objective whose importance was soon recognized - to promote recognition and
protection of the rights of socially and economically disadvantaged Canadians.
The Context
It is useful to put the development of CAP into its proper context. It
was one of five pieces of major federal social legislation enacted in the
period 1964 to 1966. Youth Allowances in 1964 extended children's benefits to
those aged 16 and 17 who were still at school. The Canada Pension Plan in 1965
provided workers and self-employed people with a contributory, earnings-related
social insurance plan offering retirement, disability and survivor's benefits.
The Guaranteed Income Supplement in 1966 provided a 40 percent supplement to
old age pensioners with little or no other income. The Medical Care Insurance
Plan of 1966 extended federal sharing to provincial health insurance plans
covering physicians' services.
Those measures in turn formed part of the Federal Governments'
"program for the full utilization of human resources and the elimination
of poverty" popularly dubbed the War on Poverty, which included items like
ARDA, ADA, FRED, the CYC, and Occupational Training Allowances as well as the
social programs. (See page 39 of Hansard, April 6, 1965.) The United States had
launched its own War on Poverty, and so had several European nations, sparked
by the PariBoverty Conference sponsored by UNESCO in February 1964. The Civil
Rights riots in U.S. cities like Watts, Detroit and Rochester brought
widespread public attention to the problem of poverty and precipitated demands
for action to eliminate poverty. In major Canadian cities welfare rights
organizations of welfare recipients with names like the Just Society, Humans on
Welfare, Unemployed Citizens' Welfare Improvement Council, Welfare Rights
Movement, Community Action Group and No Other Way were created and demanded
improvements in the welfare system. The National Film Board series
"Challenge for Change" with such films as "Up Against the
System" focused attention on defects in our anti-poverty programs. The
Economic Council of Canada in its Fifth Annual Review in 1968 "The Challenge
of Growth and Change", included a chapter on poverty which questioned why
poverty was so widespread when billions of dollars were being spent on social
security. It noted that about 25 percent of the population of Canada in 1961
had family income below the DBS "low-income cut-off" or poverty
level, and that by 1965, following vigorous economic expansion, this figure had
fallen to 20 percent.
The Canada Assistance Plan was launched in this atmosphere as one more
shared-cost conditional grant program. However, there was considerable
controversy over the place of shared- cost programs in a federal system. Some
have maintained that federal leadership in promoting the health, welfare and
social security of the people of Canada entitles the Federal Government to use
its spending powers to persuade provinces to adopt programs in areas that are
strictly under provin- cial jurisdiction. New programs for joint-federal action
would be proposed, and those provinces that agreed to accept the conditions
would get financial support, by channelling federal revenues into certain types
of program, provincial disparities might be overcome.
Others have said that conditional grant programs are unacceptable in a
federal state, since they imply that the Federal Cabinet knows better than any
Provincial Cabinet what is right for the people in these fields that are under
provincial jurisdiction. For the Federal Government to offer financial support
to those provinces that agree with it, and deny it to those who do not, means
that all Canadians are taxed to provide services that are available only in
some parts of the country.
Because of this controversy, the government of the day decided that the
CAP would be the last shared-cost program it would offer. The Medical Care
Insurance plan was presented as a no-agreement, unconditional grant program to
provinces that had programs designed in accordance with four or five broad
principles. The Established Programs (Interim Arrangements) Act of 1965 went
part way to removing some of the irritants of the conditional grant approach,
by permit- ting provinces to obtain equivalent funds through transfer of tax
points. And when the Social Services Act was presented in 1977 as a new
shared-cost program to replace part of CAP, it was designed so that a province
would get financial support whether or not it signed an agreement. It is
therefore a strong indication of the provincial support for CAP that, despite
the opposition of some to shared-cost programs, all provinces had signed
agreements within 13 months of its proclamation. - 12 -
III. Period of Re-examination 1966-72
No sooner had CAP been launched than the Minister of Finance proposed,
in September 1966, that it be terminated. In a statement to the Tax Structure
Committee, he offered to terminate it as of March 31, 1970, and to replace it
with a combination of tax abatement, equalization payments and adjustment
grants unrelated to program costs. It would be agreed that federal-provincial
discussions on maintaining and improving program standards would be continued
and federal consultative services would be available, and provinces
experiencing net in-migration in any year would receive portability grants if
they agreed to allow access to assistance and services without reference to
residence. Quebec was the only province to indicate acceptability of this
offer.
In August, 1968, one month before the Economic Council published its
Fifth Annual review, which called for a re-examination of social programs for
their effectiveness as anti-poverty programs, and suggested that the Senate
might establish a committee to examine the problem of poverty, the federal
Deputy Minister of Welfare, submitted his confiden- tial report to Cabinet
entitled "Assessment of Federal Social Development Programs" which
had been commissioned in March 1968. It contained a frank analysis of the defi-
ciencies of CAP.
These may be summarized as follows:
- provincial progress was slow in the development of welfare services to
help prevent and remove the causes of poverty and dependence; at the same time
both British Columbia and Alberta complained that their community-wide
preventive services were not shareable under CAP, which required a needs test.
- the assistance program did not provide the protection Parliament had
intended, because the provinces had not been persuaded to set rates at adequate
levels although no upper limit had been placed on assistance rates for sharing
purposes; the Federal Government was passive on the need for improved
provincial rates as it would seem inconsistent to urge higher rates while
proposing federal withdrawal from the Plan.
- the cost sharing formula did not relate contributions to regional
needs, nor recognize the additional burdens of dependency that exist in lower
income areas. The Atlantic Provinces argued that CAP should provide a
differential rate of federal contribution to compen8ate those provinces with
special problems of depen- dency; they wanted contributions related to some
index of provincial need, based on per capita personal income, labour force
partici- pation rates, and the relative level of unemployment. They noted that
equalization payments were designed to equalize provincial revenues, but not
expenditures. British Columbia wanted special portability grants to cover net
in-migration of transients during their first year of residence.
- more effort was needed to avoid duplication between work activity
projects and Manpower training and employment projects, or overlapping with
FRED income maintenance payments, and with community development projects under
other Regional Development programs.
- no agreements on Indian Welfare had been signed under Part II; efforts
should be made to resolve the jurisdictional questions raised by the provinces
about responsibility for Indian Health and Welfare.
- continuing difficulties were experienced in agreeing on a dividing
line between mental patients in mental hospitals and ex-mental patients in
homes for special care, and between institutions and clinics for mentally
retarded children.
- similar problems were encountered in distin- guishing between child
welfare services and correctional services for children, especially since some
provinces cared for problem children in welfare institutions and others in
correc- tional homes. The problem of defining "a child in care has been a
continuing one for CAP which specifically excludes sharing in the costs of
health, education and correctional institutions. Consistent and equitable
treat- ment of children in care is difficult when provinces have different philosophies
as to the nature of the services they are providing. In
Quebec children in need of protection were placed in child protection
schools, or church orphanages; if these were educational institu- tions their
costs were not shareable.
- greater efficiency and reduced costs rnight be achieved by the
extension of welfare organiza- tion and management consultant services to
provincial administration; new administration costs were made shareable to help
strengthen provincial administration.
The complex nature of the CAP program was also noted in this Assessment.
Not only was it designed to support basic income maintenance for persons in
need who were not covered by other programs, but it was also intended to
supplement benefits provided under other programs (like CPP and OAS) that
failed to meet a person's budgetary needs. By support- ing welfare,
rehabilitative and preventive services it was intended to increase the
effectiveness or availability of other programs: e.g. homemaker and mobile meal
services would benefit older persons receiving the Guaranteed Income
Supplement, day care would facilitate entry into the Labour Force. The need for
CAP assistance was expected to decline as increased unemployment insurance
benefits and new CPP survivors' and disability benefits became payable. Simi-
larly, when Medicare came in, the focus of CAP health expenditures shifted to
non-insured services like drugs and dental and nursing care. On the other hand,
CAP was used in place of VRDP (Vocational Rehabilitation of Disabled Persons
Act, 1961) in some provinces, and job counselling and place- ment services for
assistance recipients were given in others to compensate a deficiency in
manpower services. Reliance on CAP supported services was also built into a
number of the Regional Development agreements. In a short period of time, CAP
had become an essential and interlocking feature of the whole social security
structure of Canada.
At a Conference of Welfare Ministers in January 1969, it was agreed to
set up three federal-provincial task forces which would explore ways of
improving and simplifying assistance programs, trends in the costs of various
services and the factors affectin9 costs, and the extent of alienation among
welfare recipients and the possibilities of improving their participation in
the administration of welfare. These three task forces presented interim
reports at the October 1969 Conference of Welfare Ministers and final reports
at the January 1971 Conference. The group studying costs presented a trend analysis
of past expenditures and an extensive proposal for a general statistical
reporting system to overcome the lack of data it had encountered. The second
group suggested several ways in which provincial administration could be
streamlined, most notably the abandonment of the needs-test approach for a more
impersonal income-test approach to determining eligibility. The group studying
alienation surveyed 2100 welfare recipients (see "The World of the Welfare
Recipient", January 1971) and 10 welfare rights organizations, conducted
laboratory experiments on the interaction between recipients and welfare
workers, and ten other studies, and made 15 recommendations - including
reaffirmation and publicization of the right to assistance, separation of the
payment and counselling functions, provision of work incentives, and creation
of opportunities for welfare rights organizations to be involved in the
process. The survey of recipients (family heads and individuals) revealed that
in the summer of 1970, 41 percent were on welfare because of permanent
disability or illness, 26 percent because of the absence of husband, 13 percent
because of unemployment, 9 percent because of old age and 8 percent because of
temporary disability. As of March 1970 there were about 1.25 million people
(5.8 percent of the population) receiving social assistance in Canada,
including about 500 000 family heads or single adults.
It should be noted that most of the recommendations of these three
groups related to provincial, not federal, activities since the administration
of assistance is a provincial responsibility. However, the proposal to permit
an income- test in place of the needs test to simplify administration required
a change in or reinterpretation of the Canada Assistance Plan.
The reform of Unemployment Insurance in 1970 had a signifi- cant impact
on CAP by keeping people off assistance rolls and offering benefits at levels
not requiring supplemen- tation. (However, many of these reforms have since
been reversed, causing upward pressures on CAP spending.) In November 1970 the
Federal Government published a White Paper on Income Security proposing to
convert family allowances to an income-tested program, to raise the Guaranteed
Income Supplement, and to improve the CPP. It rejected the Guaranteed Annual
Income as a replacement for income security programs, and proposed experiments
in Canada like those in the U.S. that were evaluating the guaranteed income
approach. It proposed discussions with the provinces on the future of CAP with
particular reference to:
1. The right of access to assistance.
2. Income exemptions as work incentives.
3. The adequacy of assistance levels in covering basic requirements.
4. Improved appeals machinery.
5. More effective communication with recipients and
support for welfare rights groups. 6. Simplified administration and
minimizinq invasions o~ privacy.
7. A review of cost-sharing arrangements and the dividing lines between
different kinds of institutional care and services.
8. Greater participation in work activity projects.
9. Use of an income test for day care and homemaker services, and
improved accommodation, health and counselling for youth.
10. Greater coordination of welfare and manpower services, with priority
for services to get people into employment.
The reference to guaranteed income experiments was followed up by an
offer to share with provinces the cost of such studies. These would be
patterned on the experiments in New Jersey, Gary, Iowa, and Seattle-Denver, and
would explore the effects of a guaranteed income program on work incentives.
Though several provinces expressed interest, in the end only Manitoba carried
out such an experiment, concurrently with the social security review.
In discussing the nature of poverty, the White Paper noted that between
1965 and 1967 the percentage of families below the DBS low-income cut-off
levels had fallen from 21.2 to 18.6 percent. In subsequent years this
percentage fell further to 17.4 in 1969, to 15.9 in 1971 and to 12.0 in 1973.
This was a period of improvement in Unemployment Insurance benefits and OAS and
GIS payments, as well as provincial social assistance rates. Nonetheless,
Federal CAP expenditures rose from ~45O million in 1969-70 to ~727 million in
1971-72 and to ~825 million in 1973-74.
The White Paper focused on the needs of the "working poor",
those families and individuals with insufficient earnings from work to meet
their minimum requirements. This was reflected in the proposed income-tested
program for families with children and the suggestion to build better work
incen- tives into CAP to make it a more effective income supplement program for
low-income workers.
During this same period (1969-71) much emphasis was placed on
constitutional reform, culminating in the Constitutional Conference of First
Ministers ~n Victoria in June 1971. Many studies were launched on the
distribution of powers between federal and provincial governments, including
"Income Security and Social Services" a working paper published in
1969. It proposed (page 106) that provincial legislatures have exclusive
jurisdiction over social services, that Parliament have paramount powers in
respect of retirement insurance, and that Parliament and the provin- cial
legislatures have equal powers to make general income support payments to
persons and concurrent powers in respect of public income insurance measures.
The Report of Quebec's Commission of Inquiry on Health and Social
Welfare published in January 1971 proposed a provin- cial General Social
Allowances Program to replace social assistance, with two levels of
income-tested benefits for people who could work and those who could not, to be
shared under the terms of the CAP. The role of family allowances as an integral
part of the provincial system was a hotly debated issue through most of 1971 as
Quebec's proposals and the federal FISP proposals were not at first compatible.
Through negotiation they became so. But Quebec's unrequited demands for
paramountcy over all social security measures in June 1971 led to the rejection
of the Victoria Charter for repatriation of the Constitution. On the federal
side it was argued that members of Parliament would have little interest in
voting funds for programs over which they had no control.
