Alliance Against Poverty Information Walk for CBC-KW “Sounds of the Season”
3 December 2015 Kitchener-Waterloo
The Alliance Against Poverty (the AAP), a local grassroots group pressing for economic justice for everyone, will hold an Information Walk outside of THE MUSEUM at 10 King Street West, Kitchener, from 6:00am to 8:30am., where the CBC “Sounds of the Season” broadcast will occur tomorrow, Friday, 4 December 2015.
The AAP believes that rather than treating the symptoms of poverty, such as lack of food, with food banks and a lot of expensively administered, overlapping social programs, a simpler and more effective approach is a cure for poverty that eliminates the need for perpetual treatments of poverty’s symptoms. That cure is a Guaranteed Livable Income, also known as a Basic Income.
The idea of a GLI is supported by a wide range of people and groups from conservative to progressive. Martin Luther King Jr., for example, stated “the solution to poverty is to abolish it directly by a now widely discussed measure: the guaranteed income.” Canada’s former Conservative Senator Hugh Segal also has been an advocate of a GLI for decades.
In August 2015 the Canadian Medical Association passed a resolution recommending a GLI for Canadians, because doctors know that poverty has a huge impact on health, which drives up the costs of health care. A GLI would cost all levels of government a lot less than the present system of meagre social assistance. In addition, the Green Party supports a GLI.
The AAP wants to see a GLI implemented in Canada to wipe out poverty and make food banks unnecessary. During the Information Walk, AAP members will distribute handouts on the GLI.
However, the AAP says: “Until there’s a GLI, keep supporting the Food Bank.”
Contact:
Richard Walsh email: richard.walsh@greenparty.ca mobile: 519-897-3630