Lifetime
ban from welfare:
a message from the station that cares?
by Jonathan Nzouankeu
Dec. 24, 2002
Non-verbatim: “Merry Christmas to you, your families and people
you love. A message from the station that cares, Newstalk 1010 CFRB”
Newstalk 1010, honestly, do you really care? If you do, then you pick and choose who you care about. And Kimberly Rogers, surely is not in your short list.
This is ironic because John Oakley, in my humble opinion the best Newstalk 1010 broadcaster - probably because he is also the most educated - raised an interesting topic on Christmas last week: how sincere is this change in people’s behavior around the Christmas period? This - positive - attitude, expressed by generosity, help to the community, compassion, why isn’t it more permanent? Surely this good behavior toward our fellow human throughout the year would prove its sincerity and that was John Oakley’s excellent point.
And my answer to Newstalk 1010 wishing us - listeners - a merry Christmas: Liars. You don’t care. If you get to pick and choose people you care about, then you don’t - sincerely - care. Life is interesting because the same day, I get the confirmation: Randy Taylor’s Live listener poll asking la-question-du-jour “Do you agree or disagree with the decision from the Ontario government to keep its zero-tolerance-lifetime ban from social assistance for people convicted of welfare fraud?” Guess the answer. Callers agree. Their argument: “This is help from the society. If they cheat, they don’t deserve it anymore”. And some other callers to go “fraud is fraud. I agree with the government”. I have another one for them: apple is apple. And stupidity is stupidity.
I want to tell these extremists that this help is not a gift. This help is a right. Constitutional or not, it does not matter. And this is what our society is all about. People helping people. With a government elected to make sure that people in need get some help. Finance related or not, if people need help, we -the society- should give them some. And I challenge any of Newstalk 1010 callers and Live listener poll broadcaster to tell in their conscious that Kimberly Rogers did not need help at the time of her condemnation. I challenge any of them to prove that the Ontario government did not fail in its primary task of protecting every single one of us, before trying to save us a few dollars – or get a few more voters, who knows - with an absurd “zero tolerance” policy.
I did vote French conservatives twice for the last presidential elections, but I can tell you right now that this won’t happen here in Canada. I immigrated in this country 3 years ago and I swear to God that Canadian Progressive Conservative Party will NEVER collect my vote until they remove this “zero tolerance” on social assistance. And I will make sure to explain to my circle of friends the reasons of my non-conservative vote for them to know WHO they are giving their voice to.
Some background:
"Most Canadians were appalled last summer when they heard that Kimberly Rogers had died alone and eight months pregnant, in her sweltering apartment in Sudbury, Ontario, while under house arrest for welfare fraud. What many do not realize is that the policies and conditions that set the stage for this tragedy are still in place and in some respects, have actually worsened.
Kimberly Rogers was charged with welfare fraud after collecting both social assistance and student loans to help cover the costs of attending four years of community college. She was convicted in April 2001 and the penalty was stiff: six months under house arrest (with the right to be allowed out of her hot apartment three hours per week); a requirement to repay more than $13 thousand dollars in benefits; 18 months probation and loss of the right to have part of her student loan forgiven.
At the time of Rogers'
conviction, Ontario Works* regulations specified that anyone convicted
of welfare fraud would be automatically suspended from receiving benefits
for three months. This stipulation has since been made tougher. Anyone
convicted of welfare fraud in the province of Ontario will be banned for
life from ever being able to collect social assistance."
http://www.ccsd.ca/perception/2534/kimberly.htm
Brenda Elliot is the Ministry of Community, Family and Children’s Services in Ontario.
Tell me if I'm wrong: isn't it Brenda Elliot who "justified" herself in an interview that was retransmitted on Newstalk 1010 on Friday Dec 20, 2002 after the Ontarian government refused to remove the lifetime ban from social assistance for anyone cheating on welfare, by a pathetic "People committing welfare fraud not only hurt the taxpayers but also hurt people who need welfare the most". Whouahou. That was a blast! Can you see the angel wings growing behind her back? Thank you so much Brenda Elliot for protecting Ontarian families. Unfortunately, Kimberly Rogers is a sad example of your failure.
I CANNOT BELIEVE WHAT I AM HEARING HERE...
Where is this moron of Brenda Elliot coming from? Is she stupid, cruel, or both? She must have a pea in the scull and a stone in the chest. Please help me here. How could she make it to a ministry position? Are we - the society, because I don't want to get into any conservatives/liberals polemic here. This is a drama and we don't polemic with drama - but are we so desperate of politicians filling positions? Don't we have anybody else for the Ministry of Community, Family and Children’s Services to have to bring that silly goose from a farm in Huron?
My answer to Brenda Elliot: Not in my name. As an Ontarian "taxpayer" - as you qualify us - I refuse you the right to speak in my name. Your cold-blooded words do not represent me. Don't speak on my behalf. You are a monster and I'm not afraid to say that you have a large responsibility in this double-murder that we – Canadian society - committed against Kimberly Rogers and her 8 months unborn baby. Although I have been in Canada for only 3 years, I do feel very affected and responsible for what happened. Nothing, I repeat NOTHING can justify this drama, and especially not the alleged few thousands dollars you claim to save with your inhuman "zero tolerance" policy.