Meanwhile from mid-March to mid-May the federal Minister worked with his
colleagues for approval of amendments to CAP which would (a) provide a basis
for supporting either needs, means or income-tested social allowances programs,
(b) provide additional support for provinces with high unemployment rates, and
(c) build in a control factor to limit federal contributions, especially for
income-tested programs. The last item was later dropped as it was considered
impossible to put a ceiling on the amount of poverty the Federal Government was
willing to help alle- viate. He discussed this proposal bilaterally with
provincial Ministers and together at the June 1971 Welfare Ministers
Conference, making it clear to them that if there was a successful resolution
of the constitutional issues concerned with social policy at the Victoria
Conference, CAP would be amended to provide compensation for programs that
employ an income test. Provinces could set up guaranteed income plans and
provide benefits to low-income workers and receive cost-sharing. With the
failure of the Victoria Conference to reach agreement, there were no more
federal- provincial welfare conferences until January 1973.
In 1971 the Senate Committee on Poverty published its report
"Poverty in Canada", which among other things recommended a federal
Guaranteed Annual Income program for all Canadians who needed it, replacing all
existing federal income- maintenance laws except CPP, Unemployment Insurance,
veteran's Allowances, and benefits for native peoples. It recommended also that
the CAP be retained and updated "to serve as a vehicle for
federal-provincial cooperation and cost-sharing in the delivery of social
services", and to cover those not initially covered by the GAl on a
"needs basis
Although a successful solution to the FISP problem had been negotiated with
Quebec in late 1971, the revised FISP failed to receive Parliamentary approval
in July 1972, and died when an election was called in August. In the absence of
a federal-provincial forum for welfare ministers to discuss their concerns, the
Quebec and New Brunswick ministers persuaded their provincial colleagues to
convene in Victoria late in November 1972 at the first of many Interprovincial
Welfare Ministers' Conferences. The two issues emphasized at this meeting were
the integral importance of a strong family allowance program to any provincial
social welfare system, and the pressing need for a joint federal-provincial
review of the whole social security system in Canada.
IV. Joint Federal-provincial Social Security Review 1973-78
In April 1973 the federal Minister issued a "Working Paper on
Socia1 Security in Canada" and called a federal- provincial conference of
Welfare Ministers to discuss his proposals. It presented five strate9ies and 14
propositions for joint consideration. Three task forces of federal and
provincial officials were set up to deal with these questions. The Working
Paper focused on "those who can work" and the need for built-in work
incentives in an income supplement program for them. For those who cannot work
it proposed income support. Its sixth proposition was that:
"The incomes of those who are working but whose incomes are
inadequate by reason of family size or by reason of the nature of their
employment (low-paying self-employment or intermittent or partial employment)
should be supplemented under a single, general income supplementation plan,
with built-in work incentives."
Its seventh proposition was that:
"A Guaranteed Income should be available to people whose incomes
are insufficient because they are unable or are not expected to work, namely
the retired or disabled, single parent families, and people who are not
presently employable by reason of a combination of factors such as age, lack of
skills, or length of time out of the labour market."
Its ninth proposition was that:
"While income supplementation along the lines provided for in
propositions 6 and 7 would remove the great majority of people from social
assistance at it now stands, a supplemen- tary or "last resort"
programme would be required to meet special situations as they arose (as is now
provided for under the Canada Assistance Plan)."
This last proposition reflected the initial view of the authors of the
paper that the Canada Assistance Plan was a necessary evil, to be tolerated
until it could be replaced. They believed that it gave the provinces a
"blank cheque", and that a ceiling on the federal commitment was
needed. This would be achieved by reducing the CAP to a residual support or
"last resort" plan, and replacing its main assis- tance thrust with a
new guaranteed income or income support plan yet to be designed. The social
services provided by CAP were dealt with in the Social and Employment Services
Strategy (itself an afterthought when the absence of any reference to social
services was noted) under propositions 10 and 11, which proposed that:
"The broad spectrum of social and unemployment services required to
make the employment and income supplementation strategies fully effective and
efficient should be extended and improved - training, counselling, placement,
rehabili- tation, special work situations, homemaker and child care
services."
"The costs of special services including nursing home and child
care, which cannot be met by the individual out of his/her income, including
income supplementation, should be covered through special measures under the
general social security system."
The Task Force on Income Maintenance focused for months on the proper
design of the Income Supplement and Guaranteed Income (Income Support)
programs; many meetings and interim reports dealt with work incentives, and
definitions of incomes, of family, of accounting periods, in order to get more
"rationality" into the assistance programs. To iden- tify the target
population, it developed also extensive statistics on the characteristiccs of
those classed as "the working poor . But there was a lack of consensus as
to whether the federal or provincial government would operate all or part of
the program. A cost-sharing offer was made by the Federal Government in June
1976 for a two-tiered income support and supplementation plan. It was not
enthu- siastically received by the provinces, and was withdrawn in August 1977.
Federal Task Force members then directed their efforts to salvage the
principles and design features it contained by developing the federal
Refundable Child Tax Credit which was legislated in 1978, for Family Allowance
recipients with below average income, and by suggesting ways of improving CAP.
These included the addition of work incentives, and the development of better
guidelines to replace the Interim Guidelines adopted in 1975 to clarify the
boundaries for cost-sharing, and to ensure consistency with the income support
and supplementation proposals.
The Task Force on Social Services sought to achieve parity with the way
in which health services are provided - some made available on a universal
basis, some with user charges geared to income, some only on the recommendation
of a professional counsellor. It emphasized the need to separate the provision
of financial support from the provision of welfare services. It explored the
nature of and the need for protective, rehabilitative, preventive,
developmental and residential services, and recommended a new Social Services
Act to finance welfare services provided by CAP and rehabilitative services
provided by VRDP. Later, after a federal-provincial working group had spent a
year developing an acceptable approach to the provision of residential
services, they were removed and placed under the Established Programs Financing
Act (EPF) of 1977, in response to the provinces request for a consistent
approach to the treat- ment of institutional care, from acute hospitals through
to homes for the aged. The provinces generally agreed to the social services
proposals in June 1975 and so the Social Services Act was developed. It
received first reading in June 1977, but by then the EPF Act had caught
provincial imagination. Some provinces began pressing for a similar
block-financing approach for social services. Despite this, when the federal
Minister announced in September 1977 his intention of adopting such an
approach, the Conference of Provincial Ministers at their meeting in Edmonton
that same month was "united in their rejection of the tactics used ... in
making a unilateral proposal ... without consultation with the provinces".
After the March 1978 federal- provincial Conference of Welfare Ministers
approved the concept in principle, in May 1978 the Social Services Financing
Act was given first reading. However, the economic climate drastically changed
during 1978, and in November of that year the Minister of Finance withdrew the
offer to cost-share social services when no agreement could be reached on
revising the terms of the EPF Act.
Early in the course of the review two issues of concern were raised by
the provinces, one dealing with nursing homes, the other with day care.
Manitoba and Ontario were both inter- ested in developing universal programs
for nursing home care as part of their hospital insurance system, yet they
feared they would lose the 50 percent cost-sharing currently provided under CAP
for needy persons in nursing homes. The provinces argued that the requirements
of the CAP were forcing them to deviate from the kinds of social priorities
they wished to pursue for their own people - that it was "distorting"
provincial priorities. They were assured that no province would be worse off
financially by introducing such universal programs. Eventually the Nursing Home
Care Benefits Regulations were adopted whereby provinces could be reimbursed
for the costs of nursing home care for patients who could pass the provincial
assistance plan needs test if they had been required to do so - a sort of
"shadow" needs test. As of January 1, 1974, agreements with Ontario,
Manitoba and Alberta guaranteed payments to replace CAP revenues lost due to
the operation of universal nursing home care programs.
British Columbia and Manitoba were moving toward universal day care
programs for children of working mothers regardless of their need for assistance,
and wanted CAP sharing to continue for such programs. CAP was sharing in the
day care costs for low-income families, i.e. those "likely to become in
need" if the service were not provided. But the defini- tion of this
concept was contentious, and several provinces argued that the income
thresholds being used by the CAP administration to determine eligibility for
subsidized day care were ridiculously low. At the end of 1973 new Day Care
Interim Guidelines were worked out and agreed to by the provinces, to be
followed until such time as the future nature of income supplementation and
social services avail- able as a result of the Review had been determined. At
that stage CAP was regarded as a program soon to be replaced by something much
better. It was expected that under the Social Services Act, day care services
would be available to all, with user fees set on a sliding-scale according to
income.
Another contentious area was the question of young offenders; should
they qualify as "children in care"? The Solicitor General was
developing a Young Offenders Act, and many provinces were concerned that they
would lose CAP sharing for children in correctional services operated by
welfare authorities. On the other hand, Ontario and New Brunswick argued that they
had children in care who were under the jurisdiction of correctional
authorities and were unjustifiably being denied cost-sharing because of their
philosophy of child care for young offenders. So in April 1974 payments to
these two provinces were authorized to share in the cost of such services for
young offenders under the Young Offenders Agreements. (It was not until July
1982 that the Solicitor General was successful in having the Juvenile
Delinquents Act replaced by the Young Offenders Act, effective 2 April 1984.
Youth transferred to provin- cial corrections jurisdiction are no longer
covered by CAP. Those not yet transferred and still under the Juvenile
Delinquents Act may be covered still under CAP for a year, when their situation
must be reviewed. Youth under provin- cial child welfare authority are still
covered under CAP.)
These three issues illustrate the nature of the "interface"
problem that CAP has confronted since its inception. If health, educational,
and correctional institution costs are not to be shared, where are the lines to
be drawn? What part of a building is a health institution, and what part is
welfare? when is a school for handicapped children educa- tional, and when is
it welfare? Disputes about where such lines should be drawn led to the downfall
of the Social Services Act in 1977, and generally made for a contentious
atmosphere in federal-provincial relations as the Social Security Review came
to a close amid the economic con- straints of 1978. Provinces welcomed EPF in
1977 because it meant no more federal "nit-picking" over the
eligibility for sharing of specific provincial expenditures. But they found
that, when nursing homes and homes for special care were transferred from CAP
to EPF, there still remained the need to draw lines between these types of
accommodation and other specialized kinds of shelter for transients, assault
victims, and so on. Although the nature of the lines had shifted, they still
had to be drawn in new locations to delimit CAP's sharing responsibilities.
CAP's interface problems with EPF were found to be numerous:
1. Residential services for adults were no longer share- able, but
children's residential services in adult residential care facilities were.
2. Are nurses in mental health programs to be regarded as providing
services that are part of Extended Health Care (covered under EPF) or part of
the rehabilitation service shareable under CAP?
3. The nature of the professional services involved determined whether
the services being provided by a Rehabilitation Centre were social or medical.
4. CAP cost-sharing was available for adult day care services provided
only to non-residents by institutions for adults.
5. Home care services are covered under EPF Extended Health Care, but
meal services are shareable under CAP as long as they are provided to
non-residents, residents temporarily out of an institution are not eligible.
6. Respite services (short-term admissions to relieve families caring
for infirm relatives) are not shareable under CAP.
7. Community preventive services must be differentiated from home care
and ambulatory services provided by community health and social service centres
to deter- mine what is shareable under CAP. 8. Family planning services when
rendered by a physician
or in a hospital are ineligible for CAP sharing.
Determining what is shareable is still CAP's major problem.
V. Period of Restraint 1978-1984
The problem of settling boundary questions for CAP sharing has generated
a great deal of the federal-provincial friction that has been associated with
this program. In its early years there seemed to be a high level of social
content in joint discussions around CAP; until about 1976 there was a sense of
utilizing government policy initiatives to solve the many problems of poverty
faced by Canadians. In the last decade discussions have seemed to have a much
lower level of social content: they have centred on negotiating additional
expenditures to be shared for borderline provincial programs. There has been a
federal suspicion that provinces were working on schemes designed to get more
federal cost-sharing rather than to solve social problems. Concurrently, the
federal treasury was pressing for stricter controls on CAP spending. As a
result, provincial dissat- isfaction with CAP and its administration mounted,
as provincial treasuries also suffered from fiscal constraints. As new
provincial programs were developed, and old ones evolved, the federal
cost-sharing rules seemed to the provinces unclear and ambiguous, and federal
discretion seemed to be employed to thwart their plans for expansion.
During the period 1978 to the present, three major themes have dominated
developments in the social assistance field. With the tremendous upsurge in
unemployment rates, many more "unemployed employables" appeared on
the welfare rolls, leading to renewed efforts to build work incentives into the
assistance programs and to help recipients back into employment. The fiscal
restraint announced in August 1978 reduced the federal funds available for
social welfare items. And the acrimonious nature of federal-provincial
negotiations on EPF amendments, the Canada Health Act, and the Charter of
Rights in a repatriated Constitution created a very difficult atmosphere in
which to conduct federal-provincial consultations on welfare issues.
The Social Security Review had emphasized the need to build work
incentives into the design of income supplementation plans in order to ensure
that low-income workers would not be worse off than those on assistance, and
that assistance recipients could improve their incomes by working, even part
time. When the Income Support and Supplementation offer was withdrawn in August
1977, efforts were increased to improve social assistance plans by building
better work incentives into them. This could be done by modifying the benefit
reduction rates for income from earnings, or by increasing the band of exempt
earnings before benefits start to be reduced. At the November 1978
federal-provincial Welfare Ministers' Conference, the federal Minister agreed
to find ways to improve CAP work incentives and to update other CAP guidelines.
After much discussion and considerable provincial pressure, in July 1980 the
federal authorities increased by 50 percent the ceiling on earnings exemptions.
The amounts allowed for work-related expenses and the liquid asset exemption
levels were also substantially increased. The flat-rate exemption for aged and
disabled beneficiaries has been regularly increased to keep pace with OAS/GIS
levels. These guidelines had been introduced in May 1975 as temporary measures
during the Review.
