The pandemic is an opportunity to radically reimagine the ways Canadian government and civil society cares for people, say Sarah Schulman and Gord Tulloch — but to do so, both sectors need a deeper understanding of the problems embedded into our social safety nets.
Calls to 211, a now-national helpline connecting Canadians to government and community social services, has increased by 30 percent during the pandemic. The need for clear, accurate, and compassionate information about social support is as pressing as ever — and a national 211 expansion means thousands more Canadians will have this need met.
There’s been much talk in recent weeks about Canada’s Security Council seat loss, but humanitarian and international affairs expert Rahul Chandran says there’s a set of deeper questions to explore. How can Canada uproot the racist foundations its foreign policy is built on? Is its foreign policy truly compassionate? Is it future-proof for a post-pandemic world?
The federal government’s $912 million Canada Student Service Grant program could put 100,000 students to work this summer in the social impact sector. But the program is receiving heavy criticism, after the government announced that WE Charity would administer it — and now, more than 900 Canadians have signed a petition calling for its complete overhaul.
Canada is the 7th largest donor to the United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP), the world’s largest humanitarian agency working toward a world with Zero Hunger. In March 2020, WFP officially opened its Ottawa office to strengthen both funding relationships with the Canadian government and open new doors for Canadian organizations addressing food security to export their solutions globally.