By Kendall Worth!
Easter 2025 has now come and gone, and we are heading into the warmer days of Spring. For many Nova Scotians, this is a hopeful, optimistic time of the year. But for many recipients of Income Assistance, this is a time of mixed emotions.
That is because many in our community supplement their modest IA benefits through the winter with seasonal jobs tied into the school system and educational year. These jobs will end in June and these people will all be bumped over onto Employment Insurance for the summer months. So now is the time that they have to start thinking about how to prepare financially for this.
The nature of their problem is not obvious, so let me explain. For people on Income Assistance, there is a provision by which they can supplement their IA benefits with wages. This is to encourage IA recipients to enter the work force, earn income, and perhaps even work their way off of IA benefits.
However, this “incentive” ends the moment these same people are laid off. Although they qualify to receive Employment Insurance benefits, receiving such benefits while on IA is considered “double dipping”. And ALL EI benefits are clawed back from Income Assistance. Yes, - there is a 100% claw back!
Now, this is not a new policy: the 100% claw back from Employment Insurance has been in place since Nova Scotia’s ESIA program was first launched. Seven years ago, I wrote a public letter to our Premier of the day, Stephen McNeil, expressing my concerns about the unfairness of this claw back. This prompted an intervention in the House by Dartmouth North MLA Susan Leblanc, who was assured by the Minister that she would look further into this issue. This led me to follow up with Susan Leblanc and others on this issue, as reflected in multiple articles that followed in the Nova Scotia Advocate, here, here and here.
But eight years later, the claw back on EI benefits is still fully in place. In retrospect, I should probably have included the elimination of the EI clawback in my recent blog where I listed some of the steps needed to reform ESIA in a way that would positively impact the lives of IA recipients. The McNeil Government had initiated an ESIA Transformation process back in 2013, which got our hopes up for improvements. But the Liberals never got round to actually solving the various problems that had been identified, and the whole reform process was scrapped in 2021 when Tim Houston’s Conservatives came to power.
It is estimated that this punitive claw back policy costs the IA recipients I am hearing from approximately $400 over the summer months. This loss of income has not just a financial impact on people’s lives, it also impacts their social lives and well-being, as I have discussed in this earlier BLOG and will now explore further.
For low income households and IA recipients, the transition from Spring to Summer can be a challenge. The reality of the seasons is that we are now moving into a time of the year when life out of doors – in the sun, nature and across the city – is so much more pleasant than the biting cold of the winter months. However, it is also a time of year when one’s lack of income draws such a clear and stark line between those in our society who have disposable income and those who do not.
Those who do have income, go on vacations, attend festivals, enjoy drinks and meals in sidewalk cafes. They participate in a public celebration of life, family, friends and fun. This is a celebration that excludes their neighbours living on limited incomes, scrambling to pay rent and buy groceries, whose most public celebration of summer may be sitting on a park bench, watching the world go by.
To many of these people, Easter weekend is a first reminder of the approaching summer, - a time of painful exclusion and marginalization, the heightening of a very public social isolation. Of course, ending the claw back of EI benefits would not in itself transform the lives of people in my community. Even if they could retain those $400, that money would more likely be spent on groceries than socializing. But at least people would be able to make choices about their own lives and priorities, - and perhaps just host a simple birthday celebration, as I have written about here.
What distresses me most in this situation is the fact that the First Voices that I engage with and try to represent and amplify in my writings, are voices that NEVER seem to be heard by the decision-makers in power. As I wrote in 2017, the fact that this claw back policy is still in force today underlines how our First Voices are not heard. Or perhaps we are heard,- but just ignored.
It seems hardest in summer not to get angry or be envious when you see the 1% of our community enjoying life on their luxury yachts and sailboats while low income earners are forced to live crowded into substandard apartments just to cover rent and to avoid ending up in a shelter or tent (see here). The unfairness of these inequities can feel overwhelming, as I have written about before. And surely contribute to a range of mental health issues for many in my community.
In an effort to ease the alienation and exclusion felt by those with low incomes, I have in past BLOGs promoted participation in the many free Summer events that take place locally such as concerts, parades and festivals. Such public events do not generate the same sense of personal socializing that a gathering of friends and family might, but the issue of building and maintaining friendships is an issue I have discussed elsewhere.
All the same, free and inclusive community events are still a good option that allows people in my community to get out and engage with others in a fun and accessible activity. This can make a BIG contribution to easing mental health issues like depression and anxiety, as some First Voices have confirmed to me.
In Conclusion ...
I have opened some big cans of worms in this blog about Summer, - discussing issues of poverty, social isolation, economic inequalities, mental health and more. One “upside” of summer we should not forget is that it is often easier to gather people together for a shared activity when the weather is good. And not just for fun: maybe we could get a group of First Voices and allies to come together to consider solutions and actions to these many challenges faced by our community?
As my readers will know, I am a great advocate for the launching of a Social Prescription Program / Social Prescribing Organization in HRM that would work to break down social isolation in our community. Perhaps it could even help to mobilize our community in support of advocacy efforts like the Benefits Reform Action Group used to do? Things will never change for the better until we start to heat up on the policy advocacy front, as I have written here.
I will end this current BLOG post by simply asking people to please have some consideration for the well-being and mental health of our less fortunate neighbours over the coming months. We should all be able to celebrate the glory of a Nova Scotian summer.
Kendall Worth is an award-winning anti-poverty activist who lives with disabilities and tries to make ends meet on income assistance.
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