I don’t want you to save my “tax dollars” at the expense of the others. Money is not my God. I refuse your hellish deal. What’s the point in having fancy roads, laptop computers at each school table if we let die an 8 months pregnant woman alone in the heat of her apartment?
Isn’t it the
same Ontario government claiming savings in healthcare and education?
The trouble is a recent study showed that more people died in Ontario
as a direct result to job cuts in hospitals by this government:
http://dawn.thot.net/nnsa/documents4.html
The opposition
speaks:
“I think the cost of the Conservative government’s tax-cuts
are starting to come home to people. People are starting to see the long-term
cost and what it can mean for people’s health and for people’s
safety and for the communities we all depend on. As the year has
unfolded, we have started to see other costs as well. We have chaos in
our schools now. Even the government’s own commission has come forward
and stated our children are not receiving the quality of education they
deserve and they need due to under-funding of at least one billion dollars
a year. The healthcare situation, by all the evidence I see, continues
to grow worse.”
http://www.patrides.com/march1/1hampton.htm
This is what you get, when you see the society by the narrow outlook of MONEY.
For your civic education, Honorable minister Brenda Elliot, the whole purpose of living in a society is helping each other. Sharing, financial support, safety, understanding, etc, are a few ways of achieving this.
I must be dreaming: I'm giving some basic civic education to an elected minister.
Kimberly Rogers was obviously struggling in life. She made a mistake. What she did was wrong. What did we do? We punished her so hard, that we actually pushed her head under the water and turned our back from her. She committed a fraud collecting welfare without being entitled to. My question: did she and her child have to die for that? Be honest with yourself and answer that question. If you say "NO" - and I hope you will - then there is something wrong with the system.
Christie Blatchford: National post journalist and guess what... Newstalk 1010 commentator - "Les chats ne font pas des chiens" as would we say in France.
The finding of facts came as a victory for Christie to release the Ontarian government - and irresponsible and selfish citizens by the same token - from the feeling of guilt: Kimberly Rogers died of an overdose of anti-depressors and not from a heat stroke as some had claimed. BIG DEAL ! Oh I am so happy to learn that this poor woman chose to kill herself instead of dying from starvation or from getting dried-out by the summer heat under house arrest. This is a revolution. The scoop of the year. Look at that: majestic "Hello Christie" frees up all the guilt by showing us the light! And when Christina Cherneskey – a good Newstalk 1010 broadcaster for a change - tells her at the end of the interview “Thank you for this prospective”, “Hello Christie” slams with the back of the hand by an arrogant “It is not a prospective, it is the truth”. Al-le-u-yah!
And what is better than a pea in the scull? 2 peas in the scull.
But I have to give credit to Christie Blatchford for saying “I’m by principle against any kind of zero tolerance”. I was impressed. It is amazing how someone can climb back in your esteem so quickly. Although she added “the government is right to be tough on that matter” and this is how she gets it all WRONG.
Now everybody – not the whole mailing list, I have fabulous people in this email list and they will recognize themselves- but the rest of the list, please listen-up here because I want to spend more time with my family and less time writing emails: you cannot fix something wrong with another wrong thing. WRONG AGAINST WRONG DOES NOT DO ANY GOOD.
“Hello Christie” said “This woman was struggling in life”. This is the kind of person that need help. She needed a lift, not a push. And you can bring all the autopsies and justifications you like: it does change neither the facts nor the end result: Kimberly Rogers and her baby got pushed even further down to the point of dying like an ill animal retiring in its cemetery. At the sole difference that this retirement place got imposed to her. I am ashamed. Shame on all of us. I do take responsibility. I don’t release it on “welfare cheaters”, “lazy people”, or even Brenda Elliot. As a citizen of the Canadian society, I take my fair share. And I am asking God, Kimberly and her baby to forgive us.
A system cannot be more perfect that the imperfect people who set it up. When a system starts crunching the weak, then there is a problem and we have to wake-up and change things. The Ontario government had the opportunity to do it by ending this absurd “lifetime ban from social assistance” or “zero tolerance” last week but they dropped the ball.
I believe in society. I believe in community. I believe in rehabilitation.
Every single day Life is giving us another chance to get better. We must consider ourselves beyond God to deny this opportunity to our fellow human beings.
Unfortunately, it is no accident that people supporting “zero tolerance” are the same supporting the death penalty.
My help to those ignorant: when you die, you won’t take any money or wealth with you. You only will take love and knowledge. Love that you have been able to give and to receive. On that matter, you will be judged – by yoursel f- as you have judged the others.
Kimberly Rogers and her baby’s death should not be useless. This would mean we did not learn from this tragedy. Let’s wake-up and make it worthy. Let us be proud to tell our kids that we are making sure that no other Kimberly Rogers dies in our societies.
Let’s get rid of this fascist-like “zero tolerance” policy which is not up to the standard of any civilized and educated society.
Jonathan Nzouankeu
http://dawn.thot.net/Kimberly_Rogers/
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Page last updated December 24, 2002