The needs test with its required examination of a family's budget and
basic needs, as well as assets, income, and other resources, was another source
of contention for some provinces. It was said to be demeaning for the
applicant, and it made for higher costs of administration. Several provinces
preferred a simple test of income and standard budgets for various family
sizes. The CAP administration accepted the concept of a "pre-added"
budget with rates for most items fixed in advance, but insisted that at least
one item, shelter costs, be kept as a variable to be determined for each
family. where provincial programs shifted to a straight income test, the
Federal authorities insisted that the province either "carve out"
those who did not qualify under the needs test, or apply a "shadow"
needs test to identify those recipients who could qualify as "persons in
need". The latter was used for nursing home care, and the former for
family benefits for single mothers, guaranteed income for the disabled, and
supplementary benefits for aged persons. "Carving out" meant that a
needs test was applied first and if qualified, the applicant received shareable
assistance payments; an income test was then applied and the applicant might
receive a supplement to assistance, or the full benefit if no assistance was
payable. Not all prov- inces were prepared to accept this position. Ontario and
Quebec were both strong advocates of the income test approach which they believed
was more efficient and less demeaning. Although the Federal Cabinet had
approved this in 1971 as a "carrot" for constitutional reform,
successive Cabinets have since withstood pressure to amend CAP to include the
income test approach as an option to the budget review approach, probably
fearing the fiscal consequences.
During the Social Security Review much emphasis was placed on "work
activity" projects (Part III of CAP) as part of the Employment Strategy.
Some provinces developed model "community employment" projects in
1973 and '74 to show how welfare recipients could be gainfully employed.
Several provincial welfare departments developed their own placement services
to find jobs for their clients. With the continued upsurge in unemployment in the
1980's, some provinces have re-examined the Work Activity concept in order to
get cost-sharing for their job-readiness projects. The federal
- 26 -
Department had certain reservations about these projects. Even though they were clearly designed to help people back into employment, it was feared that CAP was overlapping into CEIC's area of jurisdiction - job creation and placement. Early in 1984 Quebec proposed certain pilot projects to run from April 1984 to August 1986 which would be added to the list of shareable programs under their CAP agreement, and this the Federal Government accepted.
- 26 -
Department had certain reservations about these projects. Even though they were clearly designed to help people back into employment, it was feared that CAP was overlapping into CEIC's area of jurisdiction - job creation and placement. Early in 1984 Quebec proposed certain pilot projects to run from April 1984 to August 1986 which would be added to the list of shareable programs under their CAP agreement, and this the Federal Government accepted.
Concerned with the phenomenal increase in the number of assistance
recipients in 1982 and '83, Quebec gave top priority to resolving the
unemployment problem, but with little success. Its pilot project has promising
possibili- ties, with its focus on those under 30 who cannot find or keep jobs.
It is a five-pronged project, of which three prongs are potentially shareable
under CAP - the completion of secondary education, work experience, and
community service. (The other two prongs deal with wage subsidies and wage
supplements.) Over the next two years it is to cost CAP $59 million. About 9000
recipients are expected to participate in the "rattrapage scolaire" program
to obtain a secondary school diploma in preparation for future employ- ment.
Perhaps 30 000 recipients would participate in the year-long work experience
project - alternating study and work sessions to develop basic knowledge and
skills, subsidized by training allowances paid by employers. The community
service project, also for one year, would focus on the development of
volunteers in local promotional and service organizations, and might involve
about 10 000 recipients. Out of a total caseload of 400 000 recipients, 260 000
(65 percent) of whom are employable, Quebec esti- mates there are 85 000 single
persons under 30 without dependents. Close to 50 000 of these would be
participating in the pilot project. Quebec's caseload is estimated to be about
42 percent of the national caseload of 950 000. If the Quebec project is a
success it may demonstrate to other provinces how they can help reduce their
own welfare case- load by helping people to find employment.
The second theme of the period has been fiscal restraint. Following Tax
Reform in 1971 and the Established Programs Financing Act of 1977, the federal
share of tax revenues had been steadily declining, while provincial tax
revenue~ w~r~ increasing. The implications of this trend for shared-cost
programs must be obvious, especially where the receiving government has all the
control over the amounts that are to be shared. The relative fiscal positions
of the federal and provincial governments in 1985 are considerably different
from those of 1965 when CAP was being developed. The fiscal imbalance of the
1980's has been a source of concern to the Federal Government and has given
rise to successive attempts to cut back on federal CAP commitments. - 27 -
Fiscal restraint was being felt as early as 1977 and no doubt contributed
to the withdrawal that year of the offer to share in Income Support and
Supplement plans. But it was formally announced in August 1978 and led
immediately to program reductions and layoffs in the federal public service,
including the abolition of 800 positions in Health and Welfare. The proposed
Social Service Financing Act was an early victim of restraint, sacrificed when
provinces would not agree to any cutbacks in the EPF arrangements. At the same
time there were suggestions that a ceiling should be imposed on federal
expenditures under CAP, which was expected to face increasing demands from the
provinces for sharing in the costs of social services. At the end of 1978, it
was being predicted that the social service component of CAP would continue to
grow at the rate of 20 percent, its average over the previous 6 years: Quebec
was forecasting a 13 percent growth rate, Alberta a 24 percent rate, and
Ontario was expected to have much expanded claims for child maintenance costs.
The fear that provinces would increasingly use CAP as a fiscal instrument to
improve their own incomes without improving their social programs led to
consideraton of terminating the CAP agree- ments and negotiating new
arrangements that would ensure federal control over future federal expenditures
on assistance.
In September 1978 three options were examined: vacating the field
entirely and yielding the corresponding tax points to the provinces, block
financing which would involve payment to each province of the same national per
capita average regardless of its own assistance expenditures, or reducing below
50 percent the percentage of provincial expenditures to be shared. In each case
it would be the low-income provinces that were hardest hit. Any saving to the
Federal Treasury would be realized at the expense of the poor, the disabled,
the aged, single mothers with small children, and the long-term unemployed -
since the poorer provinces would have to reduce rates of assistance or
caseloads, and tighten eligibility rules in order to cut their spending. But
the problems of backing out of a long-term federal commitment to social welfare
seemed to outweigh the apparent advantages of capping federal expenditures on
the relief of poverty. In any ca~e, this approach was set aside after the 1979
election.
when the Social Services Financing Act was abandoned on 9 November 1978,
the federal department had been asked to explore ways of limiting the increases
in federal CAP contributions. This limitation was presumed to apply only to
social services, not assistance, and it was proposed to the provinces that they
limit growth in these areas to 11 percent in 1979. The provincial reaction to
this proposal was largely negative. By July 1980, provincial expenditures on
social services had not increased nearly as much as had been anticipated.
Nonetheless it was proposed that two central agencies (MSSD and Finance) review
both EPF and CAP, and a Task Force was set up in September to develop a
strategy for renegotiating CAP and identifying the appropriate division of
social policy responsibilities between the federal and provincial governments.
They were concerned by the growing fiscal imbalance, and by the lack of federal
leverage in setting standards and in controlling costs. Federal transfer payments
to provincial governments were seen as an area of significant potential
savings; if they could be reduced, a better fiscal balance would be achieved,
and federal efforts could be concentrated in areas of federal concern. Any
changes, however, should not undermine the federal commitment to basic social
programs. At the same time constitutional discussions were underway, and there
were many doubts expressed about the appropriateness of the federal role in
contributing to social services or assistance.
In preparing its contribution to the work of this Task Force, the
Department made the assumptions that the Federal Government would continue to
share responsibility for solving major social problems, but that it sought a
more effective use of resources - perhaps by reallocating among target groups
or types of services. If effective targetting were to continue, the federal
authorities must maintain the principles that all people in need are entitled
to assistance, with no requirement for prior residence, and that effective
appeals machinery must be maintained. Some thought was given to cost-sharing
percentages that varied among provinces, related to some measure of provincial
needs and costs, such as the provincial personal income tax base, or relative
per capita wage, unemployment and labour force participation rates. It was
clear however, that unless more federal money could be allocated to the field,
some provinces would get less, and their social programs would decline.
Early in 1981 a set of guiding principles had been developed by the Task
Force for transfer payments in the social policy area - including the extent of
federal constitutional responsibility for reducing poverty and improving the
quality of life.
These principles are as follows:
1. Federal financial involvement by means of transfer payments to
provinces for social programs that are under the general constitutional
authority of the provinces, is based on a commitment by the federal government
to ensure that Canadians share in the benefits and obliga- tions of common
nationhood, have access to basic social services and through these programs
strengthen their identification with Canada as a nation.
2. Federal financial support to the provinces for major social programs
is to ensure the development and main- tenance of fundamental national
standards in these programs.
3. The federal government is committed to ensuring that the costs of
provincial basic social programs which have major benefits outside the province
are fully shared by all Canadians.
4. Federal involvement in the financing of provincial social programs
brings a responsibility for a coopera- tive federal-provincial partnership in
the development of policy.
5. Social programs supported by federal transfers should provide full
portability of benefits and equality of access to all Canadians.
6. Funding agreements with the provinces should ensure the provision of
adequate information for Parliament to evaluate the expenditure of federal
funds.
7. Federal-provincial transfer payments arrangements must provide for
full visibility of the federal role in the support of these programs.
The third theme that dominated this period was the acrimo- nious nature
of federal-provincial relations. The proposals to repatriate the Constitution
with a new Charter of Rights and Freedoms, to amend the EPF Act which expired
in 1982, and to replace Hospital and Medical Care Insurance with the new Canada
Health Act, created a very difficult atmosphere in which to discuss anything
with the provinces, especially CAP changes that might reduce the contributions
they would receive. Nonetheless discussions were held. At the time the Social
Services Financing Act was withdrawn, two issues were left with the federal
authorities to resolve - how to improve work incentives and update assistance
guidelies (which was discussed previously), and how to simplify CAP's
administration. In June 1980 the Chairman of the - 30 -
Interprovincial Conference of Welfare Ministers proposed that a
co-chaired federal-provincial task force be set up to review administrative
procedures and program guidelines for CAP. At issue was the potential sharing
of new provincial assistance programs like the Saskatchewan Family Income Plan,
and the Quebec Work Income Supplementation Plan, neither needs-tested. The
provinces wanted the law changed, or the guidelines abolished. They wanted a
completely pre- added budget (i.e. income-tested); they wanted various
restrictions removed, like the "carving out" provision to identify
those costs eligible for sharing, the provision that there be no prior
residence requirement, and the provision that there be prior federal review and
approval of each work activity project; and they wanted a simplified audit. In
the federal view some of these issues could best be dealt with on a bilateral
basis, while for others a multilateral review was appropriate - such as the
inter- pretation of "likely to be in need", the "auspices"
under which welfare services may be provided (e.g, health? corrections?
education?), the use of sampling to determine shareable expenditure, and
further exploration of work incentives.
Such a task force was set up in the fall of 1980 by the
Federal-Provincial Ministers' Conference - the Task Force to Review CAP and
VRDP. Its report in May 1981 identified those changes that the provinces wanted
to permit them more flexibility in designing and operating their programs,
including streamlined reporting systems, a revised audit process to eliminate
duplication, reduced delays in final- izing claims, a more flexible evaluation
system for work activity projects, better measures to maintain disabled persons
in employment, relaxation of earnings exemption guidelines, and sharing in
income-tested benefits for selected target groups.
Following this a Continuing Committee of Officials was set up in the
fall of 1981 to explore these issues further. They met and considered joint
audits, methods to alter the existing exemption guidelines, and the
"likelihood of need" concept with more generous thresholds for income-testing
cost-shared welfare services.
The Task Force also noted the implications for CAP of the Report of the
Special Parliamentary Committee on the Disabled and the Handicapped
("Obstacles") published in February 1981, which had recommended a
number of improvements in the provision of services for disabled persons.
The following year the Parliamentary Task Force on Federal- Provincial
Fiscal Arrangements reported on CAP and EPF. The terms of reference of this
Task Force called on it to examine CAP and the expenditures made under the EPF
Act with a view to recommending a reduction in payments to the provinces.
However, the Task Force recommended:
- the continuation of cost-sharing for social assistance (all members in
favour) and social services (a majority in favour);
- increased spending on several program changes, including variable
cost-sharing to recognize varying levels of need for social assistance payments
in different provinces;
- no overall reduction in the fiscal commitment for programs now
cost-shared under CAP;
- a review of the extent to which provinces are meeting program
conditions and consultation with the provinces on more precise definitions;
- strengthened requirements for statistical and financial information to
improve understanding of the programs cost- shared under the Plan.
The Parliamentary Task Force made several observations, among which was
the need to reduce interprovincial varia- tions in per capita spending, and to
encourage the development of national standards in social assistance (all members
in favour) and services (a majority in favour).
Since CAP's creation in 1966 it has had a substantial effect on the
level of provincial spending on social programs, especially on social services.
No doubt the decision to share in the costs of increased provincial
administration contributed to the growth of provincial and municipal welfare
infrastructures as well.
The following tables have been presented in order to indicate the growth
in assistance caseloads and expenditures in recent years. From these tables it
may be noted that the number of beneficiaries, including dependents, has
increased by 50 percent between March 1974 and March 1983 - from 1 208 600 to 1
832 900 persons - with an increase of 22 percent between 1982 and 1983. Since
1973 British Columbia's beneficiaries increased by 120 percent; since 1974 the
increase in Quebec was 70 percent and in Alberta 62 percent. However, part of
this is due to a change in definition. - 32 -
Between 1967-68 and 1982-83, social assistance expenditures rose from
$450 million to $4 billion with close to a ten- fold increase in Quebec and
eight-fold increase in Ontario, reaching $1.5 billion and $1 billion
respectively. British Columbia and New Brunswick expenditures increased to
fifteen and seventeen times their spending in 1967-68. Overall expenditures
increased by 15 percent in '81-'82 and by 28 percent in '82-'83. These amounts
are for assistance only. In addition, another $2,2l6 million was spent on
social services under CAP in 1982-83, and $l,980 million in 1981-82, compared
with $737 million in 1974-75. Half these sums are reimbursed from the Federal
Treasury under the Canada Assistance Plan.
By 1983-84 total expenditures on social assistance had risen to $4,940
million and on social services to $2,344 million.
Now in its twentieth year, the Canada Assistance Plan has clearly had a
tremendous impact on the quality of life and well-being of millions of
Canadians, in a period when wide- spread unemployment and rapid inflation were
taking their toll in human misery and deprivation, thwarting the career plans
of our youth and the contingeny savings plans of older people. It has not
achieved all that the provinces would like it to have done, but it has put
billions of dollars of tax revenues into the hands of those whose need is
greatest, and has helped finance services for disadvantaged children, disabled
persons, and elderly people who have lost their independence. It has become
part of the fabric of life in Canada.
