[homeles_ot-l] C-382: Irene Mathyssen, NDP Critic for Housing Introduces Legislation For Safe, Accessible, Affordable Housing. Wed 22 Nov 2006.

[lj1967 at sympatico.ca]

Irene Mathyssen, NDP Housing Critic Introduces Legislation For Safe, Accessible, Affordable Housing ( C-382 ).
Wed 22 Nov 2006.

Ottawa-The Conservative government's refusal to commit money for federal homelessness projects will affect communities across Canada.  Most organizations will have to start scaling back and shutting down, some before Christmas, as their funds start to run out. 

"The money has not been committed for next year, and this will impact programs and services for homeless people which will be forced to shut down this winter," said Irene Mathyssen, NDP critic for housing. "This is why I am going to introduce a bill in the House today, on National Housing Day, which would ensure every Canadian has a right and access to safe, affordable housing in this country."

Mathyssen has battled the Conservative government for months to deliver promised funding to affordable housing and homeless support programs in London, where four of the ten agencies still have not received their funding and are now closing emergency crash beds and other services. Those agencies that did receive money were provided only pro-rated amounts for the remainder of the year.

The homelessness and housing crisis is growing right across Canada. 

"There are 1800 people in shelters in oil-rich Calgary each night, some bused to suburban warehouses or housed on buses overnight with many more on the street," said NDP social policy critic Tony Martin who this fall has brought his party's "End Poverty in Canada" campaign to Calgary, Saskatoon, Vancouver and Victoria. "That is happening in Calgary in the literal shadow of the oil companies who are getting handouts from Conservative and previous Liberal governments while precious little is being done to help the poor. There's a vicious cycle criminalizing poverty. Without a proper national housing strategy cities are dealing with this growing problem of homelessness by forbidding people from resting or sleeping in public places. 

Front line-workers tell me the homeless in desperation sometimes turn to street drugs just to make it through the night."  In January, the Pembina Institute concluded that the Government of Canada provided the oil and gas industry with $8 billion in breaks and subsidies between 1996 and 2002.Mathyssen's Bill C-382 is an Act to provide secure, adequate, accessible and affordable housing to Canadians. It incorporates the provisions of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Canada's obiligation to live up to our 1976 signature of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

Click the Bill number below to open a .PDF version of the complete Legislation.

      Attachment Size 
      C-382_1.pdf<http://irenemathyssen.ndp.ca/ndp-drupal/files/irenemathyssen/C-382_1_0.pdf> 80.82 KB 

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Tuitio ad servitium pauperum: 

"Those who do not feel pain much, seldom think that it is felt. And yes, to wipe all tears from all faces is a task too hard for mortals; but to alleviate misfortunes is often within the most limited power: yet the opportunities which every day affords of relieving the most wretched of human beings are overlooked and neglected with equal disregard of policy and goodness."  ~ Samuel Johnson.

Live to make civil society every day -- Ne lache pas!
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