Walking on Eggshells: Abused Women's
Experiences of
Final
Report of Research Findings from the
Woman and
Abuse Welfare Research Project
Academics: Janet
Mosher,
Patricia Evans,
Community Partners:
Eileen Morrow (
and Transition Houses); Jo-Anne Boulding & Nancy VanderPlaats
(
Funding From the Social Sciences and Humanities Research
Council
of
EXECUTIVE
SUMMARY............................................................................................ iv
PART
A – BACKGROUND TO THE RESEARCH PROJECT............................. 1
1.
Context of the Study................................................................................................ 2
2.
Key Thematic Findings........................................................................................... 5
a)
Feed the kids, pay the bills, play by the rules................................................... 5
b)
Required to work, but no ‘hand-up’; welfare as work..................................... 6
c)
Constant scrutiny, and walking on eggshells................................................... 8
d)
Trapped by abuse, trapped by welfare................................................................ 9
3.
The Research Partners........................................................................................... 9
4.
Conceptual Framing.............................................................................................. 10
5.
Methodology........................................................................................................... 11
PART
B – KEY RESEARCH FINDINGS................................................................ 13
1.
Inadequacy of benefits......................................................................................... 13
a)
Welfare Rates and the decision to leave or return........................................ 16
b)
OW and the clawback of the NCBS................................................................... 20
2.
The Intersections of Abuse, Paid Work and Workfare................................. 21
a)
Paid work as a site of abuse............................................................................... 22
b)
The realities of paid work in women’s lives.................................................... 27
c)
Workfare: “not busy in the right places”.......................................................... 27
i)
training/educational programs are hard to access.......................................... 28
ii)
workshops and unpaid placements.................................................................. 30
iii)
workfare, children’s needs and childcare........................................................ 31
iv)
workfare and health/disability issues.............................................................. 35
d)
e)
Women are not informed of the deferral.......................................................... 40
3.
Spousal and Child Support.................................................................................. 42
a)
Women are not informed of the waiver............................................................ 44
b)
Pressure to pursue support................................................................................ 45
c)
When support orders are not honoured.......................................................... 47
4.
Spouse in the House............................................................................................. 47
a)
Knowledge of the rules........................................................................................ 48
b)
Implications of the rules...................................................................................... 49
5.
Constantly Living Under Suspicion; Welfare Surveillance.......................... 50
a)
Walking on eggshells............................................................................................ 52
b)
Repeated demands for information.................................................................. 56
c)
Fraud as a weapon of control and domination............................................... 56
6.
Difficulties in Accessing Information................................................................ 59
7.
Parallels Drawn Between Welfare & Abusive Relationships...................... 64
8.
Lack of Knowledge of the Dynamics of Abuse.............................................. 65
a)
Disclosing abuse................................................................................................... 66
9.
Shelters and Access to Housing........................................................................ 67
10.
The Interconnections of Social Location, Welfare and Abuse ................ 71
a)
Immigrant and Refugee Women........................................................................ 71
b)
Aboriginal Women................................................................................................ 74
c)
Women with Disabilities....................................................................................... 76
d)
Rural Women ......................................................................................................... 77
PART
C – RECOMMENDATIONS ......................................................................... 79
References
.................................................................................................................. 92
Appendix
1 .................................................................................................................. 97
Appendix
2 ................................................................................................................ 105
Walking on Eggshells: Abused Women’s
Experiences of
EXECUTIVE
SUMMARY
Research
Partners
The research was undertaken by three
academics (Prof. Janet Mosher of York University (Principal Investigator),
Prof. Patricia Evans of Carleton University and Prof. Margaret Little of
Queen's University and two community partners: the Ontario Association of
Interval Houses (OAITH; Eileen Morrow); and the Ontario Social Safety NetWork
(OSSN; Jo-Anne Boulding and Nancy VanderPlaats).
The research partners were also greatly
assisted by an Advisory Committee, especially in the formulation of the key
research questions and in the development of the interview guides. We are
indebted to the members of the Advisory Committee for all of their assistance:
thank you to Jacqueline Bittencourt (
The Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council funded the research for a three-year
period (commencing February 2000, and extended for a one-year period). We are extremely grateful to the Council for
making this partnership and the research project possible.
Methodology
The primary
research undertaking was 64 in-depth qualitative interviews of 1.5-3 hours in
length with women who are, or have ever been, in an abusive adult intimate
relationship and are at present, or have been at some point since 1995, in
receipt of social assistance benefits through Ontario Works (OW) or the Ontario
Disability Support Program (ODSP). Of
these interviews, five were conducted in Tamil, five in Bengali, six in Spanish
and three through cultural interpreters in other languages. Of the 64 women
interviewed, 38 (60%) had immigrated to
A questionnaire was mailed to all area
administrators of Ontario Works (48).
Thirty-five completed questionnaires were returned, for a response rate
of 73%. The questionnaire is attached
as Appendix 2.
A draft of the key findings from our
analysis of the interviews and the questionnaires was circulated to a group of
approximately 40 women, including women who participated in the interviews,
front line shelter workers, women's equality advocates and social justice
advocates. We held a full day forum on February 6th in
RESEARCH FINDINGS
Overview
The findings from
our research project make clear that women who flee abusive relationships and
turn to welfare seeking refuge and support frequently find neither. Women's
experiences of welfare are often profoundly negative. Women struggle to survive with their children
on little income, often going without adequate food, shelter and clothing. They encounter a system that is less than
forthcoming about their entitlements, and about the multiple rules with which
they must comply. Their hopes of
training and employment through workfare participation are almost invariably
dashed. They are often subjected to
demeaning and humiliating treatment from workers within a system in which
suspicion and the devaluation of recipients are structured into its very
core. For many the experience of
welfare is like another abusive relationship.
And virtually every woman with whom we spoke was caught in one or more
double binds as she struggled to be a good mother, good worker and good
citizen. Disturbingly, the decision to
return to an abusive relationship is often the 'best' decision for a woman, in
a social context of horrendously constrained options.
Simultaneously
and very importantly, the welfare system is also misused by abusive men to
enhance their power and control over women.
Their power and control is enhanced when women return to, or can't
leave, the relationship because they are unable to adequately provide for themselves
and their children on welfare. Abusive
men's power and control is also shored up when they are able to call
anonymously to welfare snitch lines, and when they can readily set women up for
fraud prosecutions. And their power and
control is further strengthened when they can manipulate systems because of
better English language skills.
This picture of
abused women's experiences on welfare stands in sharp contrast to the state's
promise of zero tolerance of domestic violence so frequently trumpeted in the
criminal justice context. The 'deserving'
recipients of criminal justice protection (and we hasten to add that this
protection does not always materialize in practice) are, as our report details,
recast within the welfare regime as undeserving and untrustworthy. In the welfare context abused women are
subjected to another zero tolerance policy -- zero tolerance of welfare fraud
regime -- a regime abusive men readily exploit.
Genuine respect
of women's right to safety, and to live free of violence in their lives means
creating the social conditions -- adequate welfare, access to safe housing,
access to childcare, access to employment that pays a living wage, etc. -- that
would truly make it difficult for men to "get away with it". As is clearly revealed by our interviews,
access to meaningful social supports is absolutely essential to women's
safety. A responsive, supportive,
adequately funded welfare system could play a fundamental role in securing
women's safety and women's equality.
What is needed
most urgently and most profoundly is a fundamental paradigm shift; a shift from
viewing poverty as the failing of individuals, and those who are poor as lazy,
unmotivated and deceptive. To the extent
that the welfare system in
1.) Inadequacy of benefits
Virtually all of
the women interviewed reported that the amount of money that they had to live
on while receiving social assistance was inadequate to meet their basic needs
and those of their children. Many women
had to spend all, or nearly all, of their monthly allowance to cover their
shelter costs. Many reported regularly
going without meals, having inadequate shelter (unable to heat their dwellings,
units in very bad disrepair, overcrowding, etc.), inadequate clothing
(especially during winter months); and lack of access to transportation. Several women reported medical problems as a
result of inadequate nutrition. Many
women were without phones, a gravely dangerous situation for abused women.
In the complex
decision-making process of whether to stay in or return to an abusive
relationship it is clear that the adequacy of welfare rates plays a significant
role: nine of the women we interviewed remained in abusive relationships
because they knew how much they would receive on welfare and felt that they
couldn't provide adequately for themselves and their children on the rates;
seven women reported returning to the abusive relationship in situations where
their struggle to survive on welfare was the
reason, or one of the main reasons, for returning; and six women were
contemplating returning to the abusive relationship at the time of the
interview or had contemplated returning because of the difficulties they were
experiencing on welfare.
In our survey of
area administrators, 17 of 35 responded affirmatively when asked, "Are you
aware of any cases where a woman has left welfare and returned to an abusive
relationship because she found that she was unable to adequately support
herself and her children on welfare?".
2.) The Intersections of Abuse, Paid Work and
Workfare
The voices of the
women reflected in this report speak forcefully to the many ways that OW
workfare policy is not working. The requirements are being applied in ways that
almost always ignore the abuse they have experienced, discount the needs their
children have for care, and their own health problems. Women are not receiving
information about deferrals from workfare requirements, and the provisions in
place to respect restrictions on childcare are very often disregarded. Women
also found that their OW workers paid little attention to their own career
goals. The experience of workfare is
rarely viewed as positive; most often, women are unable to access the supports
they need, whether it is modest costs associated with training, or programs
such as ESL. It is ‘not busy in the
right places’. Women are not receiving a
‘hand up’ -- on the contrary, they tell us that it is more like an obstacle
course.
Women spoke
powerfully about their need for real opportunities and good jobs. They do not believe that the shortest route
to employment is the best route or that any job is a good job. They have been, or are, in precarious
employment and they know that they need to find decent jobs to be able to
provide adequately for themselves and any children they may have. The workfare requirement does not further
their opportunities for decent employment.
What it does do, however, is to further stigmatize women on welfare as
individuals who, in the absence of a requirement to participate in work or
work-related activities, would prefer ‘scrounging’ to working. Such a policy is
profoundly dissonant with the aspirations and realities of the lives and
experiences of women in this study.
3.) Spousal and Child Support
"It's crazy to have women track men down (for
support), you're running from him for God's sake."
This quote from one of the woman interviewed for our study captures
vividly the problems that arise when women are required to pursue abusive
spouses for support as a pre-condition to welfare eligibility. In addition to well-grounded fears of violence,
many women are reluctant to pursue support because they want to move on with
their lives and have no contact with their abusive partners, or because they
worry that a claim for support will launch a counter-claim for custody or
access that would be harmful for both them and their children.
Although a temporary waiver may be granted in cases of domestic
violence, several problems were identified with this regime: almost no women
were told of the waiver; no definition of domestic violence is provided and no
guidelines exist as to when further extensions are warranted; standards for
verification are vague; and many women (often those who are most marginalized)
do not have access to the forms of verification requested. These difficulties with the waiver regime
are compounded by the reality -- described so vividly by the women in this
study -- that many women do not disclose the abuse to their welfare workers.
4.) Spouse in the House
The definition of
'spouse' and of 'same sex partner' create great difficulties for many
low-income women and unfairly discriminates against women. Our report shows, not surprisingly, that the
present definition lead some women to be very wary of forming relationships at
all, preclude some living arrangements which could help reduce costs, and
subject women to a great deal of scrutiny of their intimate lives. The definition is so complex and ambiguous
that it is virtually impossible for women to know when a spousal relationship
will be found. Our report also shows
some abusive partners threaten, and act on the threat, to call the welfare
fraud line to falsely accuse women of living in 'common-law'
relationships. Women described how such
threats further the abuser's power and control, leaving them feeling trapped
with no where to turn.
Lack of access to
full and comprehensible information creates many problems, one of the most
significant of which is the constant fear that one might be in violation of a
rule that one doesn't even know exists.
The difficulty of ascertaining the rules -- which are complex, often
discretionary, and frequently counter-intuitive (loans count as income, e.g.)
-- combines with the fear of extreme and negative consequences if one breaks a
rule (being cut-off and/or charged with fraud), to lead many women to the
conclusion that it is simply not safe to talk to their workers, including about
the abuse in their lives.
Many abusive men
threaten to report and/or do report their current or past partners to welfare,
alleging fraud. As noted above, the
alleged fraud often is based on a claim that the woman is living with her
'boyfriend', or 'common law partner'.
Sometimes the man calling claims to be the person living with her,
sometimes he points to another man. In
most of the instances of this in our interviews, the allegations were
baseless. Nevertheless, more often than
not, benefits were immediately terminated.
One woman had her benefits terminated four times; each time it was her
former abusive partner who called, and the welfare office was aware of the
history of abuse. Threats or actual
calls to welfare by abusive partners occurred for roughly 20% of the women
interviewed.
We note too that
in the survey completed by area administrators of welfare, 20 of the 35
respondents that answered this question answered affirmatively when asked,
"Are you aware of any cases where an abusive partner has reported to the
welfare fraud hotline or elsewhere that his former partner is living with
another man?"
Women told us of the
extraordinary difficulties that they have had in accessing accurate and timely
information that might be of benefit to them.
General prohibitions and obligations seem to have been rather well
communicated to women, such as the obligation to report income and to pursue
child support. However, very few women
knew about the availability of special benefits and the possibility of
deferrals or waivers of some OW requirements.
Importantly as well, many
of the rules are so complex -- e.g. the definition of spouse -- that is
extraordinarily difficult for anyone (even with full access to the relevant
policies) to confidently discern what is/not permissible. Women during our February 6th
forum also noted that the sheer terror of going into the office and the gravity
of the many issues women face when they leave the abusive relationship make it
exceedingly difficult to take in information.
Trying to access
information was incredibly frustrating and it took women many attempts to
contact their workers. And, when contact
was made, they often discovered that the information they had received was
inaccurate. Women also found it very
difficult to get a timely response from workers when they needed immediate help
or information (cheque not arrived, emergency travel, e.g.).
Some women did identify
helpful workers, but they were far more likely to receive information and
support in navigating the welfare system from workers in shelters and other
community organizations. Agencies providing culturally-based services proved to
be a vital source of information for women recently arrived in
7.) Parallels Drawn Between Welfare & Abusive
Relationships
Many women drew
explicit parallels between their experiences on welfare, and their experiences
of abuse. And in several other
instances, although the women did not draw the explicit parallel, there were
many similarities in their descriptions of their abusive relationships and of
their experiences of welfare.
Four predominant
parallels emerged in the interviews:
i) the near
complete control of information and the difficulties of getting access to
accurate and full information, a tactic which maintains domination and control;
ii) the sense of
walking on egg shells, just never knowing when you'll run afoul of some unknown
rule, expectation, etc. and you'll suffer greatly if you do;
iii) demeaning
and humiliating treatment and in particular, being made to grovel and beg for
benefits; and
iv) not being
trusted -- constantly under suspicion and thus constantly under surveillance.
8.) Lack of Knowledge of the Dynamics of Abuse
As reflected both
in the area administrators’ responses and in the women's experiences of
welfare, in the vast majority (but not all) of the welfare offices in
In our interviews
with women, when asked what needed to change in the welfare system, the most
common response was the way they were treated by welfare workers. They wanted workers who would treat them
with understanding, compassion and respect and who would understand the
circumstances of their lives, including the abuse. Many noted that the responses they
experienced from particular workers were responses required by or encouraged by
the dictates and culture of the welfare system.
As we noted above, what is required is a paradigm shift; only then can
it be anticipated the personal interactions between women and welfare workers
will be transformed. Additionally,
specific training on woman abuse is absolutely required.
9.) Shelters and Access to Housing
The lack of
affordable housing is a key reason why many women do not leave abusive partners
and why they return to them. Many women
interviewed experienced insecure and precarious housing arrangements. Women in their recommendations for change
reiterated how important access to emergency shelter had been for them. Several advocated more funding for shelters
so that women would not have to be turned away and to ensure that shelters
could provide a full range of services, including cultural interpretation. Women also identified quick access to housing
as an important need.
10.) The Interconnections of Social Location, Welfare
and Abuse
Women who have
arrived in
RECOMMENDATIONS
Recommendation 1
All Ontarians be
granted the right to welfare based solely on economic need.
Recommendation 2
Increase benefit
levels to reflect the actual costs of living, including realistic amounts for
rent, nutritional food, utilities, telephone and transportation. Levels should not only meet basic sustenance
needs but should allow for equitable participation in society.
Recommendation 3
Implement a
regular mechanism for reviewing the adequacy of social assistance rates,
drawing upon data on nutritional food baskets from public health officials and
indexing the rate to reflect the cost of living.
Recommendation 4
The clawback of
the National Child Benefit Supplement should be eliminated.
Recommendation 5
Eliminate benefit
reductions caused by income that is deemed, but not actually received.
Recommendation 6
Provide for a
wider range of individual needs. These
include costs of cultural interpretation and additional expenses associated
with immigration/refugee status. New
mothers and pregnant women require infant formula, special diets and
clothing. Rural women, in particular,
require special consideration in the treatment of their cars as assets and
expenses related to the use of their cars.
Dental and eye care are urgently required.
Recommendation 7
Reinstate the
policy that allows individuals on social assistance to simultaneously receive
their basic social assistance living allowance and student loans for tuition
and course-related expenses.
Recommendation 8
Review the level
of allowable assets and the process of asset depletion to ensure that women and
children are not being "pauperized" in order to be deemed eligible
for welfare. Rules that require
depletion of educational savings, and selling a car worth more than $5000 must
be altered.
Recommendation 9
That the woman be
assumed to be the 'head' of the household in heterosexual couples and families
(and thus the person who receives the benefit cheque), unless otherwise
requested; in other words reverse the present presumption.
Recommendation 10
Eliminate the
mandatory work requirement as the first step in orienting Ontario Works to
working with women.
Recommendation 11
The objective of
the ‘shortest’ route to a job must be replaced by an emphasis on sustainable
employment. OW employment planning must support appropriate, meaningful and
longer-term training opportunities that are likely to lead to long-term
economic security.
Recommendation 12
A woman’s own
definition of her needs and career goals must be prominent in the OW employment
planning process and attention must be paid to issues of safety.
Recommendation 13
Language training
and assistance in the recognition of qualifications earned abroad must become
an integral component of employment planning and supports.
Recommendation 14
Allocations for child-care
subsidies must be expanded and action taken to ensure that a range of
high-quality and flexible options are available to ensure that women are able
to take advantage of training, education and employment opportunities.
