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Insecure tenure and homelessness has reached crisis
proportions throughout Canada. Though community
based organizations and different levels of government
have started to address the crisis, scant attention
has been paid to women’s experiences of homelessness.
This article exposes the connections between women’s
housing insecurity and women’s poverty and provides
an overview of some of the ways in which government
programmes actually contribute to women’s insecure
tenure and homelessness.
Over the past decade Canada has experienced an unprecedented
crisis of homelessness. Despite economic growth,
the incomes of households have steadily eroded and
more people are facing homelessness than ever before.
The mayors of Canada’s ten largest cities have declared
homelessness a “national disaster” and in Toronto
each year alone, approximately 30,000 individuals
rely on shelters for the homeless.
In Canada discussion of homelessness tends to ignore
women’s realities and there has been insufficient
analysis of homelessness as a women’s issue. Homelessness
is commonly defined very narrowly – life on the
streets – and thus, the “housing crises” that increasingly
defines the lives of poor women in Canada is absent
from policy development and implementation and from
media portrayals of the issue. Although recent data
suggests that in Toronto as many as one in four
people living on the streets are women, “street
homelessness” is not representative of most women’s
experiences. Increased vulnerability to violence
and sexual assault or the apprehension of placing
children into government care make “street life”
an impossible option for most women and something
to be avoided at all costs. Indeed, women experience
insecure tenure and homelessness in a variety of
ways, including living with the constant threat
of violence so as to avoid the loss of “shelter”;
living in unsafe or unhealthy accommodation; living
in overcrowded situations with family or friends
and living without necessities such as food, clothing
and medical needs so as to be able to pay rent.
As a starting point, in order to address the homelessness
crisis in Canada in a manner that is meaningful
to women, the homelessness crisis must be understood
as a poverty crisis.
In 1997 women accounted for 56% of all Canadians
with low incomes and almost 20% of the total female
population in Canada (2.8 million women) were poor.
In 1996, there were close to one million (945,000)
female-headed lone-parent families in Canada who
are by far the poorest of all family types. 56%
of these families, or over half a million single
mothers, were living in poverty. These statistics
are worse when viewed in light of intersecting disadvantage.
For example:
- In 1996, a startling
73% of Aboriginal single mothers lived in poverty.
- In 1997, approximately 50%
of unattached women 65 and older lived in poverty.
- In 1996, nearly 50% of newcomer
women (who immigrated to Canada between 1991-1996)
were living in low-income situations.
- According to a 1998 study,
60% of women with disabilities were either partially
or wholly dependent on the welfare system for
basic daily needs.
- In 1995, 43% of visible
minority women under the age of 15 and 41% of
those between 15 and 24 were living in low-income
situations, as compared to 20% of non-visible
minority women under the age of 15 and 24% of
those aged 15-24 who were living in low-income
situations.
Housing Programmes
From the 1950s onward, the federal government played
a leading role in the development of assisted rental
housing and by the 1970s was a key player in the
Canadian housing system through major public housing
initiatives. By 1993, the federal government was
subsidizing 645,000 rental units across Canada in
a wide variety of public housing, non-profit, co-operative
and rent supplement units. However, in 1993 the
federal government froze federal contributions to
social housing (except for on-reserve Aboriginal
housing), which resulted in an estimated reduction
in spending from over 4% of GDP in the 1980s to
under 3% in the late 1990s. This translated into
a loss of approximately 325,000 assisted rental
units across the country.
These federal cutbacks to spending on social housing
were followed by significant provincial cutbacks.
By 1997, subsequent to the freeze on new federal
spending, provincial spending had been reduced by
over 90%. Thus, in general terms, cutbacks in allocations
to social housing in the last decade have meant
a reduction of almost $2 billion a year in government
spending on assisted rental housing.
Women have felt the effects of government withdrawals
from funding affordable rental housing most dramatically.
Single mothers are more likely to be tenants and
are more likely to use a higher proportion of their
income towards rent. They are more likely than men
to meet income qualifications for assisted housing
and therefore more adversely affected by cuts to
assisted housing. In 1997, 71% of single mothers
in Canada were renters compared to 48% of single
fathers and 22% of two spouse families with children.
60% of sole support mothers who rented paid more
than 30% of income toward rent compared to 40% of
sole support fathers and 29% two spouse families.
39% of households in core need in Canada are lone
parents. While disparities between men and women
are less dramatic among unattached individuals,
it is certainly the case that unattached women are
predominantly renters, have serious affordability
problems and would therefore qualify for subsidized
housing if it were available. 66% of unattached
women under 65 were renters and 52% paid more than
30% of income toward rent. 51% of women over 65
years of age are renters and 62% of these renters
spend more than 60% of income toward rent.
Conclusion
The housing crisis facing poor women in Canada is
particularly shocking in light of the fact that
Canada is one of the wealthiest countries in the
world and remains at the top of the Human Development
Index year after year. As in many developing countries,
however, the Government of Canada persists in implementing
liberal economic policies, which result in the serious
erosion of social programmes upon which many poor
women rely. Only by recognizing the interrelationship
between women’s housing and women’s poverty can
we identify and challenge the laws and policies
that cause women’s insecure tenure in Canada.
Leilani Farha
is the Women’s Programme Manager at the Centre
for Equality Rights in Accomodation (CERA), based
in Toronto, Canada.
Ruth Goba is CERA’s Women’s Programme Officer.
This article has been
modified from: CERA, Women and Housing in Canada:
Barriers to Equality (March 2002), available on:
www.equalityrights.org.
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