Source:
Service to the Public - Canada Assistance Plan
Government of Canada
1985
Service to the Public - Canada Assistance Plan
Government of Canada
1985
Note: In the hard copy version of this report, the last two pages are tables showing the number of welfare cases and related costs.
Source:
Social Security Statistics: Canada and the Provinces, 1978-79 to 2002-03
Table 361 - Number of Beneficiaries of General Assistance (including dependants), as of March 31
Table 362 - Total Federal-Provincial Cost-Shared Expenditures for General Assistance
Social Security Statistics: Canada and the Provinces, 1978-79 to 2002-03
Table 361 - Number of Beneficiaries of General Assistance (including dependants), as of March 31
Table 362 - Total Federal-Provincial Cost-Shared Expenditures for General Assistance
The most recent version of Social Security Statistics is:
Social Security Statistics, Canada and Provinces, 1978-79 to 2002-03
http://web.archive.org/web/20070814082442/http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/en/cs/sp/sdc/socpol/tables/page00.shtml
Social Security Statistics, Canada and Provinces, 1978-79 to 2002-03
http://web.archive.org/web/20070814082442/http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/en/cs/sp/sdc/socpol/tables/page00.shtml
1967
A
Statement on Poverty and the Canada Assistance Plan
elcic.ca/.../300.41967-AStatementonPovertyandtheCanadaAssistancePlan...
for
work, and for living in decency and dignity. We believe that in ... Canada,
brings an integrated approach to social assistance. It represents a major
step ...
==============
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* Money for nothing : What effect
would guaranteed annual income have on employers?(Canadian HR Reporter) -
September 5
* NDP MP Romeo Saganash's Speech On Murdered, Missing Aboriginal Women Silences House (The Canadian Press) - September 19 * Plans to cut parental programs draw scorn in Quebec (Globe and Mail) - September 16 * Brigit's Notes - Le Bloc-notes de Brigit (September 2014 - septembre 2014) (Canadian Women's Health Network - Réseau canadien pour la santé des femmes) * Action for Seniors (Employment and Social Development Canada) - September 10 * SPARmonitor - Monitoring Toronto's Social Change - September 17 (2014) issue [SPAR = Social Policy Analysis & Research, City of Toronto] * Poverty and the provincial election - September 16 - The New Brunswick Provincial Election is September 22 * Federal cuts force child-care, welfare groups to crowdfund (CBC News) - September 15 * Social Assistance Rates Update (eff. September/October 2014) : Ontario Works & Ontario Disability Support Program and the Ontario Child Benefit (Income Security Advocacy Centre) * [Canada] Bill tabled to ban refugees from social assistance (Toronto Star) - September 11 * [Canada] A Petition of Academics Against the Canada Revenue Agency Audit of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (Progressive Economics Forum) - September 11 *What's New in The Daily [Statistics Canada]: --- Consumer Price Index, August 2014 - September 19 --- Employment Insurance, July 2014 - September 18 --- Population projections: Canada, the provinces and territories, 2013 to 2063 - September 17 --- StatCan Blog, September 2014 : Projecting the population - September 17 --- Health Reports, September 2014 : Positive mental health and mental illness - September 17 --- Job vacancies, three-month average ending in June 2014 - September 16 --- Productivity: What Is It? How Is It Measured? What Has Canada's Performance Been Over the Period 1961 to 2012? - September 16 * What's new from the Childcare Resource and Research Unit * Poverty Dispatch: U.S. media coverage of social issues and programs * [United States] Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2013(Census Bureau) - September 16 * [New Zealand] Universal Income Trust * Child Rights Information Network - CRIN
---
What
was new before that?
- This is a link to the online version of the September 14 (2014) issue of the Canadian Social Research Newsletter. |
 "Do not judge me by my successes, judge me by how many times I fell and got back up again." |
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------ Direct Links
to Top Media Sites / Blogs ------
* Canadian
Progressives Aggregator * Progressive
Economics Forum Blog * NewsMap Canada * iPolitics * PolicyMonitor.ca * National Newswatch * Canadian Dimension *Bourque
Newswatch Canada * Google
Canada News * CBC * CTV * Canada.com*Ottawa
Citizen * Ottawa
Sun * Hill
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---------------------------------- [... more blogs & media links ... ] ---------------------------------------------------------
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What's New across Canada 100+ direct links to What's New pages on Canadian social research websites (govt. & NGO)
Media
Scan page (Income Security Advocacy Centre)
[ Toronto - Ontario - Canada - (some) international ]
UPDATED TO SEPTEMBER 8, 2014
What's
New elsewhere in the world
50+ direct links to What's New pages on U.S. And international government and NGO websites
Poverty
Dispatch - U.S.
[NOTE: the content of the Poverty Dispatch is updated every weekday.] - links to news items back to July 2006, mostly from the American press about poverty, homelessness, welfare reform, child welfare, education, health, hunger, Medicare and Medicaid, etc.
Gilles'
Poverty Dispatch Archive
[Table of contents for each daily dispatch back to December 2011, all on one page!] |
Numbers in parentheses (--) below represent
the number of links on each page.
[- some links appear on more than one page -]
[- some links appear on more than one page -]
Federal/National
All
Canadian federal, provincial and territorial government home pages on one
page (14)
Top-level home page for each Canadian government - Canada, the provinces and the territories Federal government - general (202) Prorogation (97) Gouvernement fédéral (84) - présentation des sites en français --- Common Look and Feel Standards for the Internet (CLF 2.0) *How the federal government changed the roadmap to its websites (Feb. 9/09) --- The Harper Government™ Record [Lest We Forget] (270) Open government Federal government - departments: --- Agriculture to Environment (328) --- Finance (468) --- Fisheries and Oceans to Veterans Affairs (626) --- Statistics Canada Link Archive * (3,500+ links to selected StatCan social studies from 2012 back to 2008) [ * WARNING : The StatCan Link Archive is 303 printed pages.] Employment and Social Development Canada (452) - incl. Canada Pension Plan, Old Age Security, Employment Insurance, Social Insurance Number, etc. Employment Insurance (272) (incl. historical UI/EI reports) Federal [social spending] Caps and Cuts, 1972-1995 Health - Canadian and international (683) The unofficial [national] Social Union / NCB page (351) The government debate about the cost of Medicare (383) The Federal Government's Role in Poverty Reduction in Canada (20) (part of the national antipoverty links page of this site)
Provincial/territorial (P/T)
Departments
responsible for welfare (13)
Welfare policy manuals (107) Social Union - P/T pages (241) Council of the Federation (98)
Newfoundland
and Labrador (224)
Prince Edward Island (171) Nova Scotia (387) New Brunswick (389) [version française (30)] Quebec(598) [version française (473)] Ontario: --- Guide to welfare in Ontario (145) --- Provincial government (822) - including minimum wage --- NGO/Municipal govt. [A-C] (687) --- NGO/Municipal govt. [D-N] (626) --- NGO/Municipal govt. [O-Z] (1170) --- Poverty reduction in Ontario (561) --- Review of social assistance in Ontario (328) --- The Ontario Special Diet Allowance (45) --- The Drummond Commission report --- Drug testing people who apply for or receive welfare --- Spouse-in-the-house (54) (welfare cohabitation rules for single people & single parents) --- Gouvernement de l'Ontario - page d'accueil (version française) (31) Manitoba(389) Saskatchewan(305) Alberta(518) British Columbia --- Provincial government (631) --- NGO [A-C] (442) --- NGO [D-W] (511) --- Welfare Time Limits (94) --- 2010 Vancouver Olympics and Poverty Olympics (73) Yukon(143) Northwest Territories (148) Nunavut(82)
American
links
U.S. government social research (847) U.S. non-governmental social research [A-J] (873) U.S. non-governmental social research [M-Z] (625) Pension reforms (254) - incl. retirement pension reforms in Canada, the U.S. and Chile Poverty measures - U.S. and other international resources (744)
Social
research elsewhere in the world
Government (1278) Non-government (1021) Children and Families - International - incl. U.S. (831) Women's sites - International (430)
|
Aboriginal
people / First Nations (498)
Anti-poverty strategies and poverty reduction: --- Provincial and territorial information (1072) ------ Ontario information (561) --- National/federal & international information (836) Asset-based social policies (368) Banks and business (253) - includes a whole section on Wal-Mart! Brain drain (56) Canadian government budgets (+analysis/critique) [incl. federal, provincial and territorial budgets] --- 2015 --- 2014 (374) --- 2013 (345) --- 2012 (202) --- 2011 (424) --- 2010 (356) --- 2009 (396) --- 2008(298) --- 2007 (245) --- 2006 (188) --- 2005 (243) --- 2004 (204) Canada Assistance Plan / Canada Health and Social Transfer / Canada Health Transfer / Canada Social Transfer (312) Canada Pension Plan (see "Human Resources and Skills Development Canada" in the left column) Canada’s Economic Action Plan (156) Canadiana (132) - incl. Canada country reports, history links, U.S.-Canada studies, etc. Canadian history links (24) [NOTE: this is part of the Canadiana Links page] Case law / Court decisions / Inquests (201) Census - see "Social statistics" further down in this column Census : the 2011 long-form questionnaire (443) --- mandatory long form vs voluntary survey Children, Families and Youth: --- National/federal government sites (220) - [includes the Canada Child Tax Benefit Guideline Table, July 2014 to June 2015] --- Canadian non-governmental organizations (602) --- Childcare Resource and Research Unit Archives (1500+) --- International resources(831) --- Children's rights (CRIN) (458) ------ CRINMAIL Archives I [2011 to 2013] (260+) ------ CRINMAIL Archives II [2014] (50) --- Early learning and child care - govt. links [aka early childhood development] (415) --- Early learning and child care - NGO links (719) Chilean pension model - see Pension Reforms (below) Conferences and events (498) + special designated days/weeks/months/years + past conferences Conservative omnibus crime bill (2011) Council of the Federation (98) Disability(642) Education(208) Elections: --- 2011 federal election (574) --- 2008 federal election (393) --- 2006 federal election (303) --- 2004 federal election (316) --- Provincial-territorial elections (273) Employment (finding) (part of ESDC Links page) Employment Insurance (272) (incl. historical reports on UI/EI and job vacancies) Federal [social spending] Caps and Cuts, 1972-1995 Federal government's role in poverty reduction in Canada (20) Flat tax(37) Food banks and hunger (589) G8 / G20- Globalization (744) Gambling - social costs (42) Guaranteed annual income (362) The Harper Government™ Record [Lest We Forget] (220) Health - Canada and international (683) Homelessness and housing(1501) Human rights(631) Inequality (income/wealth) (717) International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (17 October) (31) Labour market info (part of ESDC Links page) Legislation and law (15) Media (124) - Media scan of social issues by Jennefer Laidley Medicare - the future of health care (383) Minimum wage / living wage links (368) Municipalities (380) National Child Benefit - see "Social Union", below National Council of Welfare (R.I.P.) (incl. links to 150+ NCW reports) Non-governmental organizations: --- Canada (522) --- U.S. [A-J (873)] --- U.S.[M-Z (625)] --- International (1021) --- Provincial/territorial NGOs ==> select a jurisdiction in the left column of this page Old Age Security - see "Human Resources and Skills Development Canada" in the left column Pension reforms (254) - incl. retirement pension reforms in Canada, the U.S. and Chile Political parties - see "Elections" (above) Polls(11) Pooled Registered Pension Plans Poverty measures: - Canadian resources (429) - U.S. and other international resources (744) Self-sufficiency project (35) Poverty reduction initiatives - see Anti-Poverty Strategies and Campaigns Prorogation - 2010 (107) Seniors(652) Social Finance and Social Impact Bonds (26) Social Insurance Number (part of the HRSDC Links page) Social research organizations I (600) Social research organizations II (418) Social statistics (687) - (incl. Census, poverty, income, welfare, population, crime & justice, social security, health, etc.) Social Union / National Child Benefit (NCB): --- The unofficial [national] Social Union / NCB page (351) --- The unofficial [provincial/territorial] Social Union / NCB page (241) Socialist sites (62) Socioweb [external site : Sociology] Spouse-in-the-house (41) - (Ontario welfare) Tobin tax and Robin Hood tax (55) Taxes and Tax Freedom Day (28) Unions(92) United Nations links (774) --- International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (17 October) Universities/colleges(324) Voluntary sector / charities (165) --- Welfare (social assistance): --- Depts. responsible for welfare (13) --- key provincial/territorial links (1072) - incl. welfare stats and benefit levels --- policy manuals (107) --- fraud (10) --- welfare reforms in Canada (289) --- selected historical texts about welfare in Canada --- welfare leavers (40) --- welfare statistics --- Welfare in Canada 2012 (Welfare Incomes) --- welfare Incomes by province/territory, 2011 --- review of social assistance in Ontario -- drug testing people who apply for or receive welfare --- welfare time limits - British Columbia (94) --- Canada Assistance Plan / Canada Health and Social Transfer / Canada Social Transfer (312) --- Wikipedia articles on poverty and welfare (24) --- "Working Joe" vs "Welfare Joe"--- reality check --- welfare in Canada vs the U.S. - NOT the same thing! --- Women's social issues: --- Canadian government women's sites (257) --- Canadian non-governmental women's organization sites (502) --- International women's sites (350) Work-Life Balance (245)
`
|
Ottawa Links
For
Ottawans, like me, or anyone seeking information about
Ottawa:
Weather
Conditions in Ottawa
--- [ elsewhere in Canada ] City of Ottawa (municipal government home page) Hydro Ottawa Power Outages OttawaStart.com Find a Health Services Professional in Ottawa (or anywhere else in Canada ) by postal code Ottawa blogs from OttawaStart Social Planning Council of Ottawa Community Information Center of Ottawa Green Ottawa Ottawa Kiosk Flyerland Ottawa (flyers, coupons, catalogues, contests, etc.) Shop.ca - Canadian online shopping RentSeeker.ca - Find houses/ apartments for rent in Toronto, Ottawa, Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, Montreal, Hamilton and other cities across Canada OttawaGasPrices.com Canada National Gas Price Heat Map
--------------------------------
Local free classifieds sites: - Kijiji Ottawa - FreeCycle Ottawa - craigslist Ottawa - UsedOttawa.com - Used cars in Ottawa [ from AutoCarDeals.com ] - Locanto.ca - Ottawa - Khrido Ottawa Yalwa Ottawa Business Directory Askalo - Discover Ottawa Take it Back! - where to dispose of non-recyclables in Ottawa (automotive - garden supplies - health - electronics - household products) Recycling/composting in Ottawa - City of Ottawa info including collection calendar Recycle your electronics OttawaEntertainment.ca Ottawa Movies - showtimes, locations, trailers, reviews The Internet Movie Database Current Time in Ottawa CTV Ottawa (formerly CJOH) CBC Ottawa Ottawa Radio Stations - live feeds Bank Street Bully - Ottawa's Finest?