Recommendation 15
Reinstate the
STEP regulations regarding earnings exemption that were in place prior to
Recommendation 16
Any pursuit of
child support must be voluntary recognizing that there are many reasons,
including the possibility of increased violence, that would deter a woman from
pursuing support. Thus, receipt of
benefits should not be made conditional upon the pursuit of support.
Recommendation 17
Social assistance recipients should receive a financial benefit for
pursuing child support; benefits should not be deducted dollar for dollar.
Recommendation 19
If abuse has been
disclosed and a support application is contemplated the safety implications of
pursuing support must be considered.
Recommendation 21
The welfare fraud ‘hot
line’ should be eliminated.
Recommendation
22
Benefits should not be
reduced until there is a conviction for fraud.
Recommendation 23
Women need access to
competent state-funded representation if charged with fraud.
Recommendation 24
A thorough review of the
circumstances in which women are being charged with fraud should be undertaken.
Recommendation 25
Ministerial direction is
required to establish principles and guidelines regarding the provision of
information to individuals on OW and ODSP.
At a minimum these principles and guidelines must include:
·
full disclosure
to the public, claimants, and recipients, of available benefits and conditions
of eligibility;
·
the delivery of
accurate information in a comprehensive, user-friendly and widely distributed
form;
·
a recognition
that at the point in time when women access the welfare system they are often
in crisis
·
information that
is accessible in a variety of languages and formats, reflective of the
diversity of languages and literacy levels among OW and ODSP claimants and
recipients.
Recommendation 26
When language is a barrier
to establishing or maintaining eligibility, OW and ODSP should only use trained
interpreters.
Recommendation 27
That the Minister review
approaches to ensure that necessary information is available to individuals in
a timely manner. Two options that should
be considered for achieving this objective are a toll-free and dedicated ‘help’
line, and time limits by which workers must respond to client information
requests.
The Ontario
Government should renew its commitment to second stage housing and provide more
units of this nature.
Recommendation 29
More subsidized
housing units are needed and these units need to be more welcoming to
women. An independent appeal process
needs to be established with staff members who are knowledgeable in poverty and
abuse issues.
Recommendation 30
Funding for
women's shelters needs to be restored and enhanced. The definition of need for emergency shelter
needs to be more broadly defined to include women who are recovering from a
history of abuse, even if this abuse is currently not on-going.
Recommendation 31
Adequate funding
for community based information and advocacy services must be provided.
Recommendation
32
We recommend that
universal screening for woman abuse not be implemented in Ontario Works and
ODSP offices. As recommended earlier,
women need to be given full information about all benefits, entitlements,
waivers, deferrals, etc. Only then can
they make an informed decision as to whether to disclose abuse.
Recommendation 33
Welfare offices should
have readily available and accessible to women information about resources for
abused women and staff should be trained to able to make appropriate referrals.
Recommendation 34
Social assistance
workers should be trained in anti-oppression practices/approaches to their work
and receive significant and on-going training in issues related to woman
abuse. There needs to be on-going
monitoring of the impact of the training and supports in the work environment
to implement the training.
WALKING
ON EGGSHELLS:
ABUSED
WOMEN’S EXPERIENCES OF
WELFARE
SYSTEM
PART A. -- BACKGROUND TO THE RESEARCH PROJECT
In recent years, both violence against
women in their intimate relationships (woman abuse) and the problem of 'welfare
dependency' (particularly of single mothers) have been identified as
significant social policy issues and substantial reforms in both areas have
been introduced. Problematically,
however, the issues have been conceptualized, and policy responses developed,
as though each had little, if anything, to do with the other. It is apparent from the rapidly expanding
research from the United States that a significant number of women on welfare
have experienced abuse in their intimate relationships and that welfare
regulations and conditions of receipt can negatively affect women's safety and
well-being (as well that of their children), women's equality, women's
autonomy, and women's participation in society (Allard, 1997; Cooley et al,
1997; Pollack, 1996; Raphael, 2000; Raphael & Tolman, 1997).
The number of women in receipt of welfare
in
Extrapolations from existing data, in
particular the Violence Against Women Survey, suggest that the rates of abuse
among female beneficiaries of Ontario Works (OW) and Ontario Disability Support
Program (ODSP) benefits is likely to be very significant. Among the general
population, fully one third of the women surveyed through the Violence Against
Women Survey reported physical or sexual assault by a marital or common-law
partner (
As noted above, there is a significant
body of research emerging from the
To ascertain the impact of the current
welfare regime in
1.
Context of the Study
The welfare system that is
the focus of this project emerged during a period of transformation in the
conception of social citizenship in
As citizenship
becomes enshrined in market norms, poverty is further inscribed as an
individual problem of lack of motivation, not a lack of decent jobs. The ‘solution’ is to ensure that ‘the poor’
are subjected to the ‘discipline’ of the market, so benefits are restricted and
surveillance and coercion are heightened.
As gender intersects with class, single mothers on social assistance are
redefined as 'employable' and are identified as the primary targets of the restructuring
of welfare (Baker & Tiffin, 1999; Bashevkin, 2002; Little, 1998). This 'adult worker' and gender neutral
approach ignores the realities of women's inequality, resulting from the
combination of discrimination in the labour market and the primary responsibilities
for the caring and unpaid work they shoulder in the household. The processes of lowering benefits,
increasing levels of scrutiny, and introducing workfare profoundly and
negatively impact on women who have become ‘disentitled’ and are now
constituted as the ‘undeserving’ (Mosher, 2000).
Although welfare
has always been a residual and stigmatized program, the changes ushered in by
the provincial Conservative Government’s ‘Common Sense Revolution’ ensure a
significantly ‘leaner and meaner’ state.
It is important to note that the profound changes at the provincial
level, described below, were significantly influenced by the Federal
Government's repeal of the Canada
Assistance Plan Act 1966-67, and the consequent disappearance of the
conditions formerly attached to federal funding for welfare: a right to social
assistance when in need; a right to an amount that takes into account basic
requirements; a right to appeal when denied assistance; a right to benefits
without established provincial residency; and a right to assistance not conditioned
on participation in work.
Four of the most
significant changes to
a) In 1995, welfare rates were cut by 21.6%. There has been no increase since 1995 so the
cumulative cut to benefits by 2003 amounts to a 34% reduction in benefits
(Income Security Advocacy Clinic, 2003).
A single person in
b) 'Workfare' was introduced, requiring participation in employment or
employment readiness activities as a condition of benefits for all non-disabled
beneficiaries. For the first time,
single mothers with children in school, half-day as well as full-time, became
subject to work requirements. The legislation
is explicit in its expectation that individuals have an obligation to become
and remain self-reliant through paid work, and through the shortest route
possible.[2] Conceptually this represents a fundamental
shift from the notion of welfare as an entitlement or right to assistance of
last resort, to welfare as conditional state largesse. In short, it represents a retreat from the
practices of social citizenship.
c) Fraud detection was prominently profiled as a concern, despite the
very low levels of actual welfare fraud.
‘Snitch’ lines were introduced, the requirements to provide information
increased significantly, computer programs were set up to automatically trigger
investigations for fraud (high rents, e.g.), and a lifetime ban from receiving
welfare was imposed (recently repealed).
Visions of security have been profoundly altered; talk of social
security and state-funded safety nets has largely given way to a discourse
saturated with concerns about the threat welfare recipients and low-income
people generally pose to 'the taxpayer'.
d) A new definition of 'spouse' was introduced (and modified somewhat
subsequently) which treated persons of the opposite sex as presumptively
spouses upon taking up co-residency.
This represented a dramatic shift from the regime in place since 1987,
in which the definition of 'spouse' for social assistance purposes largely
tracked the Family Law Act definition
(which importantly meant that persons could co-reside for a three-year period
before being treated as spouses for social assistance purposes). The introduction of the new definition of
spouse resulted in 10,013 people being cut off social assistance. Of these, 89% were women and 76% were single
mothers. The new definition of spouse,
coupled with the intense focus on potential welfare fraud, has largely returned
matters to the pre-1987 regime when investigations for men in the houses of
women were common, intrusive and embedded in the moral regulation of women
(Falkiner et al v. Director of Income Maintenance Branch, 2002; Little, 1998;
Little & Morrison, 1999).
The changes to
It is also clear from our
study that issues emerge in relation to welfare that are very particular to
women who are survivors of abuse perpetrated by their intimate partners. And while gender and experiences of abuse
are very significant variables in shaping the relationship between welfare
beneficiary and state, so too are race, immigration status, geographic area,
disability and sexual orientation.
Many women turn to welfare
as they seek refuge from abusive relationships.
And while past welfare policies have been far from perfect, there is
much to suggest in our data that the effect of welfare reforms over the past
decade has been to enhance, rather than disarm, the power of abusive men. In other words, women’s safety has been
further compromised. The welfare reforms
that resulted in grossly inadequate benefits, workfare, increased scrutiny, and
the changed definition of spouse, have all operated to make it even harder for
women to leave their abusers and re-establish their lives.
Most women who
participated in this project expected to be on welfare for a relatively brief
period after leaving the abuser. The
realities were, almost always, very different. Their stay on welfare has been
longer, much more difficult, frustrating and demeaning than they had imagined
possible. Rather than offering a ‘hand
up’, they tell us about a system that presents continuing obstacles as they
struggle to provide for themselves and their children. The experience of welfare is, with rare
exceptions, punitive, harsh and deeply stigmatizing. And many reported to us having returned to,
or contemplating a return to, an abusive relationship, logically deducing -- in
a world of incredibly constrained choice -- that the abusive relationship is
sometimes a preferable choice to life on welfare.
Women’s
experiences of welfare are diverse and complex, and the specific issues they
confront are detailed in different sections of this report. But there are also themes that permeate many
aspects of their experiences on welfare that we highlight below.
a) Feed the Kids, Pay the Bills, Play by the Rules
Women spoke powerfully and
repeatedly about their struggles on welfare to be excellent mothers, good
workers, and honest women. Welfare makes
it difficult to be any one of these things, but nearly impossible to be all of
them. Much of their planning and
determination is focused on ensuring that their children are well cared-for. On a daily basis, children are at the
forefront of the difficult decisions about what to go without. As Swift and Birmingham note (2000, p. 101),
the considerable amount of time, energy and thought that women on welfare give
to assessing and meeting the needs of their children is “considerably more
immediate, complex, contradictory, ‘messy’, and painful” than is typically
acknowledged. Incredible efforts are
made to stretch inadequate benefits to see that children are properly fed and
clothed, are able to participate in school activities, and can hold their heads
up among their classmates. In order to
feed their children, women cut back on their own food and other needs, they
visit food banks and Goodwill, they go into arrears and worry about how to feed
the kids and pay the rent and other bills. Here is what women told us:
“I can’t afford where I am living. You know, I am borrowing from Peter to Paul
to give to Sally to pay the rent and … it’s not fair that we don’t have money
to, like I mean, it is sad when you can’t buy a loaf of bread or a bag of milk
for your kids when you’ve got to fork it all on your rent.”
Acutely aware of the
day-to-day hardships and the sharp and cumulative disadvantages that inadequate
income imposes, mothers worry a great deal about their children’s future:
"I am highly worried over the basic needs of my
children such as education and clothing.
I become obsessed of thinking about these issues repeatedly".
The women who participated
in this study want to be able to provide well for their children and themselves
and they want to be able to leave the welfare system. Their ideal options about how much paid work
they could undertake depended, not surprisingly, on the ages and particular
needs of their children and their own circumstances (such as health). However, they rarely had the luxury of
choice. The employment available is
typically in that part of the gendered labour market that requires irregular
hours, shift work, evenings and/or weekends.
These jobs are very difficult to hold while caring for children,
especially when the pay is low, jobs are insecure, and decent and affordable
childcare is very hard to find.
Leaving her abuser, a
woman came onto welfare but had to leave it or risk deportation.
She describes how the
realities of welfare, immigration, childcare and low-wage work all collided as
she experiences incredibly conflicting pressures of trying to be a ‘good
mother’, a ‘good worker’ and a 'good citizen'.
"I had to leave welfare because of
my immigration status. I had to show
them that I was working and not taking government money. So I started looking for a job. I had nobody to look after my son at that
time [about age 6]. But
I had to work and leave welfare to earn the right to stay in this country. My husband was an asylum seeker, and due to
his behaviour he was to be deported. I
couldn't go back. My ex would kill
me. … I had to show the government that
I was strong enough to stand on my feet.
It was very difficult because I was a single mom, there was nobody to
look after my son, and I couldn't afford childcare. …My first job was at the
sock factory near my house. I worked in
the night shift and my landlady kindly agreed to monitor my son while he slept.
… All these tensions and worries
affected me immensely."
Negotiating the complex
and seemingly arbitrary rules (which are impossibly difficult to ascertain)
women confront impossible decisions and consequences. For example, the offer of loans, money and
gifts are difficult to turn down. Money
and gifts of 'small value' can be allowed without reducing benefits (OW
Directive 16) but workers exercise discretion, and it is difficult to determine
in advance what can be exempted, how much and from whom. If women accept the money that is desperately
needed and disclose this to welfare, it may mean being no better off because
their benefits may be reduced, dollar for dollar. Not disclosing, however, could result in
being cut off benefits and/or a prosecution for fraud. As this report reveals, money and gifts that
come from an abusive (ex)partner are especially problematic because they serve
to increase his control over her, and she is even more vulnerable to being
reported for fraud. As one woman puts
it,
“ …the way it goes…is that you
basically can’t tell them [welfare
workers] anything because if you do
they’ll take it off your cheque and then you won’t be able to feed your
kids…and that’s where the fear comes in because they want to know everything
and of course you’re not going to tell them anything because you’re afraid.”
Since the
introduction of Ontario Works, all mothers with children in part or full-time
school are expected to be in paid work or employment-related activities as a
condition of receiving benefits. The
mandatory workfare requirement sends a message that women on welfare do not
want jobs and are not in paid work, assumptions that are at odds with this and
other studies (Ornstein, 1995). Most
importantly, workfare also assigns little or no value to the work women do in
caring for their children and it shrinks their control in decision-making in
the context of a very individual and complex set of constraints.
As the report
documents, women most frequently experience OW as an obstacle rather than a
‘hand-up’. Those who work for pay find
their earnings ‘taxed-back’, making it even harder to get ahead. At the same time, their own efforts to
improve their position in the job market are frequently frustrated because they
cannot get approval for the programs or supports they require, or because
workers simply do not return their calls.
“They never call me back,
never! I even went down to the office and they said,
“Sorry, you’ll have to talk to your worker about it…But…a course starts at this
time and I’m not getting any reply or any help so I’m not going to be able to
take this course. I’m going to have to
wait until the next one comes around and if they decide to call me back.” She is getting “Nothing whatsoever” in the way of
help.
Being on welfare
also means negotiating the complexity of OW work requirements and expectations
in ways that do not further jeopardize themselves and their children. For
example, their required participation in workfare may collide with the safety
and care of children. Mothers are
required to find substitute care for their children on weekends or after
school, and sometimes, even told to leave children with their abusive
partners. In addition, trying to get information is hard
work, time-consuming, and stressful. They must also deal with a welfare system
that not only does not support them, but structures suspicion and disparagement
of the work they do into policies, procedures and practices.
“It was certainly a great relief to
have financial support to be able to pay for housing and the basic needs that
we had at that point and for my two children.
It added a stress to my life because every month I had to report to see
a worker and when I had a question or difficulty I had to contact the person
who was always busy and sometimes wasn’t available. And I had to leave messages. I couldn’t leave the house sometimes for a
day, waiting for a phone call. In the
beginning I was told about the basic availability but not everything, and then
I was taking extra help for childcare and I was told I wasn’t qualified for
that. Later, a month later, I figured
out I was qualified for that but I couldn’t go back and claim that amount so it
was like a daily struggle learning more and more about the system, but also running
into obstacles and getting through these obstacles. It was time consuming and it would constantly
make and definitely added stress to my life.”
“You know. They just send you a letter saying you have
to be here at this appointment. They
don’t phone and ask you if you have something going on, if you’re working or
not. They just demand you to be on these
appointments, which I think is very unfair to people, especially if you are out
trying to work, you just can’t up and quit a job in the middle of the day just
to meet their demands of going to these appointments.”
The imposition of
workfare, the increased information and reporting requirements to establish and
maintain eligibility, and a
preoccupation with fraud, all serve to expand the terrain for scrutiny and
surveillance. These changes also increase the fear of being
penalized for breaking rules, or charged with welfare fraud. Many of the women reported being treated as
though they are not entitled to, or deserving of, benefits. They are made to feel like ‘criminals’, as if
they are trying to steal money from the state.
Ironically, the very low
level of benefits serves as a justification for further scrutiny of women’s
spending. Paying rent that is regarded
as too high in relation to low benefit levels will automatically trigger an investigation. Yet since 1995 when welfare rates were
reduced, they have remained frozen during a period when increases in rents across the province ranged from 24-32%
(Income Security Advocacy Centre, 2003).
Women find that paying the fees related to immigration applications and
refugee claims may also call into question the legitimacy of their needs and
trigger an investigation.
A
woman is asked where she got the money to apply for landed status: "[a]lso I have to pay $150 for getting work
permit. I have to spend $125 on
students’ authorization for my children.
Altogether I need $550 yearly for these purposes. We did not get the
child benefit. If we did not eat, nobody
would ask me about it. However, if we cannot pay our rent or our bills, we
cannot live. My children start to feel
inferior for wearing improper dress and shoes.”
“We suffer a lot to pay money for
lawyers who work on our case. Welfare
officers ask me, ‘How could I manage to pay that money?’ I allot the GST money we get each year for
the lawyers. In addition, sometimes we
skip meals and save money. My children (3)
do not get enough food and their sleeping time is reduced. We live in a one bedroom apartment.”
“Welfare could stop having doubts about the
person who was abused because sometimes they doubt you and it is always ---the
doubt that makes the person go back to their husband because you cannot take
too much pressure. I was in pressure and
depressed and they put more pressure on me asking me all kinds of
questions. If they say they want to help
abused women, why put pressure on them?”
For many women,
leaving the abuser is exceptionally difficult.
Fears of being able to provide for themselves and any children they may
have are prominent among their
concerns. They worry, very
realistically, that leaving may incite further acts of violence and
intimidation. And some women return to
their abusers because they cannot survive on welfare rates.
The difficulties
are exacerbated for women who are newcomers to
3.
