Canada Without Poverty

Canada Without Poverty (CWP) is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to eradicating poverty in Canada and educating Canadians about the link between poverty and human rights. It is based in Ottawa, with a second office in Vancouver and is run by a board of directors who have, or have had, personal experiences of poverty. Canada has yet to develop consistent poverty indicators, which makes it difficult to effectively help the estimated 1 in 7 or 4.8 million people living in conditions of poverty. This is what CWP is working to change.

Origins

CWP was founded in 1971 as a registered charity. It was an outgrowth of the Poor People's Conference which took place in Toronto in 1971, organized by the National Council of Welfare (NCW), under the auspices of the Canadian Minister of National Health and Welfare. The original name of the organization was the National Anti-Poverty Organization (NAPO). This name was changed to Canada Without Poverty (CWP) in 2009. It has had partnerships with the Red Tents Campaign, Dignity for All: the campaign for a poverty-free Canada, Voices –Voix, and the BC Poverty Reduction Coalition.

The charity, from the beginning, was organized to become a main umbrella of nationwide anti-poverty activists; its mandate is identify the causes of poverty and to promote poverty eradication and human rights. Beginning in 1973, NAPO presented its first research document on hunger and food costs to the Federal Parliament. It continued, from this first campaign, to address poverty-related issues whether advocating for better health care, higher unemployment insurance benefits, fairer taxation, family benefits, recognition of homelessness and women's poverty, and/or the fundamental human rights of people living in poverty. It has acted as liaison between community groups and the Parliament in power.

In the 1990s NAPO began to expand its forums to regional and international discussions about poverty eradication, including concerns about homelessness, women's poverty issues, wage inequality and the growing attack on the poor, the result of neoliberal shifts towards the downsizing of government and dismantling of social programs. From addressing the UN as an NGO to co-hosting conferences at the regional and international level, NAPO not only increased its presence but drew powerful connections between reality of poverty in Canada and growing poverty as a result of globalization.

In the 1993 it convened a second Poor People's Conference and co-hosted a UN Poverty Roundtable in 1998 to deal with poverty in the Americas. In the 2000s it published documents including Voices: Women, Poverty and Homelessness in Canada, a study of female homelessness in Canada, and began a national campaign for a new minimum wage. It also championed the rights of homeless people and won a legal case against the City of Winnipeg which was forced to repeal a by-law prohibiting panhandling.

Mission

The mission of CWP is to relieve poverty in Canada by educating Canadians about the human and financial cost of poverty and by identifying public policy solutions. These 'costs' include financial and 'human'. CWP works with people from government, business and community groups to influence legislative priorities at the federal level regarding income and social support needs. CWP uses a human rights framework which states that all Canadians have a right to equality and dignity and expects social institutions to uphold the values of caring, responsibility, and accountability based on UN concepts of fundamental human rights.
Louise Arbour, Chief Prosecutor at the Hague International War Tribunals and an Honorary Director of CWP, has stated "poverty prevails as the gravest human rights challenge in the world".
In Canada, inequalities of access to social and economic resources contribute significantly to poverty levels across Canada, i.e., those in poverty are often First Nation people, immigrants and refugees, single adults between the ages of 45–64, and single mothers with children, disabled, those in the lowest-paying jobs, full or part-time. People in poverty in Canada more often access food banks, are often homeless, or in low-cost, sub-standard housing; they are part of the 'working poor' who rely on low wages, or are stuck in the poverty trap of welfare, and face hunger.

Current activities and impacts/successes

In 2006 the Federal Government cut the funding to CWP. This seriously impeded their work. Other anti-poverty groups also experienced funding cuts. The Canadian Council for International Co-operation, a group involved in global poverty

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