---------------------------------------------------------
Ottawa
webcams:
Highway
417 (Queensway) Traffic Cams - from CBC Ottawa
- links to 11 cameras, from the 417 split in the East End to the 416 split in the West End - recommended link! Ontario Ministry of Transportation Highway 417 Traveller's Road Information (click the "traffic cameras" box) - Same cameras as the link above but slower to use; includes more road info Ottawa Municipal Traffic Video - links to traffic webcams at dozens of intersections throughout Ottawa. Interactive Traffic Map: Ottawa Parliament Hill Webcam - Four words: Like. Watching. Paint. Dry. |
I
launched the Canadian Social Research Links website on November 13, 1997.
I receive no funding from any source for this work (except for the Google ads that I added in June 2010). The biases you find are mine and mine alone. (See About this Site)
I check
for broken links to external sites as time permits; if you find any broken
links during your visit to the site, just send me a message and I'll try to
fix them.
Except
for federal government sites and links, that is. Those bloody sites are
rebuilt and re-launched every few years, it seems, and the site architecture
changes radically almost every time with no consideration whatsoever of those
poor saps who have collections of links to site content, like Canadian Social
Research Links. If you find a broken federal government link, copy the title
you're seeking into the search box on the new site. If that doesn't work, do
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--------------
SOCIAL
ASSISTANCE- NOVA SCOTIA
How to Apply for Income
Assistance
To apply for Income Assistance, call the nearest office of
Community Services and make an appointment. The easiest way to do this is to
call our toll-free number at1-877-424-1177 or find your local
office.
Tell the person who answers the phone that you want to apply for Income
Assistance. (Let the office know if you have an emergency.) Someone will then
ask you questions about your situation.
Have these things by the phone when you make the call:
·
bank
statements for your account
·
your
Social Insurance Number (SIN)
·
any other
information that can help the person understand your financial situation and
your family situation
You may find out from this call if you seem to be eligible. (Read about
eligibility.) You
may get a meeting with a worker. Or you may have to wait until someone calls
you back.
What to bring to your first meeting with a
caseworker
The caseworker needs the documents that show whether you are eligible.
You can only get Income Assistance after they have all the documents they need
to complete your application.
When you make your appointment, the caseworker should tell you what you
need to bring. You may want to check off all the things the caseworker asks you
to bring on this list
·
your
Health Card number
·
your
Social Insurance Number (also known as your SIN)
·
the SIN
of your spouse
·
the SIN
of any dependent children who have one. To replace a Social Insurance Card call
toll free 1-800-206-7218.
·
your
Health Card
·
the
Health Cards of all your family members To replace a lost Health Cardc call
496-7008 or toll free 1-800-563-8880.
To look at your finances, the caseworker may need to see your
·
bank
account statements
·
insurance
policies
·
Registered
Retirement Saving Plans or RRSPs
·
Registered
Education Saving Plans or RESPs
·
the final
cheque stub from your last job
·
income
tax assessment forms
To look at what you pay for shelter, the caseworker may need to see
·
a copy of
your lease
·
the name
and address of your landlord
·
bills or
receipts that show the extra costs you pay – for heat and electricity, for
example
To understand your situation, the caseworker may need to see your
·
birth
certificate
·
drivers
license
·
marriage
license, divorce order
·
adoption
papers
·
school
documents
To replace a lost birth certificate, marriage certificate, or death
certificate, call Vital Statistics at 424-4381 or toll free
at 1-877-848-2578
The caseworker will photocopy all the documents you bring and keep the
copies in a file. This information is kept confidential. Keep the originals for
your records.
What happens at the first meeting
Your caseworker will fill out the 'ESIA Intake/Application form' using
the information you give them. Both you and your spouse must sign the form if
you are married and living together or living common law.
Read the information to make sure it is correct before you sign the
form. This form will ask you questions about your personal situation and
whether you have any reasons that you can not work on a plan to become more
self-sufficient.
You sign a 'Release of Information Authorization' form. This form allows
Community Services to confirm the financial information for your application.
The caseworker will read the form to you and explain what it means.
It is important that you understand it. Keep asking questions
until you are sure.
The caseworker will ask where you are looking for work. They will also
ask if you have looked for support from programs like Canada Pension Plan
Disability Benefits, or Worker’s Compensation.
You will likely be asked to complete other forms, depending on your
cicumstances. For example, you may be asked to complete a ‘Client Personal and
Financial Statement’ form.
How long before you know if you'll get Income
Assistance
The caseworker collects all the information. After that, it usually
takes three to seven days.
Your caseworker will call you or send a letter. You may also call the
office.
You will be told one of two things:
·
that you
are eligible, and the amount you will be getting
·
that you
are not eligible and the reasons for that
What
if I get turned down?
The letter you receive will tell you why. You can also ask the
caseworker to explain the reasons.
You can also appeal the decision. If you appeal, there are two steps to
the appeal process:
·
Step 1 –
Administrative Review – the administrative review is done by someone new to
your file, such as a local supervisor. That person will make sure that the
department did all the right things to arrive at its decision
·
Step 2 –
Appeal Hearing – if you are not satisfied with the decision of the
administrative review and wish to continue with your appeal, then you must tell
us in writing. This appeal goes to the Assistance Appeal Board. The Board will
listen to your side of the story and decide if the Department’s decision should
be changed.
After
you've been accepted
When can I expect the assistance to start?
That depends on your situation. Monthly assistance usually comes three
working days before the end of the month. It may come as a cheque or direct
deposit.
How do I get the money?
You can get the money in one of two ways
·
have it
deposited directly into your bank account. This is called 'direct deposit.'
Community Services recommends this because it is safe, you get your money on
time, and it is confidential. Your caseworker will help you set up direct
deposit if you want to use it
·
have your
cheque mailed to you
Keep notes! We recommend that you keep notes of appointments, the names
and telephone numbers of people you talk to, and a list of resources in your
community that may help you. Your caseworker will help you.
Related information
o
You can
find out more information about the application process in the
Department's Guide to Employment Support and Income Assistance (PDF).
----------------
NOVA
SCOTIA- MUNICIPALITIES- SOCIAL ASSISTANCE...
This
consolidation is unofficial and is for reference only. For the official
version of the regulations, consult the original documents on file with the Registry of Regulations, or refer to the Royal Gazette Part II.
|
Regulations
are amended frequently. Please check the list of Regulations by Act to see if there are any recent
amendments to these regulations filed with the Registry that are not yet
included in this consolidation.
|
Although
every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of this electronic version,
the Registry of Regulations assumes no responsibility for any discrepancies
that may have resulted from reformatting.
|
This
electronic version is copyright © 2009, Province
of Nova Scotia, all
rights reserved. It is for your personal use and may not be copied
for the purposes of resale in this or any other form.
|
Municipal Assistance Regulations
|
made under Section 18
of the
Social Assistance Act
R.S.N.S. 1989, c. 432
O.I.C. 81-665 (May 19, 1981), N.S. Reg. 76/81
as amended up to and including O.I.C. 1999-464 (Sept. 28, 1999), N.S. Reg. 93/99
Social Assistance Act
R.S.N.S. 1989, c. 432
O.I.C. 81-665 (May 19, 1981), N.S. Reg. 76/81
as amended up to and including O.I.C. 1999-464 (Sept. 28, 1999), N.S. Reg. 93/99
1 In these regulations
(a) "Act" means Part
II [Part I] of the Social Assistance Act;
[Note: Part I of the Act was repealed by S.N.S. 1977, c. 63, s. 1; Part II was renumbered Part I as part of the statute revision of 1989.]
[Note: Part I of the Act was repealed by S.N.S. 1977, c. 63, s. 1; Part II was renumbered Part I as part of the statute revision of 1989.]
(b) "agency" means an
organization approved by the Minister to provide Municipal Social Services;
(c) "applicant" means a
person who applies for assistance under the Act;
(d) "assets" means cash,
bonds, stocks, debentures or other assets that can be converted readily into
cash and includes the beneficial interest in assets held in trust and available
to be used for maintenance and may include the amount remaining to be paid
under a mortgage or agreement for sale, or the cash surrender value of a life
insurance policy;
(e) "assistance" means the
provision of money, goods or services to a person in need, including
(i) items of basic requirement: food, clothing,
shelter, fuel, utilities, household supplies and personal requirements,
(ii) items of special requirement: furniture,
living allowances, moving allowances, special transportation, training
allowances, special school requirements, special employment requirements,
funeral and burial expenses and comforts allowances. The Director may approve
other items of special requirement he deems essential to the well being of the
recipient,
(iii) health care services: reasonable medical,
surgical, obstetrical, dental, optical and nursing services which are not
covered under the Hospital Insurance Plan or under the Medical Services
Insurance Plan,
(iv) care in homes for special care,
(v) social services, including family counselling,
homemakers, home care and home nursing services,
(vi) rehabilitation services;
(f) "child in voluntary
care" means
(i) a child approved for placement or placed by a
children's services agency under the Children's and Family Services Act in a
facility or in the home of a person other than his natural parent or guardian,
and whose parent or guardian is unable to support the child without assistance,
or
(ii) a child who is placed in a home for special
care and whose parent or guardian is unable to support the child without
assistance;
(g) "Committee" means a
Social Services Committee of a municipal unit or units appointed or acting
pursuant to the Act;
(h) "dependent" means a
person defined by the municipal social services policy as being dependent upon
the applicant for the provision of food, clothing and shelter;
(i) "Director" means the
Director of Municipal Social Services, Department of Social Services, Province
of Nova Scotia;
(j) "home" means a home for
special care as defined in the Homes for Special Care Act;
(k) "income" means earned
income as defined by the municipal social services policy and includes unearned
income as defined in these regulations;
(l) "income maintenance
payment" means a payment made to a person by Canada or Nova Scotia in
respect of loss or presumed loss of income by reason of unemployment, loss of
the principal family provider, illness, disability or age;
(m) "municipal social services
policy" means written directives relating to the granting of assistance
issued by a Municipal Council and approved by the Minister;
(n) "recipient" means a
person who qualifies for and receives assistance under the Act, these
regulations and the municipal social services policy;
(o) "resident" means a
person in need who is being cared for in a home;
(p) "Social Services
Director" means a person
(i) appointed by a Committee with the approval of
the Municipal Council and the Minister,
(ii) appointed by the Minister, or
(iii) approved by the Minister and appointed by an
agency under the terms of a contract entered into between an agency and the
Committee with the approval of the Municipal Council for the purpose of
administering and managing all matters that are the responsibilities of
Committees;
(q) "unearned income" shall
include income maintenance payments such as Old Age Security, Guaranteed Income
Supplement, Canada Pension, Family Benefits, Workers' Compensation, War
Veteran's Allowance, Unemployment Insurance, income from insurance, income from
alimony and maintenance payments, income from stocks and bonds, income from
training allowances, and any other income not directly resulting from
employment.
Clause 1(q) amended: O.I.C. 84-321, N.S. Reg. 58/84.
Clause 1(q) amended: O.I.C. 84-321, N.S. Reg. 58/84.
Standards of administrative
organization
2 (1) The Social Services Director of the Committee shall
2 (1) The Social Services Director of the Committee shall
(a) provide applications for
assistance in the form prescribed or approved by the Minister;
(b) record on a budget form
prescribed or approved by the Minister, the financial information required to
be recorded on such budget form;
(c) determine the immediate and
continuing eligibility of each applicant;
(d) provide assistance in accordance
with the provisions of the Act, these regulations and the municipal social
services policy;
(e) interview the applicant and keep
a written summary on file of the interview;
(f) give the applicant a clear
indication of his responsibility to inform the Social Services Director of any
change in his circumstances;
(g) give the applicant notice of his
right to appeal and a copy of the procedures for filing an appeal;
(h) require an applicant who is
employable to produce acceptable evidence that he has made a reasonable effort
to obtain employment;
(i) require an applicant to provide
the information required to determine his eligibility for assistance;
(j) ensure that the applicant has no
other reasonable source of income which can be used for his financial needs;
(k) grant assistance to those persons
who are eligible effective
(i) the date of the application, if the person
meets the eligibility requirements of the Act, these regulations and the
municipal social services policy on that date, or
(ii) the day the person meets the eligibility
requirements of the Act, the regulations, and the social services policy;
(l) review semi-annually a
recipient's circumstances to determine if the recipient continues to be
eligible for assistance and keep a written summary of the review on file;
(m) make available to the public at a
reasonable cost the municipal social services policy;
(n) make available lists of persons
who are receiving or have received assistance under Part II [Part
I] of the Act only to those persons who require the information to perform
their lawful duty;
[Note: Part I of the Act was repealed by S.N.S. 1977, c. 63, s. 1; Part II was renumbered Part I as part of the statute revision of 1989.]
[Note: Part I of the Act was repealed by S.N.S. 1977, c. 63, s. 1; Part II was renumbered Part I as part of the statute revision of 1989.]