The Research Partners
The research was undertaken by three
academics (Prof. Janet Mosher of York University, Prof. Margaret Little of
Queen's University and Prof. Pat Evans of Carleton University) with
disciplinary training in law, political science and social work respectively
and two community partners: the Ontario Association of Interval Houses (OAITH;
Eileen Morrow) and the Ontario Social Safety NetWork (OSSN; Jo-Anne Boulding
and Nancy VanderPlaats). OAITH is 75-member provincial association of primarily
first stage shelters for abused women and their children. OAITH's mandate includes working to bring the
voices of abused women and children to the attention of public policy makers
and over the years it has accomplished this through a variety of initiatives:
public education; the development of media contacts; research; and consultation
with government actors. OSSN is a
provincial network of anti-poverty groups, faith communities, labour groups,
legal clinics and others whose mandate is to support progressive social policy
change. The NetWork has worked in
partnership with the Social Planning Council in the implementation of a
WorkfareWatch project, has developed and maintained a website, conducted focus
groups with low income communities on workfare and engaged extensively in
developing and distributing community education materials and in other
information-sharing activities.
The research partners were also greatly
assisted by an Advisory Committee, especially in the formulation of the key
research questions and in the development of the interview guides. We are
indebted to the members of the Advisory Committee for all of their assistance:
thank you to Jacqueline Bittencourt (
The Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council funded the research for a three-year
period (commencing February 2000, and extended for a one-year period). We are extremely grateful to the Council for
making this partnership and the research project possible.
4. Conceptual Framing
The broad
approach of this research builds upon the feminist political economy literature
that examines the consequences to women of policies that are adopted in
accordance with privatization and restructuring discourses (Andrew &
Rodgers, 1997; Bakker, 1996; Boyd, 1997; Brodie, 1995; Evans & Wekerle,
1997). There are also two quite specific
conceptual reference points for this research.
First, there is substantial literature on woman abuse that documents the
nature and range of abuses perpetrated against women by their intimate partners
(and former partners); that seeks to explain why men abuse their intimate
partners; and that attends to the implications abuse holds for women's physical
safety and psychological well-being.
Secondly, there is the literature that has explored the theoretical
implications of the nature of state regulation in the lives of women and has
documented the impacts of welfare regulation on women’s lives (Gordon, 1988;
Little, 1998). As noted above, what is
largely missing in the literature is research that seeks to understand abuse,
and to examine welfare policies, from the reference point of women who are
being, or have been, abused in their intimate relationship and who are in
receipt of welfare.
Finally, we draw upon the feminist
exploratory qualitative tradition in social science research and are concerned
to understand the changes in women’s lives from their lived experiences.
5. Methodology
The primary
research undertaking was 64 in-depth, semi-structured, qualitative interviews
of 1.5-3 hours in length with women who are, or have ever been, in an abusive
adult intimate relationship and are at present, or have been at some point
since 1995, in receipt of social assistance benefits through Ontario Works or
the Ontario Disability Support Program.
Of these interviews, five were conducted in Tamil, five in Bengali, six
in Spanish and three through cultural interpreters in other languages. Of the
64 women interviewed, 38 (60%) had immigrated to
Women who
participated in the interviews were contacted in a variety of ways. In some parts of the province a notice
advertising the project was placed in shelters, community based women's
services and other locations where it might come to the attention of
women. In other instances, the research
was brought to the attention of women by front-line service providers who
simply told women about the project and passed on printed information. The main
geographic regions of the province covered were:
There are many
organizations and individuals to whom we are indebted for their assistance in
setting up the interviews: Life*Spin, London; Women's Community House, London;
Immigrant and Visible Minority Women Against Violence, Ottawa; South Asian
Women's Centre, Toronto; Dawn House, Kingston; Interval House, Kingston; Halina
Kurowska; Eva Hudokova; Jeannette Couture; Punam Khosla; Maithily Uthayasangar;
Israt Ahmed; and Holly Brant, Program Manager, Red Cedars Shelter, Tyendinaga
Reserve, Mohawk Territory.
We are also
deeply indebted to the women who participated in the interviews. Many women spoke to us at a time in their
lives when their safety was at risk and speaking to us took courage. Every woman with whom we spoke was
over-burdened by the demands of poverty and by the demands of compliance with
welfare rules and regulations, and yet created time for the interviews. We were overwhelmed by their stories of
struggle and survival; each woman we spoke with was remarkable in her ability,
despite the incredible obstacles in her path, to provide for herself and her
children, and to plan and hope for the future.
Many of the women told us that it was very important to them to have
their stories told and heard. We hope
that this report honours those stories and the women who so generously shared
them.
The interviews
were conducted by several members of the research team and also by women with
expertise on abuse and welfare who were trained by the research team to
undertake interviews for the project. Fifty-nine
of the 64 interviews, with the consent of the women interviewed, were taped
recorded and then transcribed verbatim and translated into English where
conducted in other languages. Notes from
the other five interviews were also transcribed. The three academics involved in the project
then read ten randomly selected interviews and from these ten generated a list
of emergent themes. Louise MacNaughton,
a research assistant and student of Osgoode Hall Law School, ably assisted us
in using qualitative software, NVivo, to thematically code (based on the
emergent themes identified through the review of the ten randomly selected
interviews) each of the 64 interviews.
We shared our
interview guide with Women Today of Huron, a group interested also interested
in exploring the intersections of abuse and welfare, but with a particular
focus upon rural women’s experiences.
That group conducted interviews, using a slightly modified version of
our interview guide, with women in
A questionnaire to area administrators of
Ontario Works (48) was mailed out to each office on
A draft of the key findings from our
analysis of the interviews and the questionnaires was circulated to a group of
approximately 40 women, including women who participated in the interviews,
front line shelter workers, women's equality advocates and social justice
advocates. We held a full day forum on February 6th in
PART B. KEY
RESEARCH FINDINGS
1. Inadequacy of Benefit Levels
As noted earlier
in the Report, benefit levels were reduced by 21.6% in 1995 and have not been
increased since. With the increase in
the cost of living since 1995 the real decline in purchasing power is a
staggering 34% (Income Security Advocacy Centre, 2003). A quick look at examples of benefit rates
illustrates the depth of poverty of those in receipt of social assistance. A single person in receipt of Ontario Works
('OW') benefits receives a maximum of $520/month comprised of a shelter
allowance of $325 and a basic needs allowance of $195. The permissible asset level for this same
person is $520; in other words, asset depletion is a prerequisite to benefit
entitlement. Present welfare rates in
All but four of
the women we interviewed were receiving or had received OW (those four were
receiving ODSP), and three were in the process of applying for Ontario
Disability Support Program benefits. And
all but three women (who were still living with their abusive partners) were
receiving benefits as either single mothers or single women. Virtually all of
the women interviewed reported that the amount of money that they had to live
on while receiving social assistance was inadequate to meet their basic needs
and those of their children. Many women
had to spend all, or nearly all, of their monthly allowance to cover their
shelter costs. This meant that they had
to search for other ways to try to meet basic needs. Often, despite their best
efforts and the enormous amount of energies expended in the quest to survive,
women's basic needs went unmet. Many
reported regularly going without meals, having inadequate shelter (unable to
heat their dwellings, units in very bad disrepair, overcrowding, etc.),
inadequate clothing (especially during winter months); and lack of access to
transportation (for those in more remote locations, travel was a substantial
additional cost but many women in urban areas did not have sufficient money to access
public transit). Several women reported
medical problems as a result of inadequate nutrition. Many women were without phones, a gravely
dangerous situation for abused women.
Participants in
the February 6th forum affirmed that women on social assistance were
struggling desperately to satisfy basic needs.
They noted inadequate shelter, food, and access to transportation. Women from the North reported that heating of
accommodation is a particularly significant issue. While hydro cannot be cut off during winter
months, gas can be, and women who can't pay the gas bill have their gas cut
off, leaving them without habitable shelter.
Participants also stressed that telephones were absolutely essential to
women's safety, and noted that like several women in our study, women are
frequently without phones.
Many women we
interviewed experienced additional costs that made survival even more
challenging -- such as obtaining work permits and school authorizations for
their children (for newcomers without permanent residence status); or replacing
their and their children's identification.
Many women fled their relationships without anything and while community
start up benefits helped some women to re-start their lives, a great many women
were never told of the benefits or were given no where near the maximum, (see
the discussion infra of community
start-up benefits, Section 6).
Women frequently
noted that their children went without as well, although women went to great
lengths to protect their children, making do with less for themselves so that
their children would fare less badly.
Several were deeply worried about their children's health status. Women also discussed how hard it was to have
to constantly say "no" to their children and worried greatly about
the impact on their children of being 'outsiders' at school because of their
clothing, shoes, etc. Women also
frequently had to rely on far from satisfactory childcare arrangements while
they attended school or participated in workfare or part-time work (an issue we
discuss more fully infra, section
2(c)(iii) at page 31).
Concerns about
their ability to provide adequately for their children led many women to fear
that their children would be apprehended by child welfare authorities, and
needless to say, this caused great anxiety and stress. Participants in the February forum reported
that women on social assistance, if unable to find adequate housing, were
losing custody of their children to children's aid. Caught in a vicious downward spiral, without
custody of their children, their welfare benefits would be reduced, making it
more difficult (if not impossible) to find adequate accommodation. The Children’s Aid Society of Metropolitan
Toronto reports that housing problems were a factor in 20.7% of instances where
CAS Toronto brought children into care.
Lack of accommodation also resulted in delays in children returning to
their homes (11.5% of children experienced such delays for a total of 250
children). The cost associated with a
six-month delay for 250 children is a staggering 2.9 million; the average cost
of one month in care per child was $2213 in 2002-3 (www.casmt.on.ca accessed
Women reported
that almost all of their energies are absorbed in trying to meet basic survival
needs; many expressed the desire to have more energy to solve other problems.
For two of the women the problem they wanted to solve was the on-going abuse in
their lives -- they both noted that they were so focused on meeting survival
needs that they had not noticed the dramatic ways in which the violence of
their partners had escalated; many others wanted more time and energy to focus
on getting training and employment, time to heal, and/or time to be with their
children.
Most women
reported suffering from low self-esteem and/or depression as a result of the
abuse and violence at the hands of their male partners, and described how the
stress, despair and hopelessness of being on welfare resulted in further deterioration
of their mental well being. The pressure
and stress of trying to survive and trying to comply with all of the
expectations of the welfare system left many women feeling "pushed
down" and "trapped" by welfare; welfare was far from the
"springboard" to work that is the vision so frequently projected in
state rhetoric.
Having access to
subsidized housing made a significant difference (although even then meeting
basic needs was a struggle), but only one third of the women we interviewed
were in fact living in subsidized housing, and of these, many had waited a very
long time to access it. We were also
told by participants in the February forum that some women are unable to access
particular subsidized housing units because they are unable to pay the utility
bills.
Below are some of
the observations that women made about the amount of benefits they were
receiving:
"I went without food a lot, because
my son was so young and he had so many needs as a baby with clothes and diapers
and you know and special baby food. I
went without eating for a long time. I
even gave up drinking milk. I gave up
breastfeeding a few months after my son, after we moved, because I didn't have
enough food for me to eat in order for me to nurse."
"I do not know what this government
thinks about the people who take welfare.
Each year everything increases in price.
We have to pay more money for goods and services but we still get
insufficient money. People who take welfare are forced to live in basements or
in an unhealthy environment for not having enough money. Even people who are in prison live a better
life than people on welfare do. Our
children also have flesh and blood. Why
this government forgets to think of that?
I always feel like a beggar."
"My hope was to get away from my
husband. At that time, my condition was
difficult. I have nobody to look after
me since my parents and my sisters are living in my home country. I have nobody here. No relatives, no
friends. I am like a lonely tree. Once in a blue moon, I called my
parents. They did not listen to my
story. They did not want to believe the
truth. They wanted to hear a different
story. They wanted to believe or tell
others that I was in a very good position.
[Her husband came
to her country of origin, married her and sponsored her to
"Because I was only getting six
hundred dollars a month from welfare and my rent was seven hundred and fifty
plus and it's like, "What do you do?
Pay my rent or feed the kids?" You know."
"And it's like the kids are the one's
suffering, you know. Like adults don't
get the winter clothing allowance which is fine, you know. We deal with it. But kids, not to get proper winter clothing
and not to get proper school supplies I think is abominable in this
country."
"When I got the cheque I realized
that I only could pay the rent and I do not have enough money to buy bare
necessities. I can hardly survive with
welfare in reality."
"The welfare system is good. Nevertheless, if they increase the amount of
money, we could at least fulfil the needs and wishes of our children. At least we could buy good things to
eat. Due to lack of food, children
become weaker and weaker. Their hands
and legs become pale in colour. The
doctor gives me shots to compensate for the lack of nutrition. The reason for all of this is the
insufficiency of money we get from welfare.
We do not have enough money to buy food … my children cannot concentrate
in classes due to the lack of food. They
easily get tired. They do not eat
properly in the morning, as well as at night.
Only in the afternoon, they eat properly."
"Well, because I was on it ten years
ago [she fled an abusive
partner with her young baby] and I'm on
it again, there's a lot of differences…
it is so much harder and I wouldn't recommend it to any single mother to
try and do what I did ten years ago because there's -- I couldn’t even imagine. There's no possible way that a mom is going
to be able to take care of her baby on the welfare system. It's really, really horrible."
a) Welfare Rates and the Decision to Leave or Return
to an Abusive Relationship
It is clear from
our research, and this is confirmed both by other research and extensive
anecdotal accounts (including those we heard during our forum on February 6),
that welfare can be a lifeline for women in abusive relationships. To fully appreciate this it is necessary to
look briefly at the role that economic dominance plays as one of the many
strands in the web of domination and control spun by abusive men. Abusive men will often go to great lengths to
ensure that their intimate partners are economically dependent upon them, for
economic dependence gives them tremendous power and control. To ensure this dependence, an abusive man may
engage in any number of tactics; he may prevent his intimate partner from
participating in paid employment; he may not permit her to attend school, or
participate in training of any kind; he may prevent her from acquiring the
language skills she needs to become gainfully employed; and if she is employed
he may control her pay. All of these
behaviours were pervasive in the relationships that women described to us. Research also documents the enormous amount
of time that women are absent from work due to the debilitating consequences of
woman abuse and the incredible amount of harassment that abusive men perpetrate
at women's places of work, often causing them to lose their jobs (Cooley et al,
1997; Raphael, 2000).
Many women
escaping an abusive relationship are not in a position to support themselves
through labour market participation, although clearly some are. Some women need time to heal, some need a safe
place (and employment is often very unsafe), and some need supports and
training (Raphael, 2000). Many women
have nowhere to turn for financial support, as their partners have effectively
destroyed women's relationships with friends and family. Thus, having access to financial support that
is both independent of the abuser and
not dependent upon labour market participation is a critical pathway to women's
safe exit. Welfare potentially provides
that pathway.
Indeed, many of
the women in our study told us that they had absolutely no one to turn to for
financial assistance, for housing, food, support, etc. This was very much tied to the isolation
that so pervaded their lives while living with their respective abusers. As noted above, many abusers had effectively
cut off all ties with their partner's/spouse's friends and family; some were
never allowed to leave the house unless their abusers accompanied them. Some of the women had been sponsored by their
husbands to come to
A very large
number of women expressed deep gratitude for the welfare benefits they had
received, or were receiving. Some made
clear that without welfare benefits they would not have been able to leave the
abusive relationship. Yet, many simultaneously described the enormous
challenges of not only surviving (as described above), but also the horrible
feeling of being trapped on welfare, often a demeaning, stigmatizing place to
be. And this led several women either to
return to the abusive relationship, or to contemplate doing so in the future.
In the complex
decision-making process of whether to stay in or return to an abusive
relationship it is clear that the adequacy of welfare rates plays a significant
role: nine of the women we interviewed remained in abusive relationships
because they knew how much they would receive on welfare and felt that they
couldn't provide adequately for themselves and their children on the rates (one
called welfare to ask how much money she would be eligible for if she left her
abusive relationship and she was told $233. -- she stayed); seven women reported returning to the abusive
relationship in situations where their struggle to survive on welfare was the reason, or one of the main reasons,
for returning (one woman was cut off for three months because she missed an
appointment with her welfare worker, having no where else to turn, she went
back to the abusive relationship); and six women were contemplating returning
to the abusive relationship at the time of the interview or had contemplated
returning because of the difficulties they were experiencing on welfare. Women also commonly referred to their
friends and other women who they had come to know in shelters or elsewhere and
offered their observation that many women are remaining in, or returning to
abusive relationships because of the
welfare rates. Earlier research
undertaken by OAITH shortly after the rate cuts came to the same
conclusion: all of the shelters surveyed
reported that women were remaining within, or returning to, abusive
relationships as a direct result of the decrease in financial support that they
could receive on welfare (OAITH, 1996).
In our survey of
area administrators, 17 of 35 responded affirmatively when asked, "Are you
aware of any cases where a woman has left welfare and returned to an abusive
relationship because she found that she was unable to adequately support
herself and her children on welfare?"
When asked to estimate the frequency with which this occurs the answers
included: "occasionally" (4);
"frequently" (1), "38/year" (1) and "no
statistics/unknown" (7).
Disturbingly, for
many women we interviewed, the decision of whether to leave, to stay, or to
return often turned on the question of survival; were the chances of survival
better in the abusive relationship or on welfare? Several women who expressed a strong resolve
not to return to the abusive relationship said that they feared for their lives
if they were to return; the choice for many women then, is between struggling
desperately to survive on welfare or risking violence and possibly death, by
returning to the relationship.
Inadequate
welfare rates have also led some women into new relationships -- searching
desperately for a way off welfare and into a new life -- which have turned out
to be abusive, and as discussed more fully in the fraud section below (section
5 c) at page 56), some women are quite literally trapped in these abusive
relationships.
Women often were
caught in a double bind in their determination to care for their children. For some their only choices were to stay in
the abusive relationship and potentially expose their children to the abuse; or
leave the relationship, go on welfare and risk being unable to adequately house
or feed them. Exercising either choice
carries with it the risk of intervention by a children's aid society, and the
possible loss of custody to the state.
Below are some of
the women's observations about their decision to leave or return to an abusive
relationship:
"It is very difficult to meet their [the children's] needs and it is difficult to pay the rent too. When the rent increases my income or the
welfare money does not. Sometimes I
think about reuniting with my husband.
However, that will be my worst choice…
I know that he is going to watch me all the time. I am going to be afraid of him until I
die."
