United Way report paints grim poverty picture for HRM, highest urban centre rate in Canada

United Way Halifax paints a grim and detailed picture of poverty in Nova Scotia’s largest municipality in its 36-page poverty report released Wednesday.

“When Halifax was compared against all other urban centres across Canada, our city’s poverty rate was the highest,” Sara Napier, president of United Way Halifax, told dozens of people gathered at the St. George’s Round Church Hall in northern Halifax for the release of the United in Poverty Action report.

Napier said basic needs like food and housing that are considered human rights are increasingly difficult for many people to secure. 

“Individuals have little choice in what they eat, where they live and what they can spend money on,” she said.

Napier said incomes have not kept up with inflation.

“Just over 10 per cent of residents in the Halifax central metropolitan area are experiencing poverty, according to the 2020-21 census,” she said.

Impossible choices

Recent trends of rapidly increasing costs of housing and food are adding pressure for all residents but especially for people already at risk of or actively experiencing poverty, the report finds.

Adopted by the federal government in 2019 as Canada’s official poverty measure, the Market Basket Measure (MBM) represents the cost of a basket of goods and services required to meet a family’s basic needs. Based on a family of two adults and two children, the basket includes everyday necessities such as food, clothing, shelter and transportation.

In 2020, the MBM required for a family to meet their basic needs in HRM was $46,527 annually. At the time, over 10 per cent of households in HRM were not able to meet this threshold, meaning more than one in every 10 households in HRM fell below Canada’s official poverty line. 

Since then, the MBM threshold in Halifax has jumped dramatically, to $52,429 in 2022. Cost increases from 2020 to 2022 in housing by 12 per cent, food by 13 per cent and transportation by 23 per cent are reflected in this increase. 

It’s also notable that in 2021 incomes were artificially inflated by the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB), the federal government’s COVID pandemic benefit, meaning the current poverty rate will be higher than the 10 per cent in 2020.

“We know that the 10 per cent number is actually much larger,” Napier said.

Napier asked the people gathered in the church hall to pause for a moment and consider the difficult choices families are making on where to spend the limited dollars they have to support themselves, choosing to pay rent, the heating bill or food or medication, and “invariably going without one or more of what most of us consider necessities, and that is getting worse.”

The report highlights some positive policy changes and practices that have made improvements for people living in poverty but also cautions that increasing income disparity and increases in food and shelter costs will likely continue to hamper efforts in the next few years.

Positives

Napier referenced free Halifax Transit passes for those on income assistance, improved and free access to menstrual products in libraries, schools and municipal buildings, increased access to rent supplements and housing supports, a policy to pay living wages for HRM contractors, the rapid housing investment, HRM’s affordable housing rent program, affordable child care through the Canadawide child-care agreement, and new public housing announced by the province for the first time in decades. 

“It is also clear when we reflect on the community around us and the realities that so many people are facing that those efforts have not been enough and there is more for us to collectively do,” Napier said.

Trevor Boudreau, minister of the provincial Community Services Department, said the government appreciates United Way Halifax sharing information that will help shape the work that government must do to support vulnerable Nova Scotians, within and beyond HRM.

“Government will continue to improve access to health care, housing, food and shelter while working with our partners to ensure actions are co-ordinated, inclusive and will help reduce poverty,” Boudreau said in a news release.

The recent report, a followup to the United Way’s 2018 publication Building Poverty Solutions, provides updated data and stories to give a picture of who is most affected by poverty across Halifax Regional Municipality. 

The report draws attention to the importance of equity in decision making and policies, as marginalized and racialized residents continue to be disproportionately affected by poverty.

Higher risk

“We know that some populations are at a higher risk of experiencing poverty than others,” the report says. 
“These vulnerable populations include those previously involved in the child welfare system, people living with disabilities, single-parent families, newcomers, people living alone, Indigenous peoples, the 2SLGBTQIA+ community, African Nova Scotians, racialized people and others.”

Multiple intersecting identities, such as race, class and gender, compound to create interrelated and inextricable experiences, discrimination and poverty. There is growing concern about the rise in anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ policies locally, in other provinces and around the world. 

Discrimination of the 2SLGBQTIA+ community is expected to  lead to more barriers to housing and employment opportunities, and an increase in mental health supports needed, leading to a higher likelihood of poverty.

“As we continue to grow, we must take advantage of the opportunities to be more inclusive, to ensure more people have access to these very opportunities,”  Mayor Mike Savage said. 
“All orders of government and all of our partners must be focused on key issues such as housing affordability, food security and social exclusion if we want to create a better HRM for all.” 

Sue Lapierre, director of social impact strategy with United Way Halifax, said it is disheartening that the poverty situation continues to worsen.

Call to action

“We’ve come through a really critical time in our country and our world with the pandemic,” Lapierre said. 

“We saw during the pandemic that there are measures that can improve people’s quality of life; things like the CERB decreased our poverty rates and increased our food security.

“That’s a good demonstration that good policy can make a difference so I think from here we have to really learn those lessons and consider what we can do in the future to improve people’s quality of life.”

Lapierre said several factors contribute to Halifax’s dismal national poverty ranking, including Nova Scotia’s high disability rates, almost negligible disabled social assistance payments from the province and the enormous municipal population growth without the infrastructure or affordable housing to support that growth.

Lapierre said the levels of hopelessness and frustration among those living rough or precariously housed, even if they are employed, are overwhelming.

“The stress levels are enormous, the impact on mental health, I can’t imagine if you were living in an affordable house right now, the absolute strain and fear that you could be evicted and that your rent could go up to astronomical levels pushing you into homelessness, or if you’re homeless and you don’t see a way out, the stress levels are enormous.”

Lapierre said there are a lot of people who really want to contribute to solutions.

“Today is a call to action so that we can all start working to further address immediate needs and try to make sure that 10 years from now, five years from now, people are experiencing a better quality of life than they are today.”