(o) permit all records and files
relating to the granting of assistance and the claims for reimbursement to be
reviewed by a person or persons authorized by the Minister to make such a
review;
(p) comply with the procedures and
practices prescribed by the Minister, the municipal unit, the Director or
persons authorized to prescribe procedures and practices, as they pertain to
financial procedures and internal controls.
(2) The Social Services Director may
grant assistance in an emergency situation without complying with the
requirements of clauses (a) to (l) inclusive of subsection (1).
3 (1) A municipal unit will be
considered to have an organized social services department if
(a) the municipal unit has made
provision to grant assistance through a municipal social services department
established pursuant to Sections 20 or 22 of the Act;
(b) the person in charge of the
social services department and other members of the staff who are engaged in
social service work possess the qualifications prescribed in subsection (2);
(c) the office of the social services
department is readily accessible and open during reasonable hours to applicants
and recipients of assistance;
(d) the records of the social
services department are kept in accordance with the requirements set out in
these regulations or as directed by the Minister or the person designated by
the Minister to administer the Act and these regulations;
(e) the social services department
places emphasis on rehabilitation and social services;
(f) the appointment of the Social
Services Director and of each member of the staff of the social services
department who is engaged in social service work, has been approved by the
Minister.
(2) The Social Service Director and
every member of the staff of a social services department engaged in municipal
social service work shall
(a) be in good physical and mental
health;
(b) provide adequate references
respecting character and suitability for the office;
(c) attend such courses of training
as prescribed by the Minister and shall also either
(i) be an employee of the Municipal Social Services
Department, the Provincial Department of Social Services or an agency and be a
professionally trained social worker, or
(ii) have had work experience in an allied field,
sufficient in the opinion of the Minister to qualify him for the office, and
(iii) have satisfactorily completed in-service
training as prescribed by the Minister.
Standards of assistance
4 (1) Assistance shall be provided on the budget deficit system whereby a person's financial needs are calculated pursuant to these regulations and the municipal social services policy as approved pursuant to these regulations. Where the needs exceed the income, assistance shall be granted in the amount by which the needs are in excess of the income.
Subsection 4(1) replaced: O.I.C. 88-445, N.S. Reg. 97/88.
4 (1) Assistance shall be provided on the budget deficit system whereby a person's financial needs are calculated pursuant to these regulations and the municipal social services policy as approved pursuant to these regulations. Where the needs exceed the income, assistance shall be granted in the amount by which the needs are in excess of the income.
Subsection 4(1) replaced: O.I.C. 88-445, N.S. Reg. 97/88.
(2) For the purpose of calculating a
person's budget deficit, the municipal unit will take into account the
recipient's items of basic requirements as specified in the municipal social
services policy and the income, assets and resources available to him to meet
such requirements to provide adequately for himself or for himself and his dependents.
(3) The Director may permit, waive or
modify the provisions regarding the calculation of the budget deficit where
this would promote the rehabilitation of the applicant or recipient.
(4) The municipal unit shall obtain
the approval of the director before granting assistance for the return of
transients to their province of origin.
(5) Where a special needs allowance
is granted pursuant to the Family Benefits Regulations, to a recipient who is
blind, deaf, or who is disabled because of a spinal cord injury or its
equivalent, the municipal unit shall not include the special needs allowance in
the calculation of income.
(6) Income from the Child Tax Benefit
component of the Canada Child Tax Benefit, the Nova Scotia Child Benefit and
the Goods and Services Tax Credit shall not be considered as income for the
purpose of these regulations.
Subsection 4(6) added: O.I.C. 84-321, N.S. Reg. 58/84; replaced O.I.C. 1998-473, N.S. Reg. 74/98.
Subsection 4(6) added: O.I.C. 84-321, N.S. Reg. 58/84; replaced O.I.C. 1998-473, N.S. Reg. 74/98.
(7) Financial compensation received
by individuals pursuant to the Memorandum of Understanding regarding
Compensation for Survivors of Institutional Abuse shall not be considered as
income or as an asset for the purpose of determining a persons’ eligibility for
assistance pursuant to the Act and these regulations but any income generated
from the compensation shall be considered as income for the month in which it
is received for the purpose of determining a person’s eligibility for such
assistance.
Subsection 4(7) added: O.I.C. 96-451, N.S. Reg. 106/96.
Subsection 4(7) added: O.I.C. 96-451, N.S. Reg. 106/96.
(8) Where
(a) assistance is paid to or on
behalf of a person pursuant to the Act by the Minister on behalf of a
municipality in respect of the obligations of the municipality under the Social
Assistance Act;
(b) the person has been overpaid in
respect of benefits paid to the person or on behalf of the person pursuant to
the Family Benefits Act; and
(c) the person is no longer in
receipt of benefits under the Family Benefits Act,
the Director may recalculate the assistance paid to
the recipient by reducing the assistance paid to the recipient or on behalf of
the recipient in such a manner and in such amounts as the Director or person
acting on behalf of the Director may determine.
Subsection 4(8) added: O.I.C. 97-97, N.S. Reg. 16/97; replaced: O.I.C. 1999-464, N.S. Reg. 93/99.
Subsection 4(8) added: O.I.C. 97-97, N.S. Reg. 16/97; replaced: O.I.C. 1999-464, N.S. Reg. 93/99.
Projected operational plan
5 (1) Each municipal unit shall prepare and submit to the Minister not later than September 15th in each year, a "projected operational plan" (hereinafter called the "plan") for the ensuing fiscal year, which shall include
5 (1) Each municipal unit shall prepare and submit to the Minister not later than September 15th in each year, a "projected operational plan" (hereinafter called the "plan") for the ensuing fiscal year, which shall include
(a) a list of all personnel, both
professional and clerical, employed by the social services department stating
the job title, employment experience, and salary of each employee as of June
30th and the proposed salary for the ensuing fiscal year;
(b) a list of each proposed new
position to be filled during the ensuing fiscal year with the job title,
qualifications, proposed salary and date the position is expected to be filled;
(c) a statement of the estimated
operating costs of the social services department for the ensuing year,
including all administrative expenses as defined in Section 6 of these
regulations;
(d) a statement of the estimated
income to the social services department for the ensuing year from all sources
exclusive of the reimbursement for assistance costs and administrative
expenses;
(e) a statement of the estimated
costs of assistance to be expended during the ensuing year by the municipal
unit;
(f) a copy of the municipal social
services policy approved by the Council respecting the programs the municipal
unit proposes to carry out during the ensuing year, including the application
of assets and the scales of assistance approved by the Council to be granted to
the applicants and recipients.
(2) A full and complete explanation
shall accompany the financial statement.
(3) The Minister may approve or
withhold approval of a plan or the costs set out in the plan, in whole or in
part.
(4) Where the Minister approves the
plan, he shall so advise the municipal unit.
(5) Where the Minister withholds approval
of a plan, in whole or in part, he shall forthwith inform the municipal unit of
the reasons why the plan was not approved, and shall give the municipal unit an
opportunity to submit an amended or new plan for approval.
(6) Reimbursement shall not be made
in respect to any expenditures made by a municipal unit under a plan which the
Minister has not approved.
(7) Notwithstanding subsection (6),
the Minister may reimburse a municipal unit for expenditures not provided for
in the plan if the Minister is satisfied that the expenditures were reasonably
necessary and could not reasonably have been foreseen or provided for in the
plan.
(8) An application by a municipal
unit for reimbursement by the Minister shall be in such form and contain such
information as the Minister may prescribe.
Reimbursement - assistance and
administration
6 (1) Where a municipal unit has an organized social services department, and complies with the standards of administrative organization and the standards of assistance set out in these regulations and the projected operational plan of the unit has been approved by the Minister, the Minister may reimburse the unit for assistance furnished to a person in need by paying to the unit a percentage of the amount furnished not greater than the percentage prescribed in Appendix "A" for the unit.
Subsection 6(1) replaced: O.I.C. 85-24, N.S. Reg. 16/85.
6 (1) Where a municipal unit has an organized social services department, and complies with the standards of administrative organization and the standards of assistance set out in these regulations and the projected operational plan of the unit has been approved by the Minister, the Minister may reimburse the unit for assistance furnished to a person in need by paying to the unit a percentage of the amount furnished not greater than the percentage prescribed in Appendix "A" for the unit.
Subsection 6(1) replaced: O.I.C. 85-24, N.S. Reg. 16/85.
(2) Where a municipal unit does not
have an organized social services department, but has complied with the
standards of administrative organization except for Section 3 and the standards
of assistance set out in these regulations, and the projected operational plan
has been approved, the Minister may reimburse the unit for assistance granted
to a person in need by paying to the unit sixty-six and two-thirds percent of
the amount granted.
(3) Where a municipal unit has
provided assistance to a person in an amount greater than the person's budget
deficit, the Minister may reimburse the unit for the appropriate proportion of
its expenditures if he is satisfied that in the circumstances the provision of
the amount of assistance was necessary.
(4) Subject to these regulations, the
Minister may reimburse a municipal unit with an organized social services
department by paying to the unit in respect of its administrative expenses a
percentage of the amount of such expenses not greater than the percentage
prescribed inAppendix "A" for the unit.
Subsection 6(4) replaced: O.I.C. 85-24, N.S. Reg. 16/85.
Subsection 6(4) replaced: O.I.C. 85-24, N.S. Reg. 16/85.
(5) For the purpose of this Section,
administrative expenses include payments made by a municipal unit or jointly by
municipal units for any of the following expenses:
(a) the payment of salaries of
members of the staff of the municipal unit, whether professional or clerical,
for services performed in the administration of the social services department,
at the rates not above those set out by the Department of Human Resources for
similar positions;
(b) the payment of travelling
expenses incurred in [the] administration of the social services department
including
(i) operation and repairs of a motor vehicle owned
by the municipal unit,
(ii) a standard mileage allowance or rate as
approved by the Minister for the use of a motor vehicle owned by a member of
the staff of the municipal unit,
(iii) taxi and bus fare, and
(iv) the purchase price of a motor vehicle owned by
the municipal unit, where provision is made for the amortization of the
purchase price over a reasonable period of time;
(c) the payment of the cost of
necessary books and periodicals, printing, stationery, advertising, postage,
expressage and the cost of necessary equipment and furnishings for a social
services office;
(d) the payment by a municipal unit
or jointly by municipal units to an approved agency or the Department of
Community Services for the administration of the social services department of
the unit or units;
(e) the payment of any other expenses
that, in the opinion of the Minister, are reasonably required for the efficient
and proper administration of the social services department; and
(f) the expenses incurred in
attending such conferences or in-service training as are approved by the Minister.
(6) A municipal unit claiming
reimbursement for assistance expenditures paid to persons in need shall submit
a claim at least once a month and the claim for any month or part of a month
shall be submitted within thirty days of the end of the period for which the
claim is being made. The Minister may refuse to reimburse a municipal unit on
claims which are not submitted within the time period prescribed in this
subsection.
(7) No reimbursement will be provided
for administrative expenses relating to salaries of social services department
personnel whose appointment has not been made in accordance with the procedures
established by the Minister.
(8) Where a municipal unit provides
for the maintenance of a child in voluntary care as defined by the Children and
Family Services Act, for a period of time which is consistent with that Act,
the Minister may reimburse the unit by paying to the unit a percentage of the
amount provided not greater than the percentage prescribed in Appendix "A" for the unit.
Subsection 6(8) replaced: O.I.C. 85-24, N.S. Reg. 16/85.
Subsection 6(8) replaced: O.I.C. 85-24, N.S. Reg. 16/85.
Subsection 6(9)
repealed: O.I.C. 95-559, N.S. Reg. 113/95.
6A (1) A municipal unit shall pay a
comforts allowance to persons in need residing in a home at the rate of $105.00
per month.
(2) Where a municipal unit does not
comply with subsection (1), the Minister may provide the comforts allowance to
the person in need and may deduct the cost thereof from any assistance payable
to the municipal unit by the Minister.
Section 6A added: O.I.C. 82-1312, N.S. Reg. 222/82; replaced: O.I.C. 92-1246, N.S. Reg. 274/92.
Section 6A added: O.I.C. 82-1312, N.S. Reg. 222/82; replaced: O.I.C. 92-1246, N.S. Reg. 274/92.
Reimbursement - homes for special
care and regional rehabilitation centres
7 (1) Subject to these regulations, where a municipal unit maintains a resident in a home, in whole or in part, the unit shall be responsible to pay the home on behalf of the resident the per diem fee rate which has been fixed, established or prescribed pursuant to the Homes for Special Care Act and regulations for each day the resident is maintained in the home where the unit has paid the said amount, the Minister shall reimburse the unit by paying to the unit a percentage of the amount which the unit paid the home, not less than 66 2/3 percent of the difference between the amount charged by the home and the revenue received by or on behalf of the resident from any source other than the municipal unit.
Subsection 7(1) replaced: O.I.C. 87-61, N.S. 14/87; amended: O.I.C. 91-45, N.S. Reg. 11/91.
7 (1) Subject to these regulations, where a municipal unit maintains a resident in a home, in whole or in part, the unit shall be responsible to pay the home on behalf of the resident the per diem fee rate which has been fixed, established or prescribed pursuant to the Homes for Special Care Act and regulations for each day the resident is maintained in the home where the unit has paid the said amount, the Minister shall reimburse the unit by paying to the unit a percentage of the amount which the unit paid the home, not less than 66 2/3 percent of the difference between the amount charged by the home and the revenue received by or on behalf of the resident from any source other than the municipal unit.
Subsection 7(1) replaced: O.I.C. 87-61, N.S. 14/87; amended: O.I.C. 91-45, N.S. Reg. 11/91.
(1A) For the purpose
of subsection (1), revenue does not include revenue from the husband, wife,
father, mother, son or daughter of a resident in a home for the aged or a
nursing home.
(1B) The
reimbursement calculated pursuant to the provisions of subsections (1) and (1A)
shall be reduced by the amount by which the total of the calculated
reimbursement and the revenue received from all sources, including the revenue
described in subsection (1A), exceeds the per diem rate approved by the
Minister.