"They have pushed people into having
to go into relationships. And, you know,
if you don’t apply with it for that person you are living with, you don’t
qualify, but they have pushed you into a situation where you have no choice but
to live with somebody in order to make the rent or to make the bills because of
the cost of living has gone up and they are not prepared to give, you know,
anymore than what is absolutely necessary.
So, there is always going to be, there is always going to be abuse with
women because the system, the government, has put us into that kind of an
environment."
"Many times I thought if I was with
an abusive guy at least I could get help for food because the welfare cheque
was not enough, so many times we starved because we didn’t have food at
home. I understand too why so many women
go back to abusive guys, maybe for the extra $100 every month, but I actually
don’t, I think it is better I starve than to get into another abusive
relationship." [In deciding to leave I thought] “what am I doing in this relationship, he
is not helping or taking care of the kid.
Then I realized that I can take care of my child even if we starve or
get deported, we would survive and go on with our life without abuse. The cheques from welfare had never been
enough so we were living from scratch – Kraft dinners, malnourishment…Can you
imagine if there was nothing? I would
not have been able to leave home.
Welfare meant that I had at least something to live."
"If I could actually live, which is
something you can't do right now, now with all the cut backs you cannot
honestly live unless you are dealing drugs or you're a hooker or have a guy staying
with you, you can't live off what they give you. So if I can honestly live I would've been
probably on my own about two years ago when I first left my husband. I would have been on my own but I had to
find, really I had to find a guy to live with or a guy to take care of me. That's what I had to do. So I thought, you know I made my best
choice. I obviously didn't make the best
choice but I made the best choice I could at the time. He did have money and you know, he took care
of me. [At the time of
the interview he was incarcerated for an assault against her and she was
contemplating returning to him when he is released from prison.] And
because he'll be getting out of the correctional institution they help them
find housing. They wouldn't make him
leave without finding him an apartment.
But here I am and, it's been, I've been like here for probably three and
a half weeks and I've never heard a word back.
… You know and I really find it ironic you know, a federal inmate has
priority over somebody who is honestly trying."
"I went from a basement apartment to
a house, because my children were too sick.
I feel badly for my children because they don't adequately meet the
needs of my children to live because that's all we can afford. And another time we, we held onto our
relationship for that extra couple hundred dollars, just so we could afford the
rent. … I deserve just as much respect from the people who make the laws, make
the rules. And God forbid they are ever
in a position where they lose their pay cheque.
They will have to humble themselves like I am. And have to humble themselves to get a
cheque. And a lot of the workers are
very, they treat you like garbage."
The women
participating in the February 6 forum affirmed our finding of the significant
impact welfare rates have on women's decision to stay, leave or return to
abusive relationships. As with some of
the women we interviewed, they noted that women return to abusive relationships
because the supportive refuge they sought from the state simply did not
exist. It is not only a matter of the
inadequacy of benefit levels, but also the lack of respect, support,
understanding and validation. Participants
in the forum noted that many women are subjected to demeaning judgements and a
profound lack of understanding and empathy at a time when they desperately need
both emotional and material support.
They also noted that the unpredictability of both the welfare and child
welfare systems also plays a role in women's decision to return to abusive
relationships. In some instances, women
will opt for the abusive relationship, because notwithstanding the control
exercised by their batterers, they have more control and greater confidence in
their ability to predict behaviour and consequences in their abusive
relationships than in their relationships with welfare or child welfare.
It is not at all
uncommon for many to blame abused women for making 'poor choices', for example,
when returning to an abusive relationship.
But placing blame on individual women is deeply problematic for it
obscures the role that the state plays in constructing very limited options for
women, and thus obscures our collective responsibility. Several women described to us how their
abusive partners had repeatedly reminded them, "you can't survive without
me"; "you need me";
"you'll never make it on your own;" or words to that
effect. And very sadly, some of the
women who made the courageous decision to leave found they could not survive
without their abusive partners, and returned.
Women's inability to survive had really nothing to do with their desire,
motivation, or work ethic; but rather everything to do with the meagre social
supports they were able to access. We,
collectively, give abusive men more power -- we enable their threats -- because
we have failed to make adequate financial and other supports available to
women.
It is clear that
social assistance rates are inadequate for all recipients. The consequences of
inadequate rates are grave and clear: inadequate nutrition and consequent
ill-health (both physical and mental); widespread hopelessness and despair;
exclusion and lack of full and meaningful citizenship; and for some, continued
exposure to abuse and violence.
Inadequate welfare rates make women less safe and lack of safety is a
fundamental obstacle to achieving gender equality.
b)
A specific issue
raised by several women we interviewed is the clawback of the National Child
Benefit Supplement. In 1998, the federal
government added the National Child Benefit Supplement to the basic Canada
Child Tax Benefit. The NCBS is intended
to provide additional benefits to low-income families with children. But not a single family with children on
welfare in
Identifying one of the negative things about welfare, one woman
comments: “That they take our baby bonus
away. It is ridiculous. I get $500 a month to live on welfare. That’s all I get.”
“It makes it hard because you don’t get
your baby bonus, you’re just getting your welfare cheque and you have two
children you have to raise and feed.”
“…the money is not really at all enough
because if you’re raising kids there’s food, there’s shelter, there’s clothing
needs and they’re giving you like nine hundred dollars a month and you’ve got
three kids. And…you’re supposed to get
your baby bonus but they deduct that, part of that from there. To me that shouldn’t be allowed because
…that’s given to you from the government and there are other provinces where
it’s not deducted. The baby bonus is
considered, that’s your children’s money not your money….
She is absolutely right. From
the beginning,
The clawback policy in
Workfare is a
major feature of the new welfare 'regime'.
Through the 1997 Ontario Works legislation, single mothers, previously
exempt from work requirements, were decisively redefined as 'employable'. As a condition of eligibility, mothers with
children as young as three years old and eligible to attend part-time school
must be in paid work or participate in activities to increase their likelihood
of employment. Redefining single mothers
as ‘workers’ and not ‘mothers’ for the purposes of welfare is a very clear
statement that the work that (poor) mothers do in caring for children is not
valued. It is also only mothers on
welfare who are not allowed the autonomy to make critical decisions about the
needs of children and work (paid and unpaid).
A forum participant commented on the irony that at the same time the
federal government extends parental benefits under Employment Insurance
legislation and the
Workfare
requirements can include unpaid community service placements, job search,
workshops, education and training programs, and job placement. The assumption that ‘any job is a good job’
means that the available services are ‘minimalist’ and geared to provide the
‘shortest route’ into employment and off of welfare (Peck, 2001, p. 244). However, evaluations of this ‘work-first’
orientation in
This section
explores the experiences of women as they deal with the policies and practices
of the new workfare regime. The themes
that resonate throughout the interviews include the ways that workfare
discounts and devalues the work women do in caring for children, pays little
attention to impediments (child care, health) to employment, while ignoring
their strong commitment to employment, their specific aspirations, and the
realities of the low-wage labour market.
It is usually experienced as coercive and, very rarely, helpful. In addition, most women do not know that they
can be deferred from workfare requirements, for reasons of family violence
and/or health and disability issues.
What also emerged in the interviews, and opens the discussion, is the
abuse that women experience in their
lives in relation to employment.
a) Paid Work As a Site of Abuse
As noted earlier,
employment frequently features in the abuse as men exert their control. Abusers
sometimes insist that women are employed, then control and squander their
earnings. More frequently, however,
abusers do not permit women to hold jobs or do anything to improve their
employment prospects. Indeed, American
research evaluating various welfare-to-work programs has found that the single
greatest impediment to women’s successful participation in employment readiness
programs is the abusive conduct of past or current male partners (Raphael,
1995; Raphael & Tolman, 1997). The
abusive behaviours documented by these studies include: men hiding or destroying
women’s work clothes; physically preventing them from attending programs;
interfering with their sleep or study to undermine their abilities to perform;
and constantly harassing and harming them in the workplace (Raphael,
1995). As Jody Raphael (1995, p. 29),
one of the leading
Our survey of
area administrators asked whether they were aware of any problems arising from
participation in work-related activities because of ongoing or past domestic
violence. About one-third of the
respondents were aware of problems and several specifically referred to ongoing
or recent abuse. The problems they noted
included being stalked by an ex-partner in the workplace, the time women had to
spend in court and with police, and the psychological and physical trauma that
results from abuse. One individual
commented, “If a woman’s personal life is
in chaos, then she is unable to obtain and maintain employment.”
Eight of the
administrators identified issues that are likely to arise in the context of
current or past abuse. These included
depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, flashbacks, anger, and lack of
concentration. Several noted the
importance of making appropriate community referrals. At one site, we were told that clients of
some offices could be referred for specific services focused on employment
barriers caused by domestic violence.
Many women
described to us how the issue of work and the workplace itself are arenas for
their abuse and harassment. Injuries
cause them to lose time from work and jeopardize their jobs. They are discouraged or prevented from
working and their desire to work and/or their abilities are belittled and
questioned. Abusive partners make
repeated phone calls to them at work and refuse requests for help with
childcare or transportation. Even if the
abuse ends when women leave, the impacts can continue for a long time.
“I wanted to work. He did not want me to work. He didn’t want to pay daycare at the time,
so, every time I made an attempt to look for a job or to get involved with
activities or programs, there would be more abuse…And, you know, he didn’t want
to take the responsibility of taking the children or paying for daycare…”
She later tells us:“…he did start harassing me at work.
He actually came to my work
and took the car away from me and made me walk home about…4 or 5 miles from my
home in the middle of the night ‘cus I was working at a bar. So, there were lots of times that if I did
take the car to go to work, he would come and take the car away from me without
even saying anything to me.” This
woman experiences anxiety and depression; there are days when she is still
afraid to leave the house.
A
woman tells us about her efforts to complete grade 12 and hold jobs but because
her abusive partner did not want to stay with the children he burned her school
books and followed her to work.
“Many
times my husband went to the restaurant to see how I was behaving with the
customers or flirted with any one. I was
embarrassed, knew that he was keeping an eye on me. But I felt that he couldn’t hit me in
public…But sometimes it can be unbearable when my colleagues found his presence
repeatedly outside the restaurant.”
A woman who worked with her partner laying carpets says, “I didn’t work with him during the times
that he would abuse me and he would just leave me at home because there were
signs of abuse and anybody would be able to recognize that.”
One
woman, who gave up her job when she became pregnant, told her abuser that she
wanted to work part-time at a coffee shop, as her baby was now 10 months
old. He prevented her from working
because he feared that people from his community might think that he couldn’t
take care of her, and she might meet another man who was interested in
her.
Another woman explains: “He never permits me to master any
skills. I guess he might be thinking
that if I live a life of a simpleton, it would be easier for him to dominate me
and put me down. He did not allow me to
work after the marriage took place. I
wanted to use my learning and knowledge; therefore, I gave tutoring to some of
the neighbourhood children. One day he
found that out and he was very mad. He
yelled at me and throws the books away.
At that time, he warned me not to speak with anybody. I lived like a slave.”
“When we moved to
“Oh my god! Work!
I wasn’t even allowed to go out.
I wanted to do my degree but he stopped my education in
“He didn’t allow me
to attend ESL or any other school/course.
He used to tell me that I wasn’t capable of earning or learning. I also started believing that and lost my
confidence in paid work or my ability.”
“The abuse
interfered with my work because I was depressed. When I had to work late and come home, there
would be a big fight. Sometimes I felt
bad about working in those kinds of jobs.
I didn’t feel safe in my workplace because he used to call me and bother
me about it. This abuse affected my
self-esteem, it is very low due to those abuses and now I feel I cannot find a
job as a professional because of all the beatings. I was doing garbage jobs.”
Despite the active and
abusive discouragement of work, women we interviewed have no illusions about
the importance it has in their lives. As
one woman told us:
“Economical
independence will make women to be safe from abuse. Because a woman who is economically
independent and works and has enough money to survive for her and her kid, this
woman has the power to decide her life and to live a better, safer life.”
But economic
self-sufficiency is not easy to achieve.
Women, who may be ready for employment, must nonetheless contend with a
low-wage and insecure labour market (Stephenson & Emery, 2003).
b) The Realities of Paid Work in Women’s Lives
The increasing division
between ‘good’ jobs and ‘bad’, the rise of ‘McJobs’ and the growth of
contingent work lie at the heart of workfare.
As Jamie Peck (2001, p. 342) notes, this is the climate in which
workfare policies become “normalized as a means of enforcing labour-market
participation in a climate dominated by underemployment, low pay, work
insecurity, and low-grade service employment.”
As we have noted all along, workfare policies are not gender-neutral and
women (single mothers) have been their primary focus.
While some women we
interviewed had jobs that paid well, most would be considered to be ‘bad’ jobs:
they were poorly paid, frequently involving shift work and/or irregular hours
and offering little security. Some women
worked two or three jobs at a time and as one job ends, they hope that another
may open up. The gendered nature of the labour market is very evident in the
work they do -- many of them work as waitresses, cashiers, factory workers, and
personal support workers.
One
mother responds to a question about the type of jobs she has had: “Um, God (laugh) well anything basically…a
lot to do with, like, Personal Support Worker.
…I’ve done a lot of like Zellers, Toys R Us, working in the bowling
alley snack bar, babysitting…you know lots of variety, I guess.”
There was current
employment information available for 58 women who took part in the
research. Of these, 15 (26%) were
working on a full or part-time basis at the time of the interview. Eight women had their income ‘topped-up’ by
welfare because their earnings were low, although several worked between 30-40
hours a week (the treatment of earnings while in receipt of welfare is
discussed more fully below). A ninth
woman did not receive a top-up but was eligible for OW drug benefits because of
her child’s medical expenses. They
worked at: Tim Horton’s, a shoe store,
in dry cleaning, day care, office work, providing nursing assistance and
delivering pizza. Reported wages were
typically in the range of $8-10 dollars an hour, although one woman who
provided private tutoring received $20 an hour, and another woman who provided
day care in her home received less than $2.50 an hour.
Women are well aware of
the difficulties of securing decently paid employment and expressed their
considerable concerns about workfare and its emphasis on the ‘shortest route’
to employment. They do not believe that
simply getting into a job provides a pathway to sustainable employment. Their hopes for the future include upgrading
their skills and finding decent employment:
“…for 11 or 12 years I haven’t been back
in school and I just want to go back to school.
Do some upgrading, especially computer courses. Oh, I would love to. But you know, money is tight…I don’t have the
money. …but hopefully, I can…take some
courses here and there, a little bit here, because I don’t want to be doing
this cash for the rest of my life. “
“I didn’t want to
work in Zellers or Bi-way or some place like that because I really enjoy
working with children and I always think that if you get stuck in something
like this, you get stuck for a while…and it is hard to get out of it because
you’ve been doing it for so long. And if
you work at a job that you really like, you can afford to deal with your life. If you enjoy your job, then you do it
well. I think it makes everything a lot
easier. …They wanted me to take any job
at that time.”
“I would say I need to study to get a job
that I could work on it…not a survival job but a decent job. The pay is important but it is more important
that it is something I like...”
Immigrant women face a
racialized as well as a gendered labour market (Das Gupta, 1996; Ghorayshi,
2002). They are also particularly adversely affected by the rise of contingent
work (Gabriel, 1999). Women describe the
uncertainty and instability of their work:
“I did not get the chance to get off
welfare. I am working continuously.
Whenever the companies are not busy, they lay their workers off. I worked for two companies before they laid
me off. Now I am working in another
company. …If their work slowed down, they would get rid of the new
workers. The job is not steady. This is the main reason for my sticking with
welfare. Sometimes I get $900 and
sometimes I get $100 from welfare. To
tell you the truth if I get a steady job there is no reason for me to get
welfare… I would like to leave welfare and have a full-time job. Nevertheless, it is very hard to find a job
in…to live a normal life. Sometimes if
they do not get enough orders they ask us to go home, even if it is
“I mean I’ve had three jobs in the last two
years and you know it’s frustrating. My
last job was in a grocery store and I really liked it. It’s just now getting into grocery again,
nobody’s hiring.”
“After I got my landed paper, I went to
work. First, I worked in a chocolate
factory. They get busy only at Christmas
time. When they… laid me off, luckily I
found a job in a bindery company. And
then in a CD company. I worked in
several places.”
Although one of the women
we interviewed filed a successful human rights complaint when she was refused a
job, women more often spoke about the less overt forms of racism they
encounter. In particular, the
institutionalized forms of racism that are apparent when their qualifications are
devalued. They tell us about the
difficult and frustrating
experiences of getting jobs that recognize their credentials and experience:
“…you
spend 5 or 6 years in university to come here to clean floors and toilets
because you are not Canadian. That’s
another big problem here.”
“As a journalist coming from
(another country), it is hard to find a job here…I have never worked as a
journalist in
“I was frustrated
with my job. I have a M.A from
Many women hope that
training programs will help them to move on to better jobs and women who have
skill and educational qualifications are anxious to find jobs that use
them. A woman with four years of medical
training from her own country is hoping to save money to attend medical school
in
c) Workfare: "not busy in the right places"
It is precisely this strong commitment to work and the hope of getting
off welfare that caused a number of women to say that they were pleased, at the
start, to find out about Ontario Works.
They thought it would offer them the necessary help to get jobs or
training. The reality that emerges from
the interviews is strikingly different.
Women want to be in paid work, the supports are not available through
OW, and the program, in many instances, creates obstacles to their
employment. One woman hoping to access
employment help and childcare was disappointed that she was offered nothing
through Ontario Works. She simply
says: “They’re not busy in the right places.” Based on her examination of
an
The participants in our forum agree and suggested that the programs that
are "worth anything" are not available through OW. They also worry that women are set up to
fail, through being encouraged when they are not ready, or not being given
adequate supports, or being required to attend programs that are
ineffective. They are then blamed for
failing, and may well blame themselves.
The Ontario Works
directives spell out the involvement of the applicant (DIR 5.0-3) in a “…plan
(that) is flexible and individualized based on the person’s needs and can
change as an individual circumstances change” (DIR 5.0-6). Women did not find this to be the case. Whether they were speaking of their efforts
to access programs, their experiences with workshops or volunteer placements,
they describe considerable effort and frustration in trying to use OW to make a
new start for themselves and their children.
Their own definition of their needs,
circumstances, strategies and goals seem largely ignored in a system that is,
too frequently, arbitrary and harsh.
These themes intertwine as women tell us about the way that workfare
does not serve as a ‘hand-up’ but rather, gets in the way of paid work.
i) Training/educational
programs are hard to access
Although OW provides for
educational and training programs, women told us repeatedly how very difficult
they are to access. This is not surprising because, consistent with an approach
that emphasizes getting into the labour market as quickly as possible, the availability
of education and training programs (in Ontario and elsewhere) for people on
welfare has been cut back (HRDC, 2000).
Despite a standard that
identifies post-secondary education as an “investment in long-term future
self-reliance” (OW DIR 6.0-7), it is now an almost impossible goal. Formerly, single mothers on social assistance
could attend university or college receiving OSAP for their education expenses,
and social assistance for their basic needs.
Now those who want to attend university must rely on OSAP, a loan-based
program for all of their expenses. While
this presents problems for many people across the province, the debt load that
those on welfare are now required to assume puts university out of reach for
women who must also provide for their children.
A young mother of two responded this way when she was asked about her
goals: “Going back to school, getting an
education because I’ve always wanted to be a CAS worker or something along that
line. When you are on welfare, it’s hard
to achieve anything. That’s the way I
feel. Because they really don’t give you
enough money to do anything…it pulls you back but it tries to force you
forward. …they are telling you to go out there and get an education, but you
really can’t…”
A woman who moved from one city to another found that
she was confronted by a very new set of expectations. She was required to fulfil the job search
requirements, even though she was in university 30 hours a week and working 10
hours in a part-time job. “So that created so much pressure…. I got
pneumonia that month…. And then I was worried because when I got sick I hadn’t
done my job search and I hadn’t been at school so what was I supposed to do?
…it continuously made me fearful that I would be cut off that I wouldn’t have a
place to live, that I wouldn’t be able to make my goals…” She felt like she
was “put under a guillotine” and it
did not make sense to her: “I was getting where I needed to go. I was getting my degree.”
Even completing high
school can be very difficult:
One women explained that she had almost finished grade twelve but then
lost her day care when the Harris government came into power and cut subsidies: “I
couldn’t get an education to go off the system.”
A young woman whose pregnancy was so advanced that she could not walk to
school, had to drop out a term before graduating. She could not get travel costs covered by
welfare: “And I was stuck in a position
where I was seventeen years old and I’m pregnant, and this is the government
I’m going to fight? It was basically a
losing battle so I didn’t even really bother.
I tried a few times and I just, I mean I wanted to get my life together,
not waste my time fighting something that’s not going to happen.”
Women also recounted their difficulties in getting OW support to
participate in employment or skills-related programs that, unlike
post-secondary education, are still considered legitimate:
Two women who are recent newcomers to
Coming out of a lengthy period of abuse,
After a refusal of
support for a business skills and computer upgrading course, one woman’s hope
then turned to a Support Worker program.
Because this particular course was free, she thought it would be
acceptable because she would only have to purchase books. Her worker would not approve this course
either.
Another woman who also wanted to attend a Support Worker course told us
that her worker would not approve the
$374 fee; ultimately, her mother paid for the program. She also did not receive help toward her
transportation costs.
A mother who recently left her abuser works part-time (30 hours a week)
in retail and receives a top-up from OW.
She knows a number of jobs now require some computer facility, so she
asks her worker if it is possible to access some upgrading while continuing in
her job: “And he said that they are not providing money for that one… you are
looking at 6 months to a year helping me go to school and update …So that is
the only thing I am sad about because now I have to go to work and save money
if I want to go back to school. If I
want to take some training, I have to save money. And with the two kids, some times it is hard
….” The emphasis on ‘a job, any job’ runs counter to the longer-term
interests of this mother and her children, one of whom is not yet in full-time
school.
“They push you, you have to find a job,
and right now there are not too many jobs, and you know I have my degree from
university, but what are you doing now?
Cleaning houses, working for several dollars per hour at a restaurant
doing dishes. If you don’t do that, they
will push you. They are not going to
help you and, as I told you already, the priority is my kids so I have to do
whatever I have to do.”
ii) Workshops and unpaid
placements
Women are usually required to attend job-readiness or information
workshops. While one or two of the women we spoke to found them helpful, most
women expressed their frustration with them because they were time-consuming,
repetitive and not helpful.
The following comment is typical of a number we heard: “Instead
of engaging people in workshops all the time they should have a strategy and
proper planning, not engage people just for the sake of it.”
A woman who had completed a BA and one year of an MA in her home country
was required to attend a number of workshops: “Well in the beginning I thought it might be helpful for my
career. But … always new people are coming and telling us
the same thing. …I’m the one who
contacted people in [her design trade], started volunteering, gathered
information on jobs, businesses and finances…. I want to work, I don’t mind
attending workshops if they are useful.
They are not, they talk about the same thing on and on, like a broken
record. How ridiculous is that? I want to make a career in [her design
trade] and the welfare people want to
send me to Grammar School to keep me busy.”
In order to find
out about possible programs or employment opportunities one woman comments that
“I’ve got to sit through a bunch of
sessions of probably stuff I already know….
But at the end they help you to find a job.” Her job search so far has not turned up
anything. She now pins her hopes on a
training program, but she is worried that if she finds a program, welfare will
not want to pay for it.
Unpaid placements are another way of meeting the mandatory work
requirement. These are supposed to
provide women with skills and experience that they can use to access paid
employment. One of our respondents did tell us about a good volunteer placement
that was arranged for her, but more women reported that they received no help
in arranging volunteer placements.
When she was told
that unpaid work was a part of workfare, one woman asked if there was a list of
agencies, and was told there was not.
She comments, “I’m good at finding
my own…but there are people who have no idea how to do that.”
A woman that did
have community work arranged for her helped out for four days with a community
event and she also worked at planting plants.
However, she would very much like some computer training.
Expenses can be incurred
in unpaid placements that are not necessarily reimbursed. One woman explains why she stopped her
placement:“…’cause it was downtown and…I
lived way out past the shopping centre and it was way downtown. So either I was going to be busing it which would
have taken me forever, like I couldn’t get the children to daycare, bus there,
and then bus back to get them out in time.
And I had a piece of crap car that was dying and then it was costing me
$5 a day to park but I was just pulling my hair out….”
iii) Workfare, children’s
needs and childcare
Making paid work and ‘work-readiness’ activities mandatory for single
mothers discounts and devalues the work of caring for children. This is ironic at a time when the
difficulties of balancing paid work and family responsibilities have become
such a popular topic for today’s media.
What gets written out of the story when women on welfare are highlighted
are the enormous challenges that they face in their struggle to meet the needs
of their children for care and the expectations of welfare that they ‘work’
while managing on wholly inadequate incomes (Evans and Swift, 2000). The issues that emerged most sharply from
what women told us included the ways that their own assessment of their needs
could be totally ignored by workers, the difficulties they experienced in
getting employers to accommodate children, and the problems they encountered in
finding accessible and high quality childcare.
The ways that workfare requirements are applied frequently conflicts with the need of children
for care. A number of the examples that
women provided seem to contravene
the standard that requires that childcare restrictions are taken into account in setting the requirements for
workfare participation (OW DIR
6.0-7). Many women experience pressure
in fulfilling workfare requirements, even if it means placing their children in
arrangements that may be unsatisfactory or even dangerous. Sometimes workers even suggested that the
abuser look after a child and, in
the following example, contacted the abuser directly:
Refusing a young mother a childcare subsidy, her
worker suggests that she leave her infant with her abuser: “…she
thought (I) was…a teenage girl fighting with her boyfriend…she said well
there's no reason for us to give you subsidized childcare anything like that
when he's at home, no, no, no he should be watching her, no, no, no he's going
to watch her sort of thing and I was saying look it -- I don't want to leave my
child with him!! You know, I don't feel comfortable! I know what he is
like! He doesn’t have patience with
her! He has nothing (and this is a baby
you know) she's a little baby and I'm sorry I wouldn't do it and I mean, you
know. … she spoke with him and so that was like "Oh, my God" and that
was basically ratting me out to him, you know, so I mean you can imagine the
treatment I got that day. You know, so I
mean that was really like she didn't care to protect me at all or even try and
help protect me. … That's like putting
my head in the guillotine.” She was
then referred to a childcare centre she found appalling; she ends up relying on
friends to help her out.
One woman with three children, two of whom are pre-schoolers, was told
that she was only required to participate on a part time basis. She explains: … I had made arrangements to do volunteer work that fit in with what I
was doing or what I can do and some of it was at the school where my kids are
and some of it was through a couple of other agencies here in town and it just
seemed to fit into well with all of our schedules. I was thinking about the kids’ schedules and
childcare and all of these things. I had
put a lot of thought into it and then they come along and say, “No you can’t
but you can go to court from 8 to 4 [three days a week] and we’ll pay your
babysitter.”
Now the mother of a young baby, one mother is back in high school and
explains to us that her worker does not expect her to get a job, but does
pressure her to do volunteer work. She
tells her worker: "Look, I’m a little
busy with going to school full-time, then I come home I do home work, I clean
the house I cook dinner, I bathe the baby I put her to bed and by that time I
just about want to die (laugh). So I
said like where am I supposed to fit this work in to volunteer my time when I
don’t even have time to volunteer?…No, she hasn’t been helpful at all. She stays off my back as long as I’m in
school but if I need help with it, I’m … out of luck, you know."
As soon as her youngest child went to school, a mother was told that she
had to work “even weekends, or anything I
could get”.
In addition, we heard from mothers of the difficulties they experienced
when their children were sick.
One mother explains that she is fearful of being
‘docked’ for missing her workfare placement when her child is sick: “…
and the problem was that my child was a sick kid and when they call from school
because he’s sick, who would go and pick him up? … If I was absent from the job program, it
depends on the social worker to pay you or not, some social workers are softer
than others so they can excuse you, but others don’t; they just want to make
your life miserable.”
Another mother who receives a child care subsidy is informed that if her
child “is sick more than two days they
wanted me to pay the full fee of twenty-seven dollars a day…. And I said,
‘She’s two. I can’t help it if she’s
throwing up or she wakes up and she has diarrhea or something…. And they
actually sent me a letter saying they wanted me to pay…”
Women also spoke of the difficulties of fitting job expectations and
childcare:
A woman in part-time work for the last 5 years would like to leave
welfare for full-time nursing: “Even
though my kids are in school full-time, in this small community it’s really
difficult. They need to support it more,
either financially or footing the programs themselves or whatever it takes to
do it because I have a degree that says I can go and do nursing but I can’t
because I can’t work shift work, I can’t get a babysitter. The minute they find out that I need a
babysitter on Christmas day or major full weekend, all of a sudden I’m off.“
A woman working full-time at a coffee shop with three children,
including a daughter with a serious disability tries to negotiate a day shift
with her employer: “Yeah,
oh yeah. It really does. I don’t mind working the afternoon shift in the summer
time. And I told them that. But, I said, “Come September,” I said, “I
want to work a day shift." I said,
"I’ve been there over a year, I think I deserve the day shift now.” They told me, “Yes”. Well, here we are in October I’m still on two
afternoons 'til 10 at night. My kids
come home. They have to have microwave
dinner because, you know, they can’t cook.
So, and then when I get home, they’re in bed. And when I get up in the morning to get them
up, I see them for an hour. And, I just
said, “No, I’m not doing it any more.”
So, they’re supposed to be changing it and if they don’t change it, I’m
going looking for another job.”
But if women are
ready to take a job and need childcare, they encounter a system with too few
spaces, too little flexibility, quality that can be problematic, and costs that
they cannot afford. A number of women
were refused childcare subsidies. In
In theory, women
who are on Ontario Works should have an easier time finding childcare because
funding is targeted to OW and can now be used for unlicensed care (unlike other
childcare subsidies). This two-tier
standard of childcare is yet another indication of the diminished status of
low-income women and children on Ontario Works.
It is also part of the broader context of deregulation that has also
increased the number of children home care providers can look after (Doherty et
al., 1998). It is also clear from our
interviews that a number of women were not able to access childcare
subsidies.
Subsidized
childcare is clearly crucial to making it possible
for women to pursue a job, but they cannot, of course, address the issue of
poorly paid work. One woman who was
using subsidized child care laughed
as she commented: “Like you can’t work
and pay for childcare ‘cause it would be too expensive. But they helped with childcare. It makes up a bit of income so that way I
wasn’t down and out completely.” And the wages are also very low for women who
provide childcare. One mother takes care
of a young child in her home from
Many mothers also
spoke about the emotional impact that the abuse and separation had on their
children, and of the need to spend time with them to help in their
healing. While childcare is typically
thought of with regards to very young children, the needs of children over the
age of 12 were very much on the minds of many of mothers:
A
woman who is working three jobs, explains that her children suffered from the
abusive relationship and she “definitely
should have been home for my kids more… They lost their dad. As abusive as he was they still loved their
father and they had to lose their mom too because their mom couldn’t stay home
with them."
One mother spoke about the concern she felt leaving
her six month old child in day care but she comments: “The older they get, the more time they need and the bigger the problems
are…”
Even if suitable jobs are available, many women are not in a position to
take a job because of the needs of their children, the safety risks for them at
work, the impacts of abuse, and other health issues.
iv) Workfare and health/disability issues
Not surprisingly,
health issues feature prominently in the lives of women who experience
abuse. Yet the discourse about welfare
‘dependency’ pays no attention to the short and long-terms effects of abuse in
explaining why women come on welfare in the first place and why some stay
longer than others (Brandwein, 1999; Raphael, 2000).
Consistent with
the literature on woman abuse, many women who participated in the project
experience serious and continuing physical and psychological harms (Head &
Taft, 1995; Sassetti, 1993). Roughly
half of the women we interviewed described themselves as suffering from
depression and experiencing sleep problems.
Many reported anxiety, suicidal ideation, low self-esteem, ulcers, and
eating disorders. Mothers may also cope
with children’s health problems and disabilities; these may also be related to
abuse. While some women found workers
who understood, more frequently they encountered difficulties. Situations that one would expect to automatically
trigger work deferrals do not, and expenses related to treatment are often not
covered. Under Ontario Works, deferrals
from participation in workfare must be granted in cases of a “permanent illness
or disability” (OW DIR 6.0-17) and may be
provided where injury, illness or disability makes “any degree of
participation is impractical or restricted” (OW DIR 6.0-16). Women may also be deferred if they are
victims of ‘family violence’ [see discussion in section e)].
One mother who previously lived with an abusive partner is now
experiencing abuse from her son of 22.
Although she sometimes calls the police and goes to a shelter, she is
afraid to leave for good and worries that her son, who has serious psychiatric
difficulties, may commit suicide. She
has recently been hospitalized on two occasions and is recovering from a
‘nervous breakdown’. Despite these
difficulties, and a worker who well aware of her circumstances, she struggles
to meet the workfare requirements of 120 hours of unpaid community service. It appears that she could be deferred for
reasons of ‘family violence’ or illness/disability.
Another woman suffers from serious back problems and severe
depression. She would like to do classes
at her own pace on the computer, but was required to do a job search. Despite medical issues and the involvement of
police and a shelter her worker did not inform her of the possibility of a
deferral of work requirements. The job search expectation was applied until “…. I finally almost blew up at my caseworker
and tried to explain things to him and he was very rude to me.” She
is currently on a medical deferral that she initiated and says, “my doctor has filled out so many medicals
for the caseworkers that he is going to ring their neck. … Like,
I’ve had it with them. I mean, I kept
trying to go to school, I kept trying to get jobs. I couldn’t keep a lot of them because of my
health and everything else.” She
also tells us: "So I’m going in and following what my
doctor ordered and stuff and… I keep getting slapped with these damn bills, and
welfare doesn’t help you pay them.”
A woman is very worried about the workfare participation agreement she
is expected to sign as part of her OW application. She speaks of the continuing impacts of
abuse: “It affected my mental
health. Like, I, I have days where I
could be around people and I have days where I can’t. I can’t stand anybody getting close to
me. I went to a job interview, for
example, and they said, “We are just one big happy family here”, and I almost
ran out the door. I can’t stand being
close to people right now….” She is
currently in counselling and taking medication for depression and anxiety and
tells us “…I’m going to apply for
disability because I just can’t do it.”
When asked if the workfare requirement was applied to her, a woman
responds: “Yeah, they told me to find a job.”
She is in remission from recent cancer, which required radiation and
chemotherapy and occurred shortly after leaving her abusive partner. While she
tells us that she would not have wanted an exemption from the requirements, it
is disturbing that disclosure of abuse and recent treatment for cancer did not
prompt the worker to discuss a deferral with her.
Women also told
us of their concerns about being labelled ‘disabled’.
Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress syndrome and on a medical deferral
from workfare requirements, a woman explains her concerns: “But I
am treated differently with a ‘disability’ label. I see it in their treatment of me and others
identified as disabled. You are treated
more harshly if you have a disability.” She can only get a bus pass if she
has three medical appointments a week.
One woman who went on methadone to treat an addiction she developed
through drugs prescribed because of the abuse, could not get money to cover her
travel to see her doctor in a nearby city.
Now she is resisting pressure to apply for Ontario Disability Support
Program benefits: “…their just thinkin’ that I’m gonna be like that for the rest of my
life, not productive. I’ve even asked
them to put me into…volunteer work, anything, just to get out of my house, you
know, to get me back situated. No, they
wouldn’t do it. It’s gotten really
bad. I can understand, too, because in
some sense, the welfare, it’s like they're overwhelmed.”
Other issues that
emerged included the difficulties women experienced in getting the help they
needed from welfare with situations involving their own or their children’s
health needs. Welfare rules and
attitudes placed women and children in jeopardy and/or exacerbated health
problems.
A woman in the intensive care unit is told that she
needs to confirm information before welfare will process a cheque for her
children who are at home with no access to funds. A social worker at the hospital had to intervene
to stop the welfare worker from making demands and to ensure that the
17-year-old son had access for the money needed for the family. She remembers: "That
was the 31st of July and I expected money…and there was no
money…. And even though I’m in IC, and
the social worker was getting upset with the welfare worker: ‘She’s in IC.
She’s got children at home. Do
something for her!" A whole five
days later before there is money. My girlfriend had to come and take my girls
and send my son to
Two mothers
explain the obstacles they confront in trying to ensure that their children
have the health care they need. They
also describe the ‘work’ of welfare.
One mother needs travel funds to take her child, who
has spinal bifida to a large children’s hospital in another city. “So I
phoned and two days later, I phoned the week before I was supposed to go. The day before I left, I went into the
office. And there she sat at the
reception desk.
"What are you
doing?" I said, "I’ve left you numerous messages and you never got
back to me."
"Oh, did you?"
"Tell me you don’t
check your messages."