Subsections 7(1A) and (1B) added: O.I.C. 84-268, N.S. Reg. 44/84.
Subsections 7(1A) and (1B) added: O.I.C. 84-268, N.S. Reg. 44/84.
(2) Where the municipal unit of
settlement pays a comforts allowance, not exceeding the monthly amount approved
by the Minister to a person in need in a home for special care or in a
hospital, the Minister may reimburse the municipal unit for sixty-six and
two-thirds percent of the allowance if the balance in the person's comforts
allowance account does not exceed the amount approved by the Minister.
(3) Notwithstanding the other
provisions of this Section, the Minister is not bound to reimburse a municipal
unit for expenditures made for the purpose of maintaining a resident in a home
or a centre unless he is satisfied that
(a) the person in respect of whom the
expenditures were made is a person in need of placement in a home as determined
by the classification committee established under the Homes for Special Care
Act;
(b) the home where the person is
maintained is a suitable place for the care of the person;
(c) the person is maintained in a
home approved or licensed under the Homes for Special Care Act; and
(d) that medical, social services and
financial assessment reports are completed as required by the Director.
Clause 7(3)(c) amended: O.I.C. 82-1120, N.S. Reg. 200/82.
Clause 7(3)(c) amended: O.I.C. 82-1120, N.S. Reg. 200/82.
(4) A municipal unit claiming reimbursement
for assistance expenditures paid to persons in homes for special care shall
submit a claim at least once a month and the claim for any month or part of a
month shall be submitted within thirty days of the end of the period for which
the claim is being made. The Minister may refuse to reimburse a municipal unit
on claims which are not submitted within the time period prescribed in this
subsection.
8 (1) For the purposes of this Section
and Section 7, a "centre" is a Regional Rehabilitation Centre licensed
under the Homes for Special Care Act and regulations as a Regional
Rehabilitation Centre.
(2) Notwithstanding Section 7, the
Minister shall reimburse the municipal unit operating a centre at one hundred
percent of the difference between the per diem rate approved by the Minister
for the centre and the revenue received by the municipal unit on the person's
behalf from sources other than a municipal unit for each day that the person is
maintained in the centre.
(3) For the purposes of subsection
(2), a person is deemed admitted to a centre as an approved resident as of the
day the person actually becomes a resident in the centre and continues to be an
approved resident until the date specified by the classification committee
established under the Homes for Special Care Act as the discharge date.
(4) The classification committee
shall, immediately following its decision respecting discharge, give written
notice of the discharge date to the resident and the clerk of the municipality
in which the resident has a settlement where the municipality may be
responsible for maintenance and care of the resident.
(5) If a resident is not removed
within thirty days of the discharge date, the municipality of settlement shall
assume payment of one hundred percent of the cost of maintaining the resident.
(6) The expenses of conveying a
person to a centre shall be paid
(a) by the municipal unit in which
the person has a settlement; or
(b) by the Province where the person
does not have a settlement in the Province.
General reimbursement requirements
9 The Minister may decide that a municipal unit is not eligible to receive reimbursement for expenditures incurred in providing assistance to persons in need if the municipal unit has granted assistance in a manner or an amount which is inconsistent with or contrary to the provisions of the Canada Assistance Plan, the regulations and the policies made pursuant to the Canada Assistance Plan.
9 The Minister may decide that a municipal unit is not eligible to receive reimbursement for expenditures incurred in providing assistance to persons in need if the municipal unit has granted assistance in a manner or an amount which is inconsistent with or contrary to the provisions of the Canada Assistance Plan, the regulations and the policies made pursuant to the Canada Assistance Plan.
Commencement
10 These regulations shall come into force and apply on and after the 12th day of May, 1981.
10 These regulations shall come into force and apply on and after the 12th day of May, 1981.
Appendix "A" - Percentages prescribed pursuant
to Section 6
Last updated: 18-10-2013
------------
Contact
Community Services
Most communication with the
department should be done through your local office. Select a region from the
map below to find your local district office. For questions related to housing
or child welfare (including child abuse) see the section Other offices and contacts, below. To send an e-mail, see the
section E-mail forms, below.
Local offices by region
Other offices and contacts
·
Offices with Child Welfare Services
Child welfare services include child protection and supports for children in care, including foster care and adoption. These are also the offices where you can report suspected cases of child abuse.
Child welfare services include child protection and supports for children in care, including foster care and adoption. These are also the offices where you can report suspected cases of child abuse.
·
Housing Authority Offices (includes Public Housing)
These offices are responsible for the administration and management of public housing and other affordable rental housing programs. Applications are available through these offices.
These offices are responsible for the administration and management of public housing and other affordable rental housing programs. Applications are available through these offices.
·
Housing Services Offices & Other Housing Contacts
Contact Housing Services about home improvement loans, grants, and other financial assistance programs related to improving or developing housing.
Contact Housing Services about home improvement loans, grants, and other financial assistance programs related to improving or developing housing.
·
Head Office Contacts
These contact numbers are generally for specific administrative or policy development sections in the department.
These contact numbers are generally for specific administrative or policy development sections in the department.
E-mail forms
·
Contact Us About Community Services
Use this form for general comments or questions related to the Department of Community Services.
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·
Contact Us About the Community Services Website
Use this form to let us know about technical or content issues with the Community Services site.
Use this form to let us know about technical or content issues with the Community Services site.
Social Assistance Act
CHAPTER 432
OF THE
REVISED STATUTES, 1989
amended 1994-95, c. 7, ss. 105-106, 150; 2000, c. 27, s. 22
NOTE - This
electronic version of this statute is provided by the Office of the Legislative
Counsel for your convenience and personal use only and may not be copied for
the purpose of resale in this or any other form. Formatting of this electronic
version may differ from the official, printed version. Where accuracy is
critical, please consult official sources.
An Act to Provide for
Social Assistance
Social Assistance
Short title
1 This Act may be cited as the Social Assistance Act. R.S., c. 432,
s. 1.
Interpretation
2 In this Act,
(a) "Minister" means the Minister of Community Services or, in
the case of homes for the aged and licensed nursing homes, means the Minister
of Health;
(b) "municipal unit" means a municipality to which the Municipal Act applies, a city or an incorporated
town. R.S., c. 432, s. 2; 1994-95,
c. 7, s. 105.
Administration of Act
3 The Minister has general supervision
over the administration of this Act. R.S., c. 432,
s. 3.
PART I
MUNICIPAL ASSISTANCE
INTERPRETATION
Interpretation of Parts I and II
4 In this Part and in Part II,
(a) "council" means the council of a municipal unit;
(b) "designated residence" means a residence designated
pursuant to Section 8;
(c) "home" means a home for special care as defined in the
Canada Assistance Plan and includes a home for the aged or the disabled, a
licensed nursing home, a licensed boarding home and a social services
institution designated by the Minister;
(d) "person in need" means a person who requires financial
assistance to provide for the person in a home for special care or a community
based option;
(e) "social services committee" means a social services
committee of a municipal unit or, where no social services committee is
appointed pursuant to subsection (3) of Section 5, a council meeting as a
committee of the whole. R.S., c. 432, s. 4; 2000,
c. 27, s. 22.
SOCIAL SERVICES COMMITTEE
Social services district
5 (1) Each municipal unit
shall constitute a social services district and shall continue as such until
altered under the provisions of this Act.
Social services committee of municipal
unit
(2) The council of every municipal unit
other than a city shall annually appoint a committee of not more than five
members to be the social services committee of the municipal unit.
Social services committee of city
(3) The social services committee of a city
shall be constituted and appointed in the manner prescribed by the Act
incorporating the city or, if there is no provision for its appointment in that
Act, in the manner prescribed in subsection (2) .
Joint operation
(4) Subject to the approval of the
Minister, the councils of one or more municipal units may make and enter into
an agreement to provide for the joint operation and administration of the social
services committee of each municipal unit that enters into the agreement.
Casual vacancy
(5) If a person appointed to be a member of
the social services committee of a municipal unit ceases to reside in the
municipal unit for which the person was appointed or dies or is for any other
reason unable to act, the council of the municipal unit may appoint a member to
act in the person's stead. R.S., c. 432, s. 5.
Annual estimate
6 (1) Each social services
committee shall report to the council at its annual meeting, or at such other
time as the council directs, the estimated amount required for the assistance
of persons in need for the ensuing year.
Included in annual estimate and source
of funds
(2) The amount required by a municipal unit
for the assistance of persons in need, including amounts required for the
erection and maintenance of homes and amounts paid by the unit for the care,
maintenance, treatment and nursing of persons in hospitals and for services
there provided for them, shall be included by the council of the unit in its
estimates for the year and raised, levied and collected as part of the general
rate of levy on the whole unit and shall not be raised by an area rate. R.S., c. 432, s. 6.
Administration of responsibility of
committees
7 The social services committee with the
approval of the council may appoint a person to administer and manage or may
enter into an agreement with the Minister or an agency approved by the Minister
for the administration and management of all matters that are the responsibility
of the social services committee and may, with the approval of the council,
appoint such additional persons as may be required for the effective carrying
out of social services responsibilities in the municipal unit or in
co-operation with other municipal units. R.S., c. 432,
s. 7.
Continuation of agreement
7A Any agreement entered into between a
municipal unit or a social services committee and the Minister pursuant to
Section 7 continues in force in so far as it is required to be in force for the
purpose of enabling the Minister to
(a) administer and manage all matters that are the responsibility of the
social services committee or municipal unit under this Act and the regulations;
(b) establish policies and procedures required to provide financial
assistance to persons in need under this Act and the regulations. 2000, c. 27, s. 22.
DESIGNATION OF RESIDENCE
"residence" defined
8 (1) In this Section,
"residence" of a person means a housing unit in the Province that was
ordinarily inhabited by that person for at least two years, and includes land
on which the housing unit is situate that may reasonably be regarded as
contributing to the use and enjoyment of the housing unit as a residence or
such land that the person establishes in accordance with the regulations is
necessary to such use and enjoyment.
Successive housing units
(2) A housing unit is deemed to have been
inhabited for at least two years where that housing unit was purchased solely
with the proceeds from the sale of another housing unit and the two housing
units were inhabited for a total period of at least two years.
Designation
(3) A person in need may, before or after
any assistance is given to that person, designate that person's residence as a
residence for the purpose of this Part.
Designation by spouse
(4) A person in need and that person's
spouse may not designate different residences for the purpose of this Part.
Dispute
(5) Where there is a dispute as to whether
or not particular real property constitutes a residence for the purpose of this
Part, an application may be made to the county court for resolution of the
dispute and the county court shall determine the matter. R.S., c. 432, s. 8.
GRANT OF ASSISTANCE
Duty of committee to assist person in
need
9 (1) Subject to this Act and
the regulations the social services committee shall furnish assistance to all
persons in need, as defined by the social services committee, who reside in the
municipal unit.
Designated residence
(2) Notwithstanding subsection (1), in
making a determination pursuant thereto the social services committee shall not
take into consideration the ownership of or an interest in a designated
residence.
Sale of land
(3) Notwithstanding subsection (1), in
making a determination pursuant thereto the social services committee shall not
take into consideration the fact that land was sold for less than the maximum
attainable amount where
(a) the land is sold for at least its assessed value as determined
pursuant to the Assessment Act; and
(b) the land is land on which a housing unit that is a designated
residence is situate and the land cannot reasonably be regarded as contributing
to the use and enjoyment of the housing unit as a residence or cannot be
established in accordance with the regulations as necessary to such use and
enjoyment. R.S., c. 432, s. 9.
Statement respecting settlement
10 (1) Where a person makes
application to a social services committee for assistance, the committee may
require the person, as a condition of furnishing the assistance, to make a
written statement under oath respecting the person's settlement and respecting
matters relevant to the determination of the person's settlement.
Transmission of statement with demand
for payment
(2) Where a municipal unit, pursuant to
Section 11, seeks to recover from another municipal unit or the Minister
any amount expended by it for the assistance of a person in need, it shall
transmit the statement of the person made under subsection (1) with its demand
for payment to the other unit or to the Minister. R.S., c. 432, s. 10.
Recovery by person not liable to
support
11 (1) A person who is not
liable for the support of a person in need, but has necessarily incurred
expense for the assistance of the person in need, may recover the expense from
the municipal unit in which the person in need has a residence or a settlement,
if the person has, before incurring such expense, requested the social services
committee to furnish such assistance and no provision has been made for the
person in need.
Recovery by municipality
(2) A municipal unit in which a person in
need does not have a settlement but which
(a) has necessarily incurred any expense for the assistance of the
person in need; or
(b) has been required to pay on the account of the person in need an
amount under subsection (1),
may recover the expenses or the amount paid from the municipal unit in
which the person in need has a settlement or from the Minister if the person
has no settlement in the Province.
Extent of liability of Minister or
municipal unit
(3) A municipal unit or the Minister is not
liable under this Section except to a municipal unit for the rent or for the
use and occupation of any house or other building leased or occupied by any
person in need. R.S., c. 432, s. 11.
RECOVERY FROM PERSONS ASSISTED
Recovery from person assisted
12 (1) Where assistance has
been given by a social services committee to or for a person in need, the
municipal unit may recover from the person or, in the case of the person's
death, from the person's executor or administrator the expenses so incurred in
an action brought by the clerk in the name of the municipal unit as a debt due
the municipal unit, and the clerk may obtain as a creditor letters of
administration of the estate of the person and may file a claim against the person's
estate in a court of probate.
Limitation period respecting estate
(2) A claim against an executor or
administrator or an application for administration under subsection (1)
may not be made later than one year after the death of the person to whom assistance
was given. R.S., c. 432, s. 12.
Recovery of assistance payments
12A The Minister, or a person designated by
the Minister, has the same rights as a municipal unit to recover amounts paid
for the assistance of a person in need from that person or from that person's
executor or administrator where the assistance is paid with respect to the
maintenance of a person in a home for the aged or a licensed nursing home. 1994-95, c. 7, s. 106.