"It’s just I had so
many…. If I have too many, they are
automatically erased."
The worker made efforts to get the cheque out quickly
but in the end she had to rely on family members to take her child to the
hospital. But, as she comments "…you don’t want to keep asking and
asking and asking. I felt like a bum.”
After five months, one mother managed to access a
drug plan through welfare to cover the drugs her son needed for a serious
neurological disorder. She describes the
‘work’ of welfare. In order to get the
money to pay for glasses that her child needs urgently, she must obtain prior
approval: “Well…I’d phone and leave messages and they would never be returned. And sometimes I'd sit there all day waiting
because I really needed to speak to this person. …like with these glasses. I need them right away. And I know I’m going to be working tomorrow
and all through next week so, you know…you need to talk to them when you need
to talk to them and they don’t call back.”
d)
As indicated earlier, a
number of women were employed at the time of the interview. Of these, more than half receive some income
from OW because their employment earnings (due to low pay, limited hours, or
both) do not bring their income above the OW eligibility threshold. As an indication of the level of wages, one
woman worked 40 hours a week and was still eligible for welfare, and two others
worked 30 hours a week. In addition to
the women who are currently in paid work, a number of others had previously
been in paid work and received welfare.
The way that
earnings are treated for the purposes of welfare is critical to whether and how
much a woman will financially benefit from paid work. Along with making work mandatory, other
changes have been made that actually raise the penalties on earned income. In a careful assessment of the impact of
changes that took effect on
There are three
features of the OW current regulations regarding the treatment of earned
income: deductions, exemptions, and the
rate of benefit reduction. First,
individuals can deduct mandatory payroll ‘taxes’ such as CPP, EI, income tax,
and union dues (net income). Any
deductions with respect to voluntary contributions -- pension plans, for
example -- are counted as earned income (OW DIR 16.0-7). The actual costs of licensed and unlicensed
child care can be deducted up to a monthly maximum of $390 for children 0-5 and
$346 for children from 6-12 years old (OW DIR 16.0-9).
Secondly, a certain amount
of earnings are exempted and set aside before benefits are reduced. This earnings exemption is available only to
individuals who have been on Ontario Works for at least three months and it
varies with the size and composition of the household. For example, a single mother with one child
is allowed to earn $275 per month before her benefit is reduced; a single
mother with two children receives an exemption of $321 per month. Finally, there is the rate at which benefits
are reduced when earnings are over the basic exemption and deductions. The rate varies according to the total number
of months of employment an individual has accumulated while receiving social
assistance. For 12 months or less of
employment, every extra dollar earned reduces the benefit cheque by 75 cents
and by 85 cents if an individual is employed for 13-24 months. By 24 months, benefits are reduced dollar for
dollar (100% reduction). Months of
employment do not need to be consecutive and accumulate over all periods of
welfare receipt.
Most of the women
we interviewed were poorly paid, usually earning less than $10 per hour. By the time their employment-related expenses
(including child care, travel, clothing, etc), are taken into account, they are
likely to see little financial benefit to their earnings. Some women had to give up employment up
because of the costs of childcare. Others are able to continue working, despite
the very minimal financial gain. But in
the end, they often find that they cannot afford to continue working, or their
children need their time at home, or their job comes to an end. One woman describes the dilemmas of her
full-time office job that she held on a temporary basis before she had to come
on welfare:
“And I knew right
from day one that it was just going to be temporary…didn’t know for how
long…And financially unfortunately, it wasn’t a big help because both right at
that time …had to be with babysitters. …and of course travelling and all the
other expenses of having a full-time position.
[She estimates
that 60-70% of her earnings was spent on work-related expenses.] But it
was a good experience and when that …ended it was also sad because I enjoyed
working but I also felt I needed to be home with my children.”
For some mothers,
the combination of earnings and welfare income worked well for them. They were not necessarily sure how the
amount of their welfare cheque was calculated, but they assumed that what they
received was correct. The same woman quoted
above worked part-time as a tutor when she was on welfare. She was earning considerably more than
average ($20 per hour), and comments:
“It did work out and that
was ideal because it wasn’t full-time so I could have been with my children and
spend time with them. I loved my job and
it did bring quite a bit of money -- good money. But as I stated, it was seasonal so I
couldn’t rely on it 100%. So with the
welfare it worked out really well but it was also pressure because when I did
not have students, pressure was there and I had to look for jobs.”
But, much more frequently,
the deductions reduced the cheque to ridiculous amounts. Here is what women
say:
“… I remember one month we got a
check for…$2.78. This is great! This is going to help out a lot!”
A woman, who went back to work when her youngest child was two weeks
old, injured her back and at the time of the interview was at home with her
three-year old child. She remembers one
job that she had to quit “because it was
a joke. I turned in all my income things
and everything I made and then I got a $100 cheque in the mail and it was like
okay, “You see that I’m only making a hundred and eighty a week and you’re
taking it all.”
“…They took a percentage off
which was more or less all of it so….”
A woman explains that she no longer is in paid work because she cannot
afford it: “It was mainly at the beginning when I was honest with them and it was
just costing me too much…Yeah, and it was just more frustrating with reporting
to them with certain pay stubs and it was real, it was messing me up.” She then comments on the new regulations
and says:
“What I think they should do is that there should be benefits for people
that are trying instead of taking away from those people that are trying, and
that’s what they are doing. I believe now when you start work penny for
penny is deducted out of your cheque for 3 months and it shouldn’t be like
that. You should be able to keep that
money for the 3 months and maybe after that start deducting. Let us get a little ahead before you smash
us.”
Under Ontario Works,
anyone who “has declared himself or herself to be a victim of family violence”
may be deferred from the mandatory participation requirements for a minimum of
three months with the possibility of renewal (OW DIR 6.0-16). OW sites may decide to provide a deferral,
but they are not required to do so. If
they provide a deferral, they must document the need for a deferral and
regularly review the continued appropriateness of the deferral.
Knowledge of the
possibility of a deferral is vital information for women who leave, or hope to
leave, abusive situations. Even a
deferral as short as three months can provide a critical breathing space as changes are made that can include
housing, jobs, and school. Many women
must also deal with continued threats to their safety as well as the effects of
abuse. As already noted, the workplace
can be a site for further abuse and harassment and for many women, it is simply
not safe to go to work.
It is clear from the
interviews, that most of the women did not know about the possibility of a
deferral and were subject to workfare requirements, despite the worker’s
knowledge of abuse. We had complete information
available on workfare deferrals for 55 women.
Of these, 22 were required to participate in workfare activities,
although the welfare worker knew of their abuse. Another nine women were also required to
participate, although their worker did not know of the abuse. But these women are placed in the classic
catch-22 situation: you will not get an
exemption unless you disclose, but you will not be given information that is
crucial to making an informed decision of whether to disclose before disclosing. At the same time it is clear that even when
abuse is disclosed, the majority of women still do not know about the exemption
and are required to participate in a variety of forms of workfare.
Seven women were exempted
from workfare requirements, usually for reasons unrelated to the abuse (young
children, unrelated medical conditions, e.g.).
Two women were told about the exemption but did not want it. In addition, nine women reported that they
did not know of the possibility of an exemption, but were not pressured to
participate in workfare. In six of
these cases, the worker knew of the abuse.
Six women explained that knowing about the workfare deferral was not
especially relevant to them -- they were already employed, looking for work, or
unable to work because of their immigration status.
In total, only 9 of the 55
women were clear in their knowledge about the existence of a temporary deferral
from the requirement to participate in workfare. Many women told us that this would have been
an important option for them. Here are
some of their experiences:
A woman, who learned
about the exemption when she was interviewed for this project, says: “I
don’t know about these exemptions…. My
welfare worker is well aware of my situation….
She is the one who is pestering me for attending all the job workshops.”
A mother of two children, now 2 and 4 years of age, spent two months in
a shelter. The worker knew of the abuse
but she tells us: “The requirements were applied to me immediately. That was one of the things I thought that
under the circumstances (abuse and nervous breakdown), there should be a period
of time…. Not to get lazy but just to
get yourself together. “
Discussing reforms to workfare, one woman underlined the importance of “…a time period within which you can work,
even if they required you to go to support groups or may have to see a
counsellor or some such thing to help you get through this, and start a healing
process that could get you to the next level…. This is a goal by goal thing and
there is not a quick way around it.”
It is disturbing that so
few women were informed of the possibility of a deferral from workfare
participation even in the many situations where the workers knew of the
abuse. The reasons why women do not know
about the deferral become a little clearer when we consider the results from
the questionnaire we sent to 48 OW area administrators. Of the 35 administrators who returned the
survey, 34 responded to our questions about practices in their offices regarding
workfare deferrals for women who are leaving abuse.
Most offices (26) only
inform women who disclose violence, and two offices offer information only to
those women in violent situations who actually ask about a deferral. Five offices stated that each and every
client is told of the possibility of a deferral while a sixth office reported
that they try to facilitate a woman’s disclosure.
The prevailing practice,
reported to us, is to rely on women to disclose abuse before providing
information on deferrals. But a number
of women whose worker knew about the abuse did not know about the deferral,
suggesting that if they are informed, it is not in a way or at a time that can
be absorbed. Relying on women to
disclose the abuse they have experienced is problematic for a number of
reasons, as discussed in other parts of the report. For women to make an informed decision
regarding disclosure, they need to know, at a minimum, what difference it could
make to the conditions of their welfare receipt.
In addition to Ministry guidelines, four area administrators in their
responses indicated their offices have local policies that address deferrals
from mandatory work requirements and three included supplementary information. However, only one office provided a policy
that specifically referred to family violence.
At this site, workers are expected to ask clients whether there are any
reasons why they might not be able to participate in work activities and family
violence is one of the identified examples. Workers are also instructed to make note of
the steps that will be taken to enable the individual to participate and to ask
those who are eligible for a deferral if they would like to participate on a
voluntary basis. Written confirmation
from a physician, counselor, or shelter staff is necessary to confirm that
family violence may impede an individual’s participation temporarily.
One of the recommendations
to emerge from the coroner’s inquest into the death of Gillian Hadley was the
provision of an automatic six-month deferral for all women (and children) who
are leaving abuse and applying for or receiving benefits. However, if such a recommendation were implemented, it would not solve the problem
for the women who, for a variety of reasons, do not disclose the abuse. It also does not solve the problem that runs
through so many parts of this report:
that women have an extremely difficult time accessing accurate
information about welfare policies.
Improving the deferral system for women who disclose abuse, also does
nothing to solve the many other workfare issues that have emerged from our
interviews and discussed in this section of the report.
3.
Spousal and Child Support
All members of the 'benefit unit' are required to make 'reasonable
efforts' to obtain all other sources of compensation or income (subs.13(1),
Ontario Regulation134/98). For most
women, this means that they are required to make reasonable efforts to obtain
spousal or child support (for women under an family class immigration sponsorship
it may also mean seeking support from the sponsor). If one fails to make 'reasonable efforts'
then one may be found ineligible, or
have the amount of basic financial assistance reduced by the amount of income
that welfare officials deem would have been available if reasonable efforts had
been made. Obviously much discretion
vests with welfare officials to determine whether efforts have been
'reasonable' and what consequence should follow in the event that they should
find that reasonable efforts have not been undertaken. Arguably the policy directive seeks to guide
the exercise of this discretion in its ‘decision-making principles’. These
include the principle that "eligibility depends on effort in pursuing
support", suggesting perhaps that denials, rather than reductions, are the
more likely outcome of findings of 'unreasonableness' (OW DIR 23).
During the time period in which the interviews were conducted, Policy
Directive 23 provided for a temporary waiver of three months for those who
"left the home because of violent situations" (OW DIR 23). This waiver was subject to review of
circumstances every three months to determine whether an extension was
warranted if "there is family violence (emotional or physical) and can be
verified (e.g. by police, doctor, etc.)".
No definition of 'family violence' was provided, no discussion of the
circumstances that would warrant further waivers was included, and verification
was addressed obliquely only by example to police and doctors. The policy also stated under 'Standards',
that the family violence policy must be followed, but it appears that no policy
existed (only the waiver provisions within the policy directive itself).
Policy Directive 23 has very recently been revised (January 2004). The reference to the family violence policy
under 'Standards' no longer appears, but a new provision stating,
"individuals at risk of domestic violence are not expected to pursue
support" has been added.
Additionally the revisions include flexibility to permit waivers of up
to 12 months, after the initial three-month waiver, where there is evidence of
domestic violence and "it is reasonable to do so under all the
circumstances". A waiver of up to
12 months may also be granted at the outset where a restraining order is in
effect at the time of the application. (OW DIR 23, revised Jan. 2004). Domestic violence is not defined, nor is any
indication given of the circumstances in which a 12-month waiver would be
considered 'reasonable'.
Pursuant to subsection 33(3) of the Family
Law Act an application for an order for support can be made by the Ministry
of Community and Social Services if assistance is being provided under the OWA or ODSPA. Policy directive 23
recommends that Ministry agents should commence support applications only in
limited circumstances, including where "violence, threats or other forms
of intimidation are likely to result as a consequence of the applicant or
participant taking action" (OW DIR 23).
In the questionnaire responses from area administrators, ten of the 35
who responded indicated that their offices have a policy, in addition to the
ministry-wide policy, that addresses support obligations in the context of
domestic violence. Six provided copies,
and of these, three were assessed as additional to Ministry directives. Some
aspects of the policy and procedures in these three offices are highlighted:
·
Site 1: “The central issue must be the recipient’s
safety. Therefore the FSW (Family
Support Worker) must ensure that every effort is made to establish the validity
of the recipient’s claim and provide waivers where appropriate.” The procedures that are then spelled out
include collecting ‘detailed information’ regarding the violence or the
perceived threat; attending to the consistency and verification of the
recipient’s statement; third-party documentation, when possible. It is also
noted that abuse can be difficult to verify and workers are advised to “always
err on the side of the recipient in evaluating the validity of the individual’s
claim.” The policy also notes a
permanent waiver may be granted after a period of two years.
·
Site 2:
“Where support is being waived due to family violence, every attempt should be
made to complete the Declaration for Support/Maintenance” but if it cannot be
completed at that time, it must be completed within three months. Confirmation of services or treatment
received as a result of the abuse is required or, in the absence of agency
involvement, the details are required from the client and reviewed.
·
Site 3: The policy in this office in relation to
support directs the caseworker to defer a referral to the Family Support Worker
for three months if the applicant or recipient has left a violent situation and
would be put at risk by pursuing support. At the three-month review and,
depending upon the circumstances, the worker may continue a waiver or refer the
case to the FSW. They are advised to
“exercise prudent discretion…. erring on providing the grace period.”
For the women we interviewed, the issues of child support were many and
problematic. We review these below.
a) Women are Not Informed of the
Possible Waiver of the Obligation to Seek Support
The overwhelming majority of women we interviewed did not know that they
might be eligible for a three-month waiver (and possible further waivers) of
the obligation to seek support. Of the
54 interviews where we have clear information on this issue, the waiver was not
applicable for 20 women (e.g. they did not have present custody of the
children); 2 knew of the waiver; and 32 did not. During the interviews some women insisted
that the interviewer was mistaken and that no waiver is possible; they told the
interviewer that support must be
pursued. In most instances the welfare
worker was aware of the violence and abuse.
It is important to observe that women were clearly getting the message
about the obligation to seek support, but were not getting the message about
the possibility of a waiver (an issue that we return to later in the
report). And many women reported feeling
pressured to seek support.
"I was
told absolutely, that I had to go for child support even though I told them
that it was a dangerous situation, they still said I had to do it if I wanted
to receive benefits from them. And then
they turned right around and said they were going to take it. I had to assign it so what was the point of
me going through all of that experience for anyway?"
In these exchanges between interviewer and
interviewee in two different interviews the surprise upon learning of the
possible waiver is clearly evident:
"Although welfare can require women to
go after child support and find a job, women who have been abused can also be
exempted from these requirements. Did
you know about these exemptions?
What?
…at the
time?
What?
That is the
question.
You're
kidding me!!
No, they
can.
That is for
real?
That is for
real. Would you,
Wow. (Sigh)
Would you
like to be exempted?
It would
have made it,
Your life
easier.
Yeah,
because you don't have to,
Pursue the
man.
Yeah. It's
so sad. My family doctor wrote a letter on my behalf. It said that. Just as I said to my
worker."
"Although
welfare can require women to go after child support or to find a job, women who
have been abused can also be exempted from these requirements. Did you know about these exemptions at the
time?
But I told
you, you, know, they ask you to go after those guys.
Yes, but you
didn't know that you can say, "No, I don't want to go after him because he
might become worse."
No, no, you
can't say that, no! They push you to do
that, and they say to you, You have to go to court and they pay for
everything…It's not your decision. You have to go…. They pushed me to go."
In the responses from area administrators, nine indicated that their
practice is to verbally inform each client of the waiver policy (two indicated
that clients are asked if there are issues of violence when completing the
forms regarding support, another indicated that information about waivers is
given during a general information session).
Most area administrators (22) indicated that the practice in their
offices is to inform only those who disclose abuse, although some added that if
abuse is suspected direct questions might be asked. Of these, four also noted that workers were
alert to suspected abuse, in which case the policy would be explained to them.
Another respondent acknowledged that, depending upon the worker, the
information on support waivers might be provided only if requested by the
client. One respondent reported that
the practice in the office(s) was only to discuss the policy if specifically
requested by the client.
From our interviews with women it is abundantly clear that information
regarding support waivers is not reaching them.
Additionally, what appears to be a widespread practice among welfare
offices of advising women only after abuse is disclosed is problematic. Women need to have this information in order
to make an informed decision of whether to disclose the abuse at all.
b) Pressure to Pursue Support
Women felt a great deal of pressure to pursue their abusive partners
(the fathers of their children) for support, an action that most did not want
to take. Many wanted absolutely no
contact with their former partners and feared for their safety and the safety
of their children as they pursued support applications. They also feared the on-going contact and
control that the existence of a support order would create. Many felt that both they and their children
were put at risk by the Ministry's insistence that they pursue support; despite
the women's pleas that doing so would put them at risk. One woman was cut off welfare when she
refused to personally serve her abusive ex-partner with the application for
support. Her concern for her safety --
the basis for her refusal -- was completely disregarded.
"Did
your worker require you to have more contact with your ex partner than you
wanted to?
Yeah. They have a thing about child support. And when you're running from someone, you
don't want them to know where you are and you're being told that you better
find this person to get, okay. …To me, if the government is going to assist the
mother while she's caring for the children, if they want to go after him, they
should go after him. They should not
pull you into going after him. …the government should set up their own system
for tracking them down because if you're being beaten by someone, you don't
want to have to call that person. You
don't want that person knowing where you live!"
"Even
though the welfare officials are friendly with me, earlier on they pushed me to
get child support from him. I do not
want to blame the officials but I think the welfare system should change their
policy regarding single mothers. I want
to forget my past. I always avoid all
the things, which could trigger moments of my past life. …I want to avoid all
means of contact with him. I believe
that I could live my life without his assistance. I want to keep my children away from him in
every possible way. I want to forget my
past. I want to live like a new
person."
"Now he
wants to show the court that he is supporting his son, he is responsible
enough, which might be a way to get a status through the son [she
sponsored him to come to
"She [family support worker] said I had to give these papers to him and have him sign to fill out
for his, ah, what he spends every month on certain things and he had to sign
this paper for this and that. And he's
like, "I'm not signing that. I'm
not going to sign nothin'!" And she
said, "Well, you have to give it to him and serve him yourself for
court. Serve him the papers and get him
to fill these out." And I said, "He won't do it." She said, "Of well, you don't get a
cheque." And I'm like, "Just
great!" … so I didn't want to serve him because I knew what it was like
and she didn't understand that. So she
cut me off social assistance. So I
haven't been on it. My rent wasn't paid
for three months. Now I got the eviction
and then finally I had no choice but to serve him. Then when I served him he flipped out and
said that he was going to take bail and take off…because he doesn't want to be
ordered to pay support. No one tells him
what to do. So then finally when we go
to court… I had to explain to [the family support worker] why I didn't show up in Court. But then I was in fear, like in fear of
losing my child and she was like, "Oh yeah. Well, whatever." She said, "Why don't you want me to get
it, give me his phone number," and she said, "What are you
hiding?" I said, "Nothing! I'm hiding the fact that if I give you his
cell phone number, which he is going to know where it came from, he's going to
punch my lights out. " And she
said, "Of I don't believe he ever hit you.
I'm going to phone it." Her worker later meets her abuser in court and
learns first hand that he will not agree to anything. "Now
I have no home, no furniture, no nothing and she's like, "Well it won't
happen again." I thought, "Now
she's finally believing me but it's over and done with. I've lost
everything.""
"But like, welfare should be like, they
should be like, "If you don't want to go after child support because you
don't want that person knowing what's going on in your life". It shouldn't force you because like you're
leavin' that person with, there's a good reason behind it, especially if you've
been abused. They shouldn't force you to
have contact with him."
"Part
of going on welfare is that I'm not asking him for anything…. The way it is now you don't have enough money
for shelter and you gotta chase these men.
And then
c) When Support Orders Are Not Honoured
Another problem women encountered was where a support order was in
existence but not being honoured, yet the amount of the order was being
deducted dollar for dollar from her monthly cheque. A few women described their abusive former
partners as engaging in a new method of abuse by failing to make support
payments. Defaults on support orders not
only meant that women were without money (for one woman it was not corrected on
her cheque for six months) but also because it put women in the position of
having to make contact with him to try to get him to comply.
The ex-boyfriend of one young mother had been ordered to pay $75/month and this
amount was being deducted from her cheque.
He defaulted on his support obligations and it was six months before she
was able to get the money back on her cheque.
" … now
after he wasn't paying I had to call him and harass him and harass him and ask
him to please pay this money because it's not on my cheque so that forced me to
have more contact with him when I didn't want to. And basically grovel at his feet -- you know
please, please, she needs diapers you know, she needs formula whatever so that
I think was big time upsetting things for me because I swear I'd never bow down
to him again and here I was doing it."
4. Spouse in the House
As noted at the outset of the report one
of the significant reforms in welfare law in
The definition of 'spouse' was
constitutionally challenged in the case of Falkiner
et al v. Director, Income Maintenance Branch, Ministry of Community and Social
Services and Attorney General of
As noted in the
introductory section, this definition of 'spouse' represented a dramatic shift
from the regime in place since 1987, in which the definition of 'spouse' for
social assistance purposes largely tracked the Family Law Act definition.
Importantly, this meant that persons could co-reside for a three-year
period before being treated as spouses for social assistance purposes. And as noted earlier, the new definition
resulted in 10,013 people being cut off social assistance. Of these, 89% were women and 76% were single
mothers. Sandra Falkiner and the three
other women who challenged the definition of spouse all had been in receipt of
welfare when the new definition was introduced, each had been in a relationship
for less than a year, each had her benefits terminated when the definition was
introduced, and importantly, each was a survivor of abuse. All four, in their affidavits, attested to
the importance of having a period of time to test out a new relationship,
without forced economic independence.
The definition of
'spouse' or 'same-sex partner' also has a pernicious impact on persons with
disabilities, as illustrated by the Thomas
v. Director of Income Maintenance Branch,
which was heard together with Falkiner. Thomas was disabled and permanently
unemployable. He had lived with a person
of the opposite sex for 10 years, a person he described as his friend and
caregiver, but who had been deemed a 'spouse' for welfare purposes. The Board had found them to be spouses
because they spent most of their spare time together. The Court of Appeal found that the Board had
erred in two respects: in determining whether a relationship is spousal,
cohabitation must mean more than spending time together; and it failed to
adequately take into account Mr. Thomas' disability in considering the nature
of the relationship.
a) Knowledge of the 'Rules'
Only 18 of the 44
women who addressed this issue indicated that they had some knowledge of the
'rules' regarding forming new relationships.
Significantly, Ontario Works Policy Directive 19 provides that during
the intake verification interview, during an annual financial assessment
review, or at any time an applicant or participant declares a co-resident, the
worker must: explain the spousal/same-sex partner criteria; provide the
co-resident information sheet (which is to be signed indicating that its
contents have been explained and a copy provided); and complete the co-resident
questionnaire. It is possible that some
of the women we interviewed came onto welfare at a time when a different policy
was in place, but our interview findings also suggest that this may be yet another
area where information is not being adequately conveyed to women.
Of those who
stated that they were aware of the 'rules', they were expressed variously as
follows:
-
keep
him at arm's length
-
he
can't stay over more than 3 nights per week and he can only have so many items
of clothing at your place
-
you
can't live with him; or he can't live with you
-
you
cannot form a relationship
-
a man
cannot bring income into your home without repercussions
-
you're
not allowed to meet anyone while on welfare because they are expected to pay
your bills
These
understandings differ significantly from the actual definition; which, as
noted, is itself complex, ambiguous and interpreted and applied in a less than
consistent fashion.
Several women,
while not able to articulate a rule, simply alluded to possible bad
consequences if they did form a relationship or live with a man: something bad could happen; it could
interfere with or cause trouble with welfare; or you'd be cut off.
b) Implications of the Rules
Some of the women
expressed no concern at all regarding the rules governing intimate
relationships, stating emphatically that they had absolutely no interest in
forming a relationship -- they were done with men. Others, as noted earlier, were keen to find a
man -- almost any man -- who might be able to help make ends meet, or better
still, offer a way off welfare.
One woman, after
fleeing an abusive relationship, had a male roommate. They were investigated as spouses, an
experience that she found humiliating -- and decided it simply wasn't worth the
hassle and moved out.
Several women who
knew of the rules were wary of forming a relationship, fearing that their
benefits would be terminated (and not having a clear sense of just what
circumstances could lead to a termination).
Several other women, when asked whether women are likely to disclose
abuse to their welfare workers, noted that they would not. Often the reason given was that the
disclosure of the abuse could lead to the termination of benefits on the assumption
that there is a 'spouse in the house'.
Finally, and very
significantly, abusive men routinely exploit the rule regarding living with
one's spouse , as discussed in section 5 below.
"Yeah just like my current boyfriend,
he has his place and I have my place and we’d like to be family and
everything. But I always tell him like,
“when I am working and you’re working because of the way they are like any
little slip up and they have your life in their hands regardless of if you have
kids or not”. They wouldn’t think twice
about cutting you off and here you are, got rent to pay and everything
else." [She had to
prove her boyfriend was not living with her.]
"No, I don't think so [when asked if women would disclose the
abuse to a welfare worker]. Many women are in abusive situations and even
when on welfare sometimes, they get boyfriends that are abusive and they would
not tell their worker because even if they get $100 extra from that guy who
abuses them, they need that money to feed their children or to pay the rent or
hydro. Who cares if a woman has to pay
$200 or $300 hydro? The welfare would
only give her $50 or $60. Even for rent,
they don’t give that much so what the woman has to do is probably get an
abusive guy around. …What happens if they get an abusive boyfriend and they
tell the worker, the worker will cut their benefits or throw them off of
welfare so they will end up worse because they are looking to the abuser for a
little help and they are risking themselves to be thrown off welfare because
they are looking for an extra help and welfare cannot provide for them."
5. Constantly
Living Under Suspicion; Welfare Surveillance
There are many,
many threads that weave together the web of suspicion and surveillance in which
women find themselves: from enhanced verification and eligibility reviews; to
scrutiny of their intimate relationships; to home visits; to compliance with
workfare; to detailed, intricate rules that are hard to ascertain yet where
failure to comply can have disastrous consequences. Suspicion has been cast over welfare
recipients in part due to the conceptual underpinnings that support workfare
and which assume welfare recipients to be lazy, unmotivated, lacking a proper
work ethic and thus requiring strict discipline and control (see above), but
also in part due to the way in which ‘welfare fraud’ has been represented as a
widespread public menace that requires tough new laws and regulatory
action.
The discourse of
'welfare fraud' now permeates both official and public mindsets to such an
extent that social assistance programs have been quite firmly re-located by
government as a problem of crime, social order and regulation. In
Importantly, a
significant percentage of all fraud investigations seek to determine whether a
recipient is living with a non-declared 'spouse'; 41% of terminations, or
reductions, of benefits made as a result of calls to the welfare hotline were
related to the determination that there was an undisclosed 'spouse in the
house' (Ministry of Community and Social
Services, 1997). As such, the
police-like powers of EROs and the wide net of intrusive surveillance cast by
measures like snitch lines are deployed in significant measure to scrutinize
and regulate the intimate lives of primarily women.
Past provincial
government actors in
Those who commit welfare fraud are stealing from those who need help the
most. They are undermining honest people
who need help to get back on their feet. … People who abuse the system are not
only hurting those who truly need assistance, but they are stealing from the
hard-working
In language that
evokes criminal behaviour, the 'fraud' Report dramatically states that in
2001-02, $49 million dollars in social assistance payments went to people who
were not entitled to receive them (and must now be repaid). One is given the impression that $49 million
dollars was defrauded, in a criminal sense, from the
A significant
development in the welfare fraud control regime was the introduction of
additional penalties upon conviction: first a three-month ban on receipt of
welfare was introduced, and then a lifetime ban (Ontario Regulation 134/98,
section 36). Thus, upon conviction of
welfare fraud one was automatically banned for life from receipt of social
assistance. The constitutionality of the
lifetime ban was under challenge when the Liberal government announced the
repeal of the lifetime ban in December, 2003 (Broomer et al v. A.G. Ontario;
Ontario Regulation 456/03).
Many of the women
we spoke with described what it is like to be caught up in this web of
suspicion and surveillance. Many said
that in their interactions with the welfare system they constantly felt they
were being treated as suspected criminals.
The extensive documentation demands, the need to verify and prove
everything, the insistent calls to report to the office, and some of their
personal interactions with workers contributed to this sense.
a) On Eggshells Because You Just Don't Know All the
Rules
Women reported
tremendous difficulty accessing information.
Indeed one of their major complaints is the lack of information provided
by welfare workers. Lack of access to
full and comprehensible information creates many problems, one of the most
significant of which is the constant fear that one might be in violation of a
rule that one doesn't even know exists.
The difficulty of ascertaining the rules combines with the fear of
extreme and negative consequences if one breaks a rule (often unwittingly), to
lead many women to the conclusion that it is simply not safe to talk to their
workers, including about the abuse in their lives. As we discuss more fully later in the
Report (Section C) this has very
significant implications for the role which front line welfare offices might
play in screening for abuse.
In the words of
the women interviewed:
"No, you don't wanna' tell your
worker anything. They'll just hold it
against you."
"…scared to go to them or say
anything. They could do anything they
want in your personal life to make you feel you're belittled, like you are
lowest."
[Have you ever been investigated for any reason?] "Maybe, I don't know,
because the pity is that maybe you do something, and you're unaware that you
shouldn't do it, and then you're accused!
But you didn't know!"
"Terrified, don't know what will
happen. If some information there, or
things you could go to, then maybe I would have [disclosed]. I didn't feel I would be
protected…financially or otherwise. I
feared losing the kids."
“It is also hard to know what is or isn’t
against the rules/law. It is also hard
to access information…”
One of the areas
of greatest concern to women relates to the requirement to report all
'income'. In fact, subsection 14(1)
provides that "the administrator shall
determine that a person is not eligible for income assistance if the person fails
to provide the information the administrator requires to determine initial and
ongoing eligibility for income assistance including information with respect to
… d) the receipt or expected receipt of income or some other financial
assistance." Directive 16 instructs
workers that they must advise applicants or participants that all income
received must be reported. This
requirement, and the potential consequences of a breach, seem to have been
rather forcefully communicated to the women we interviewed. One challenge, however, lies in what counts
as 'income'. The definition in the
regulations is detailed, lengthy and in many respects, so counter-intuitive
that one would never advert to the need to report. For example, loans are included as 'income'
-- except loans for very specific purposes.
Cash advances from a credit card or line of credit are also treated as
income. Loans -- deemed income -- will
be deducted dollar for dollar from one's cheque. As such, the failure to report loans or
credit card cash advances can, and has, not only led to termination, but
prosecutions for welfare fraud for having received a benefit to which one was
not entitled.
Another very problematic area relates to ‘gifts of small cash value’. Directive 16 provides that "a casual
gift or casual payment of small cash value" is not deducted from
income. The Policy notes that,
"applicants or participants may receive occasional financial help from
relatives and friends while in receipt of assistance … however any income from
a person who has an obligation to support the applicant or participant will be
deducted at 100% unless the gift or payment is tied to a special occasion"
(OW DIR 16). It further states that,
"delivery agents may exercise their discretion when determining whether or
not gifts or casual payments are chargeable as income. There are occasions where an applicant or
participant may be faced with an immediate financial crisis. Help may be obtained from family, friends, or
another third party. When making a determination,
the delivery agent must consider the source, amount and frequency of the gift
or casual payment and the opportunity to resolve the crisis. Exercising discretion should be in favour of
applicants or participants to assist them to manage their financial
circumstances…Examples of casual gifts and payments of small value include
items such as clothing, meals at family members' homes and the occasional
purchase of items such as food. Gifts
tied to a special occasion are considered infrequent payments. Continuous payments of small value are
non-chargeable up to six months. After
six months they are no longer considered casual and therefore are considered
income to be charged at 100 percent."
The discretionary
and complex nature of the rules makes it exceedingly difficult for anyone in
receipt of welfare to know if and when gifts or casual payments will be
deducted. If reported, and discretion
is not exercised in your favour, your benefits will be reduced dollar for
dollar. On the other hand, if you fail
to disclose, you risk being cut off and even charged with fraud, sometimes even
in situations where if you had disclosed, the ‘income’ would not have been
deducted.
Some of the women
who shared their stories with us were fortunate enough to have family or
friends who helped them out from time to time by providing small amounts of
money or food, but these acts of kindness often resulted in problems for the
women because of these rules. One woman
told us that her family prepared care packages of food for her to help her out
when her children visited on weekends (her husband had custody of the children
and was also on welfare; they were included as dependants in his welfare cheque
and she received no additional benefits for them). When welfare learned of this, a cash value
was assigned and deducted dollar for dollar from her cheque. She had to ask her family to stop helping and
this caused her great distress.
Another woman
received a $300 loan from her mother to put food on the table, she was initially
told that it would be deducted from her cheque, but then, as she described
it, "luckily
I had a good worker who said we would put it down as a one-time lump
gift."
Yet another woman
told us of the pernicious effect these rules have on the formation of a new
intimate relationship; as she perceptively noted, if she disclosed to her
welfare worker each time her new boyfriend gave her something (a gift, dinner
for she and the children) she would be made to feel like a prostitute. Other women noted that women couldn’t
disclose the help others might provide from time to time because doing so puts
their children's well being on the line (because without the additional help
they simply couldn't provide adequately for them). As with the decision to leave or return,
women are in the position of having to "choose" in a world of
horrendously constrained options: suffer abuse at his hands or not provide for
the children's basic survival needs; not disclose meals, loans, etc. and risk
termination, possibly even a fraud charge, or not provide for the children's
immediate survival needs.
"I think this is such a serious
issue. That is a major issue. Forming a relationship with a man is very
difficult when you have social services.
A good man that really cares about you, whether you’re on social
services or not, will always want to help you out. Nine times out of ten they do not have the
income to take on your entire family.
There’s no concessions made for that.
So the bottom line is, if a man is coming into your life he should be
able to take care of you and your children and you should be off welfare. Nine times out of ten they’re not equipped,
income wise, to take on that responsibility. …I remember being told that you
need to tell, you need to get all the facts.
There’s repercussions for that. A
smart woman would not tell every intimate detail of her life because sometimes
the man has got children of his own from a past relationship that he’s
supporting. And he’s in your life. And he’s dating you. He sleeps over occasionally or whatever. And he may contribute to the home. He may not be there 24/7 but he does because
he cares for you and your children he might bring something. Or he might give you some extra money. I don’t think I need to tell social services
that. To me that’s prostituting
myself. If I’m in an intimate
relationship with someone and he brings me two hundred dollars in the middle of
the month when I’m falling short, I don’t need to tell them a thing about
that. That’s none of their business. He’s not the children’s father. It’s not his responsibility or my
responsibility to tell social services.
“I just got two hundred dollars because I slept with my boyfriend”. That's how it feels to me. So I would not disclose that. I will not."
"The one time it did happen. One
time. And it was only $30 or something they take off my cheque years ago.
‘Cause I told them about this cheque that I got and I’ll never do that again.
Never. …And it was taken off my cheque. After I told them about it, actually
what happened was because we were supposed to be able to make so much money a
month they started every month taking, like, something off my cheque. And even
that little bit was devastating for me."
Sometimes women
inadvertently violated these (or other) rules, but other times they did so
intentionally as a matter of survival.