Protection of designated residence
13 (1) Notwithstanding
Section 12, where assistance is given or to be given to a person pursuant to
this Part by a social services committee, the municipal unit shall not as a
result thereof
(a) recover or attempt to recover the expenses thereof from that person
or that person's estate by means of the conveyance, sale, mortgage or
encumbrance in any way of; or
(b) force or coerce that person to convey, sell, mortgage or encumber in
any way,
that person's designated residence.
Validity of security
(2) Where a municipal unit holds a mortgage
or security on a designated residence contrary to subsection (1), the mortgage
or security is of no effect.
Existing security
(3) Where, before the twenty-fifth day of
May, 1988, a municipal unit held a mortgage or security on a residence for the
purpose of recovering assistance granted pursuant to this Part and the mortgage
or security thereon had not been realized before the tenth day of March, 1988,
the mortgage or security is of no effect. R.S., c. 432,
s. 13.
CONTRIBUTIONS BY RELATIVES
Liability of relatives and direction to
assist
14 (1) The husband, wife,
father, mother, child and children, of every person who seeks assistance from
or to whom assistance is given by a social services committee under this Part,
are jointly and severally liable for the assistance of the person and shall
assist and maintain the person to such extent and in such manner as the social
services committee may direct.
Direction to relative to assist person
in home
(2) In the case of a person in a home, the
council of the municipal unit in which the person has a settlement may direct
the extent to and the manner in which the persons named in subsection (1) shall
assist and maintain the person.
Failure to comply with direction
(3) In the case of default by any person in
complying with a direction made under subsection (1) or subsection (2), then
the municipal unit in which the person in need has a settlement is entitled to
recover from the person or persons in default such sum of money as the council
may direct, not exceeding twenty-five dollars per week, in an action brought by
the clerk in the name of the municipal unit. R.S., c. 432,
s. 14.
Inquiry into means to assist
15 (1) If any person liable
under Section 14 to maintain a person feels aggrieved by a direction made under
Section 14, the person so liable may on affidavit obtain an order from the
judge of the Family Court of the area in which the person in need has a
settlement, fixing a date for the examination under oath of the person or
persons liable, and upon that date the judge shall inquire into the means and
ability of the person or persons to assist or maintain the person in need.
Power of judge upon inquiry
(2) The judge may, if the judge sees fit,
summon and examine any of the persons mentioned in subsection (1) of Section 14
and may make such order as to the assistance and maintenance of the person in
need as to the judge seems just in the circumstances.
Notice of inquiry
(3) Five days notice in writing of the day,
hour and place of the inquiry by the judge shall be given to any person to be
examined and to the clerk of the municipal unit.
Costs
(4) The judge may, in the judge's
discretion, make such order as to the payment of the costs of and incidental to
the examination and inquiry as to the judge seems just. R.S., c. 432, s. 15.
PROVINCIAL CONTRIBUTION
Reimbursement of municipal unit by
Minister
16 (1) Subject to the
regulations, the Minister may reimburse a municipal unit for part of the
expenditures made by the unit in providing assistance under this Part, including
expenditures made for the purpose of maintaining persons in a home and
administrative expenses of the unit related to the provision of assistance.
Amount of reimbursement
(2) The amount or rate of reimbursement
under subsection (1) shall be fixed by regulations and may be at different
amounts or rates for expenditures made for different purposes and at different
amounts or rates for different municipal units. R.S., c. 432, s. 16.
Reimbursement regarding homes
17 Notwithstanding Section 16, the
Minister shall reimburse a municipal unit for not less than two thirds of the
expenditures made by the municipal unit in providing assistance pursuant to
this Part for the purpose of maintaining persons in a home, if the assistance
is granted in accordance with the standards prescribed pursuant to this Part
and the regulations. R.S., c. 432, s. 17.
REGULATIONS
Regulations
18 The Governor in Council may make
regulations
(a) prescribing standards for assistance to be granted by social
services committees to persons in need;
(b) prescribing the terms and conditions upon which municipal units will
be reimbursed by the Province for assistance expenditures made by them,
prescribing assistance expenditures in respect of which such reimbursement will
be made and providing for the calculation of the amount of such reimbursement;
(c) prescribing standards of administrative organization and defining
administrative expenses;
(d) respecting the keeping of books and records and the making of
returns to the Minister by municipal units and social services committees and
providing for the examination and audit of those books and records;
(e) respecting the returns to be made by municipal units in claiming
reimbursement from the Province for assistance expenditures;
(f) respecting the designation of a residence pursuant to this Part;
(g) defining a word or expression used in this Part and not defined
herein. R.S., c. 432, s. 18.
Appeal
19 Any person who applies for or receives
assistance pursuant to this Act on or after August 1, 2001, may appeal any
decision related to the person's application or assistance received to an
appeal board established pursuant to the Employment
Support and Income Assistance Act and the provisions of that Act and any
regulations made pursuant to that Act respecting appeals apply mutatis mutandis to appeals made pursuant to this
Section. 2000, c. 27, s. 22.
20 to 24 repealed 2000, c. 27, s. 22.
PART IV
REHABILITATION AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
Activity centres and sheltered
employment
25 Subject to the regulations, the
Minister may, out of money appropriated by the Legislature, provide financial
assistance for the establishment, maintenance and continuation of activity
centres, sheltered workshops, work activity and sheltered employment. R.S., c. 432, s. 25.
Agreements
26 The Minister may enter into agreements
to carry out the purpose of this Part with such persons, organizations,
agencies, societies or municipal units as are determined by the regulations. R.S., c. 432, s. 26.
Regulations
27 The Governor in Council may make
regulations with respect to this Part
(a) defining activity centre, sheltered workshop, work activity and
sheltered employment;
(b) respecting the manner of applying for assistance and the information
to be furnished by applicants and persons receiving assistance;
(c) providing for the time and manner of granting assistance;
(d) providing for the supervision, discontinuance, reduction, increase
and resumption of assistance;
(e) prescribing the maximum amount of assistance that may be granted;
(f) prescribing methods by which the amount and form of assistance to be
granted are to be calculated or determined;
(g) determining the persons, organizations, agencies, societies or
municipal units eligible for assistance and with which the Minister may enter into
agreement;
(h) generally for the better carrying out of the provisions of this
Part. R.S., c. 432, s. 27.
PART V
CONFIDENTIALITY
Restriction on availability of list of
assisted persons
28 No list of persons who are receiving or
have received assistance under this Act shall be made available to any person
who does not require this information to perform the person's lawful duty. R.S., c. 432, s. 28.
This page and its contents published by
the Office of the Legislative Counsel, Nova Scotia House of Assembly, and ©
2001 Crown in right of Nova Scotia. Created August 9, 2001. Send comments to legc.office@gov.ns.ca.
---------------
murder
is murder...
Lake
Echo woman sentenced to 5 years in prison for killing ...
metronews.ca/.../lake-echo-woman-sentenced-to-5-years-in-prison-for-ki...
Sep 4,
2014 - Kyla MacLellan of Lake Echo pled guilty to impaired driving causing
death and impaired driving causing bodily harm in April, following a ...
MADD
voice
of the people- chronicle herald halifax
SENTENCE
WAS JUST
I have
to disagree with John David Peer’s opinion (“Sentence too harsh," Sept.
11) that Kyla MacLellan’s sentence was too harsh. My sister-in-law was killed
by a drunk driver in the early 1990s and the impact it had on family and
friends was vast. Barb was young and had her life ahead of her. Her life was
taken away by somebody who chose to get behind the wheel and drive impaired. We
will never get to laugh and share stories with her again.
The
bottom line is that Ms. MacLellan killed somebody. Mark Burnett is never coming
back and his wife, family and friends will never see him again.
I
don’t think that the sentence is “revenge" as Mr. Peer put it — it is a
step in the right direction to show that the courts have zero tolerance for
impaired driving. Hopefully, people will think twice before getting behind the
wheel intoxicated and driving.
Cate
McCor mick, Kentville
--------------------
Canadian
women stepping up- git r done.... proud of our IDLE NO MORE CANADA
Aboriginal
recruiting program takes woman from ‘maybe’ to ‘I will’
--------------
Daphne
Bramham: B.C. court cases offer timely glimpse into prostitution’s reality
Reza
Moazami, Cody Legebokoff preyed on vulnerable girls and young women
By
Daphne Bramham, Vancouver Sun columnist September 19, 2014
Daphne
Bramham: B.C. court cases offer timely glimpse into prostitution's reality
Reza
Moazami, shown the prisoner’s box in a court on Sept.25, 2013, has been
convicted of 30 charges including human trafficking.
Photograph
by: Felicity Don , THE CANADIAN PRESS
Reza
Moazami is a 29-year-old human trafficker, child sex offender and pimp
convicted this week on 30 charges involving girls aged 14 to 19.
Cody
Legebokoff is a 24-year-old, baby-faced, serial killer sentenced this week to
life in prison for the first-degree murders of three women and a 15-year-old
girl who was legally blind. Judge Glen Perrett said Legebokoff’s intention
wasn’t just to kill the women, he wanted to degrade and destroy them.
The
link between these two B.C. men is that they both preyed on vulnerable girls
and young women.
Moazami
sold them by the hour after coercing them into prostitution, drugging them,
beating them, raping them, moving them like pawns. He tried to sell them to
other pimps.
Taken
together the two cases provide a glimpse of the violent, drug-filled,
exploitive world of prostitution.
As
Judge Perrett noted, these aren’t just criminal matters. Society helped put
Legebokoff’s four victims — three of whom were prostitutes — in harm’s way.
The
judge referred to calls for an inquiry into Canada’s murdered and missing women
since two of Legebokoff’s victims were First Nations.
But it
goes deeper than that. The life stories of all the victims are strikingly
consistent even though nine of the 11 who testified against Moazami are
Canadian-born Caucasians. (The two others came as children from Afghanistan and
Ukraine.)
Their
common denominators are dysfunctional families and addictions.
These
cases are timely as Parliament debates new prostitution laws.
Legalize
prostitution and, proponents say, prostitutes will be better able to screen
customers. Yet, no screening technique exists to identify monsters like
Legebokoff. If it did, he would have been caught after the first murder.
Legalize,
say proponents, and prostitutes will work inside and hire bodyguards to protect
them.
But
working inside didn’t keep the 11 witnesses in Moazami’s case safe.
Their
lives were hell as Judge Catherine Bruce described in her 186-page decision
that found Moazami guilty on 30 counts including five counts of sexual assault,
three counts of sexual interference, three counts of sexual exploitation and
one of human trafficking.
So,
brace yourself. Some of the disturbing facts highlighted by Judge Bruce are
going to be repeated.
E.B.
was 12 when she first worked as a street prostitute to get money for food and
clothes.
She
was 14 when she met Moazami at a North Vancouver hotel room. E.B. had gone to
rescue her friend M.N., who had called saying that she was with two men and in
trouble.
Instead
of a rescue, E.B. was ensnared by Moazami, coerced into working for him.
He
often told E.B. he loved her and wanted to have children with her. But the
cocaine and ecstasy he gave her kept her continuously high. He threatened to
burn her with an iron.
For
months she wasn’t allowed to leave the hotel on her own.
Later,
she (like the other 10 who testified) was kept on an electronic leash,
controlled by frequent phone calls and text messages that had to be answered
immediately.
She
worked “tired and sore,” without a break, day and night for three years.
(Others testified that when they had their periods, Moazami supplied them with
red condoms and red sheets.)
Moazami
raped her twice after giving her GHB, the date-rape drug. The second time, he
sodomized her.
E.B.
saw none of the estimated $20,000 a month that she earned. Moazami charged her
for the drugs, clothes and accommodation. He “fined” her for disobedience —
$50,000 alone for trying to rescue M.N.
E.B.
witnessed Moazami rip up other girls’ belongings, threaten their pet dog and
punch another girl in the face. He pepper-sprayed them both before they managed
to get away.
Here’s
one of the few bits of his Facebook messages to her that are fit to print in a
newspaper. “Die you nasty bitch u just wait I’lget you and then ull be begging
for mercy how di the bear mace treat you hahahahaha !!!!”
After
a working trip to Calgary, E.B. was admitted to the children’s ward at a
psychiatric hospital.
She
has moderate to severe learning disabilities. Her verbal skills are “childlike
and simplistic,” the judge wrote. “While testifying, she curled her legs up and
hugged them to her chest.”
J.C.H.
was 13 and addicted to cocaine when she first exchanged sex for drugs. After
time in a youth detention centre, she decided to become a prostitute at the age
of 15. A friend from the centre introduced her to Moazami.
He
taught her how to use a Taser on aggressive and non-paying clients. She
practised using it on her pillow.
Moazami
gave her cocaine and GHB almost every day as well as false identification so
that she could get birth control injections.
He
raped and sodomized her. He beat her badly enough that she was taken to
hospital.
C.B.
was 15 with a $500-a-day oxycodone addiction when she started working for
Moazami. They’d first met when she was 14 and he was selling drugs to her and
her mother.
Her
addiction escalated to $1,000 a day in the two-and-a-half months she worked for
him.
Their
working relationship ended on Aug. 1, 2010 when Moazami was arrested.
Police
found him hiding in a kitchen cupboard.
dbramham@vancouversun.com
comment:
Thank
you Daphne for telling it like it is....prostitution is a vile plague that
exploits the most vulnerable... Your article should be sent to both the Senate
and House of Commons Committees that are reviewing Bill C-36.... a shocking
wake-up call...
comment:
Not
so... the research shows that even when prostitution is decriminalized,
violence and abuse is still rampant...makes sense...why would the fact it is
legal or not change the way men disrespect and denigrate working girls;
how would that fact prevent sex offenders from preying on
prostitutes?
... Financial
Eligibility Policy ... Direct Family Support (DFS) Program,
may request assistance
for special ... 7.2.1 When a participant
dies, and neither the ...
www.novascotia.ca/.../documents/SPD_Public_Policy.pdf
- 659k - 2014-01-09 - Text
Version
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