Inadequate rates and desperation forced some women to take steps that
they knew violated the rules but which were essential for their own
preservation and for the preservation of their children. While the comments of the women suggest that
they felt morally right in the decisions they had made, they deeply resented
the fact that inadequate benefit levels had forced them to be less than fully
compliant and honest citizens (see also Gilliom, 2001 whose findings, based on
interviews with women on welfare in rural Ohio, are very similar in this
respect). Most often, it seems, what
went undisclosed were the small amounts of cash or other material assistance
that friends, family and very often, abusive ex-partners or current boyfriends
provided.
"but the thing is, the way it goes
though is that I mean you basically can't tell them anything because if you do
they'll take it off your cheque and then you won't be able to feed your
kids."
"It is a crazy system that make women
lie to get what they desperately need."
"You see
Asked why do people not tell their workers about the abuse,
"I think because they are afraid of the outcome 'cause then welfare
is going to be like, "How are you being abused? That person is living with you, okay you're
charged for fraud." And then he has it over your head too, so it's a
no-win situation. I think they want to
tell, like they are just dying to tell somebody but they are too afraid of what
the outcome would be."
"It makes me feel like a little kid
that has to report like, they can't trust it that all of my bills come out of
my bank account and I write beside it, you still have to have proof. I have a once a year CPP update. I think that's crap because every question
that you're asked, every piece of paper that they fill out, every screen on the
computer is just a duplicate of what you give your caseworker every single
month. And yet that's your expense that
you sent all that stuff to them and it's your expense that you find your way,
come hell or high water, to get up there to them."
b) Repeated Demands for Information, Home Visits, and
Lack of Privacy
Women also spoke
about the constant need to prove and verify their claims for assistance, their
income status, and for some, the abuse they had experienced. Some, as contemplated by the regulations,
were required to submit monthly reports.
All were subjected to eligibility reviews. And some experienced home visits. Women felt constantly under suspicion and
"like criminal suspects".
"What am I doing that is different
now than six months ago? So why do I
have to get all the stuff again and verify every dollar of it. For me to come, why do I need to be
reviewed?"
"My over all dealing is bad,
especially the way they treat clients as if we are stealing money. They trouble me too much, always demanding me
to attend employment workshops, which are no good at all. Sometimes they call at home and taking
information from my children. Their home
visits are also troublesome, always sneaking on me, treating me like a criminal
… Believe me it's like another torturous relationship like I had with my
ex-husband."
"I have no privacy, I feel forced to
do everything. They call me to that
office all the time…every time I go to their office, it deepens the crisis of
how the welfare works, because they look at you and the welfare workers treats
you so badly, like you are less than a dog.
That helps to put you down. If
it's not the guy's abuse, then it's the worker's abuse."
"…and the welfare comes into your
house and try to check everything in your house, and they always have some
private investigator behind you, checking all the steps you're taking. For me that's not good, because what kind of
privacy, what kind of free country is that?"
c) Fraud as a Weapon of Domination and Control
Many abusive men
threaten to report and/or do report their current or past partners to welfare,
alleging fraud. The alleged fraud often
is based on a claim that the woman is living with her 'boyfriend', or 'common
law partner'. Sometimes the man calling
claims to be the person living with her, sometimes he points to another
man. In most of the instances of this
in our interviews, the allegations were baseless. Nevertheless, more often than not, benefits
were immediately terminated. One woman
had her benefits terminated four times; each time it was her former abusive
partner who called, and the welfare office was aware of the history of
abuse. Threats or actual calls to
welfare by abusive partners occurred for roughly 20% of the women interviewed.
Two women were
forced to apply fraudulently for welfare.
One woman was beaten severely by her husband, who pushed her out of
their home, telling her to go to welfare and tell them that her husband had
kicked her out. He told her not to come
back until she had welfare. She applied,
was granted welfare, and turned the cheque over to him. When she became employed a few months later
she called welfare to report that she had employment and to cancel her welfare
cheque. Her husband beat her for hours
as a result. She worried that she would
be charged with fraud and that her husband would get away with it. (He twice managed to have the police arrest
her for assault, after he had beaten her viciously, so she had little faith in
the justice system.)
One woman, who we
quote below, described to us how she entered into a new relationship, full of
hope that her new boyfriend would care for her, ultimately form a permanent
relationship, and end her period on welfare.
She was initially delighted that he began to spend a lot of time at her
place. He encouraged her to move to a
town, closer to him, and he began spending even more time with her. She was thrilled and very hopeful, believing
that he wanted to share his life with her.
She suggested that he move in, that they share the bills, and she could
get off welfare. It turns out he had no
intention of helping her, rather only of "sponging off" of her. He became more and more abusive. And he began to threaten to call welfare to
report that he was living with her; and she felt, to use her words,
"completely trapped."
We note too that
in the survey completed by area administrators of welfare, 20 of the 35
respondents that answered this question answered affirmatively when asked,
"Are you aware of any cases where an abusive partner has reported to the
welfare fraud hotline or elsewhere that his former partner is living with
another man?" When asked to
estimate the frequency, the answers included "occasionally" (4),
"48 per year" (1), "1-2 times per month" (1),
"frequently" (3) and another noted, "We have had several cases
where a partner reported to the welfare fraud hotline that his former partner
is living with another man, however, there are no figures identifying how often
the person reporting was an abusive partner."
The other way in
which men used welfare to further abuse and trap women relates to the material
assistance they may provide from time-to-time.
The trap is sprung as follows: a woman leaves an abusive relationship
and is struggling to survive with her children.
Her former partner agrees to assist by providing some food, perhaps
paying an outstanding bill, or giving her a loan. She doesn't report this to welfare. And later he says, "bet you didn't tell
your welfare worker. I can report you
for fraud. You'll be cut off. You'll go to jail….etc."
The women caught
in either of these traps describe in a very compelling way how the welfare
fraud regime, especially when combined with completely inadequate welfare
rates, give a powerful weapon to abusive men -- a weapon that they resort to
commonly and which can have catastrophic implications for women.
"He's got all kinds of things he
could do with me: report me to welfare for fraud…
You know he moved into my life, he never
paid rent, he was always at my house but he didn’t' live there, refused to live
there, said he lived at his parents and no one was going to prove otherwise.
Um, he wouldn't help me. I wanted off, I
wanted to get off welfare, then turns around on me. Then it turns around. He can get away with assaulting me, you
know. I thought this relationship was my
ticket off welfare… "great he's moving in …I'm gonna' get off welfare… I
thought he was going to take financial responsibility and I was gonna be off
welfare… He lived off me, sponged off me.
I had no way to um, I had absolutely no way to get off the system. And not only that, the pressure of the
system. I couldn't tell them what was
going on because then they would cut my cheque.
I couldn't even tell them that this guy was sponging off me … I mean you
can't even get a guy outta' your house because now he has all the power in the
world. Welfare fraud, welfare, that's
what it's all about. They just gained
the biggest stronghold they could ever gain and there'll be so many women that
will be um, affected by that." [She goes on to describe becoming very
depressed and then suicidal.] "It
was all to do with welfare. I just got
into an abusive relationship that I could no longer get out of because now
someone could accuse me of fraud. … Now
I was bound because he, that just gave him the control. …that's the
problem. See that's the whole problem
with how it's set-up now 'cause now woman can't get out. Now they are definitely trapped. They are trapped. …they're going to basically
life sentence you when you need some help."
"I think because they are afraid of
the outcome [if they
disclose the abuse to welfare worker]
'cause then welfare is going to be like, "How are you being abused? That person is living with you, okay you're
charged with fraud." And then he
has it over their head too, so it's a no-win situation. I think they want to tell, like they are just
dying to tell somebody but they are too afraid of what the outcome would
be."
"…you’ll find that people … threaten
you with what they can threaten you with.
Um, it’s like, you know if he did something for you, if he gave me some
money and we had an argument, he’d say something like, “I’m sure you didn’t
tell your worker that I gave you two hundred dollars the other day. You know, you could get in trouble for
that.” And there was always that thing
over you head, yeah, where someone has something on you that could ruin you,
you know, with the help you’re getting.
So it’s hard for you to build a relationship properly because there’s
always that fear. … But you allow him to come around more because you need the
help. And you know that as long as he
keeps coming he will always be helping you out.
So you open yourself up. I’m
pregnant with his child, who else better to help? …. You know, there’s a saying
back home, “You’re damned if you do, you’re damned if you don’t." You’re in trouble if you do and you’re in
trouble if you don’t. One way you’re in
trouble is with your relationship breaking down and you’re in trouble with
getting caught and losing the income. I
need him. I needed a better vehicle to
go to the food bank halfway through the month."
"…he feels like he has the upper
hand, because like I said they were harassing me because he kept calling and
saying that he was living with me when he wasn't. And you know when he wasn't, but they were
harassing me though. So he felt like he
had the upper hand so he really didn't give a crap you know instead of them
saying like, "We are not going to take anymore calls from you, like and if
you call one more time”, why wouldn't they charge him with harassment? Like they will charge me if I call more than
once." (She had been
told that if she called the welfare office and left more than one message in a
48-hour period she could be charged or cut off for harassing her worker.)
We asked area
administrators, "when a client is investigated because of a possible
co-residing spouse is there any investigation into whether that spouse is
abusive?" Eight responded
affirmatively, 25 negatively and two provided no answer. It is noteworthy to contrast some of the
responses. One respondent indicated that
prior to the recommendation stage, all cases involving an allegation that the
person is not living as a single person are reviewed with police to ascertain
incidents of domestic violence and goes on to note, that in cases where
domestic violence is identified, prosecution for fraud is not pursued. Contrast this response with the following;
"No, whether the spouse is abusive or not has no bearing on the fact that
the couple reconciled regarding the cohabitation issue."
Again, the
recommendations from the
6. Difficulties in Accessing
Information
As is clear from much of the preceding discussion, women often have a
very difficult time accessing information about welfare rules and
policies. The most common source of
information is not welfare workers, but rather shelter workers. Community based organizations, especially
those providing culturally-based services, are another important source of
information about welfare. Often more than the provision of information was
required, and shelter workers, settlement workers, etc. had to take on an
active advocacy role in order for women to access benefits (sometimes merely to
get an appointment).
“Like whatever welfare has in place, it’s
all kept locked up. You have to hear
about it from a friend and go and interrogate a worker before you can actually
get them to cough up some information.”
As discussed in earlier sections of the report, many women are not given
information about waivers in relation to support, or deferrals in relation to
workfare. Women also identified lack of
information about special benefits as a significant problem. For example, although we did not ask specific
questions about the Community Start-Up Benefit, during the course of the
interviews, we did hear from women who were eligible and would have found it
helpful, but did not receive it. The
CSUB is designed to provide additional funds for people who are setting up new
residences and are intended to cover items such as furniture, deposits for rent
and hydro. The maximum benefit available
is $1500 for families with one or more children and a maximum of $799 for all
others. The benefit is usually available
only once in a 12 month period, a restriction that is not particularly
responsive to a range of situations, including women who may need to move more
frequently than that for their own safety or because they have had to find
cheaper accommodation. Women with more
than one child and women who face particularly high shelter costs are also
disadvantaged.
The CSUB is an essential benefit for women leaving situations of abuse.
Many women must find new accommodation to be safe, and frequently must leave
most of their belongings behind.
However, as this mother explains, the amount, not even geared to the number
of children, is too low:
“I received $1500 because I have three
children and I’m thankful that it was there, but for the amount of things that
people have to replace when they leave a relationship--$1500 just doesn’t do
it. And it’s there to help with first
and last month’s rent, even the expenses that you do have and household
things. So, if you really sit down and
think about it if you’re a person with children and you’re leaving a situation
where you walk out with nothing…So, instead of putting, I think, a dollar
figure on, I realize they have to have a maximum, but they really should
exclude the last month’s rent…And now you have to have utility hook ups and
that takes a big chunk of money…I find it really hard to make that decision as
to what you’re going to spend that money on.
That’s really hard.”
Those who did
receive the CSUB sometimes only found out about it from workers in other
agencies, and needed help from them in order to receive it.
After a seven-year wait for subsidized housing, a mother of three gets a
spot in
subsidized
housing. She knows about CSUB because
she had received it on an earlier occasion when she left a shelter, but she is
told that she cannot receive it a second time:
“…So the worker at the Crisis
Centre told me, "When you get the place, ask for start-up to help you
move." She photocopied the benefit
policy and gave it to me. I highlighted
it and it said you could get a review of your denial of getting the start-up
because I fell under the category. I was
surprised.” It took her six weeks to
get reimbursement for van rental expenses to help her move. She thinks she is now considered a
‘troublemaker’ and comments, “I just
don’t understand why I’m being denied these things when I’m clearly entitled to
it.”
“They did give me some, some
assistance. I got a vacuum and stuff like that.
It was like pulling teeth though, to get the community start-up. I actually had to go to the Women’s Centre
and ask them to speak to welfare on
the fact that I should be eligible for community start-up…So I went to Betty at
the Women’s Centre and she called over and they gave me a portion of my
community start-up…. And this is the one time I couldn’t get it done for
myself. And…going …and standing there
(and saying): "I’m really sorry. I
hate to bug you but can you help me out?"
She’s like, "That’s what I’m here for. That’s what I do.”
A woman found housing and was able to leave the shelter and borrowed
money, unaware of CSUB: “It was hydro
hook up and it was nuts. At the
beginning it was just, I was running around with my head cut off and I didn’t
have the money. If my Mom didn’t loan me the money then I don’t know what I
would have done because welfare was not helping. I was a nut case. I was crying for about 2 or 3 days because I
couldn’t get money out of welfare and I had a place but didn’t have the money
to give them and I was staying at the [shelter] with 3 kids.”
Applying for CSUB
can also require expensive and time-consuming documentation, as with other
aspects of Ontario Works. As one woman
explains:
“…I did find it helpful but again the
process was very difficult… You’ve got to go around and get estimates for all
the stuff you need and send it in to
Women encounter enormous difficulties in accessing the CSUB, and regard
it as extremely unfair. A woman, whose
husband was given a lengthy jail sentence for assaulting her, explained that
every time he leaves prison he receives $1200.
She does not understand why CSUB is so difficult for many women on
social assistance to get. Others regard
it as miraculous if they do get it. One
woman we interviewed praised her very first worker for helping her to get the
CSUB, referring to her as her ‘guardian
angel’.
The participants in our February forum reinforced the importance of the
CSUB and the enormous difficulties that women experience in receiving it. They point out that, in addition to the
inadequate level of the CSUB benefit, women frequently do not receive the
maximum amount, although they are clearly entitled to it. This places additional demands on other
services (shelters in particular), services already under considerable
stress. They also told us that the fact
that women are required to get quotes and submit them in advance, means that
women may well lose their newly found accommodation because the owner is not
willing to hold the apartment for the welfare turn-around time.
Women also told us that they learned about other extra benefits
(transportation, special diets), often when it was too late to claim because
they did not have the necessary receipts.
They also rarely received information by welfare offices about legal
aid, housing, shelters, or other potentially valuable resources.
Women describe their repeated and frustrating efforts to get
information:
“I never got
any advice or help with subsidized housing.
Nobody told me that I was entitled to get that with the police report
within six months of reported abuse incidents.
Every worker in this country knows about it but they didn’t tell me. Besides when I came back…I went to the
housing office and they told me I was late.
Now I’ll be in the 5-6 year waiting list.” [This woman pays $720 per month for a bachelor flat
for herself and her three-year-old child.]
“…I was told about the basic availability but not
everything…a month later I figured out I was qualified for [child care subsidy] but I couldn’t go back and claim that amount so it was like a daily
struggle learning more about the system, but also running into obstacles and
getting through those obstacles. It was
time consuming and it would constantly make and definitely added stress to my
life.”
“Like I said, welfare, they don’t want to tell you
anything. You have to ask them something specifically. They won’t come up and
say, “Well, you know, there’s money for here, there’s money for there. We have a program over here. We know some people that have programs that
will help you”. They don’t do that! You
know? They just leave you there. They
don’t want you to get out of there.”
“I thought they were there to help
you...try to get you a better job. …they
hate to tell you anything. They like,
you to have to ask them for things, you know?
Instead of saying, “Well, there’s this program or, you know, we have
extra money over here."
When they do get
information, it may be inaccurate and/or conflict with what they have been told
earlier: “My previous worker told me that my physiotherapy was covered and I
didn’t worry about It. ….I had no money
to pay. So I talked to welfare and they
say, “Oh no, we don’t cover it,” and I say, “But my ex-worker told me that you
do.” This woman was also informed
that her worker had lost the documents she had sent; fortunately, she was able
to send them again because she knew not to send welfare the originals.
Accessing
information is particularly difficult for newcomers to
One woman explains the
importance of supports from her own community as she deals with the welfare
system:
“Without the agency support and
interpretation help from them I would never be able to get welfare so quickly…. My only problem is my poor English; in the
beginning I had a Bengali counselor to help me. …Every three months there is a
new worker so the rapport is difficult for me every time….”
Adding greatly to
the frustration and stress women experience in getting information from their
welfare workers is the fact that their repeated phone calls and messages go
unanswered.
“They never call me
back, never! Like, I don’t understand.
Like they should be trying to help me and I’d left detailed messages of what I
want and who I am--- my phone number, very detailed and I still haven’t
received a phone call. I even went down
to the office and they said, “Sorry you have to talk to your worker about it.”
And I said, “Well she doesn’t call me, how can I talk to her?”
“Ontario Works will not answer any calls
regardless, anything, no matter what, if you call into Ontario Works, you don’t
get anybody. All you get is
voicemail. And I’ve had all kinds of
emergencies in the past. Never got any
returned calls….”
The enormous
obstacles women encountered in attempting to access accurate information from
welfare were echoed by the concerns expressed in the February forum. Women's advocates emphasised the ways in
which the operation of the welfare system jeopardises women and children on
welfare and places increasing demands on them.
The requirements to produce documentation, the complexities of figuring
out eligibility, the inflexibility in the system, and the seemingly senseless rules,
are viewed as a form of harassment. The
inconsistency among workers also prevents front-line workers from being able to
give women an accurate picture of what will happen and what they will receive
when they leave the shelter. In
addition, the inadequate benefits mean that women must incur extra costs in
their efforts to find supplementary services, costs that are not reimbursed by
welfare.
The participants were also concerned about the impact of current welfare policies and practices on the limited, and often shrinking, resources of their agencies. The importance of the advocacy efforts of service providers was emphasised time and again by the women we interviewed. Shelter workers explained