The Canadian Council on Social Development (formerly the Canadian Welfare Council)Author(s): Reuben C. BaetzSource: Canadian Journal of Public Health / Revue Canadienne de Sante'e Publique, Vol. 62, No.3 (May/June 1971), pp. 236-238Published by: Canadian Public Health AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41984663 .

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Profiles of Canadian Health Agencies

The Canadian Council on Social Development

(formerly the Canadian Welfare Council)

Reuben C. Baetz1

A HIGH sustained level of investment in social programs and services - educa-

tion, housing, health, social welfare services, recreation - is as inescapable for a healthy society as is spending on police and fire pro- tection, control of air and water pollution, noise abatement, garbage disposal and roads."

This quotation from the Council's Social Policies for Canada , published in 1969, is, in essence, the Council's message for Canadians in the '70's. It urges the commitment of all our governments - and all of us - to the well-being of our fellow citizens.

The Council policy statement quoted from here, and others like it that have been pre- sented to the Canadian people, and widely re- ported and commented on in the press and legislatures of the land, form a principal part of our contribution to dialogue and action in governments and among the public generally over the years.

A social conscience for the nation? The Council hopes so. It has built up a reputation in the past 50 years as a country-wide focus for co-ordination, social policy formulation and research in the fields of family and child welfare, corrections, public welfare, commu- nity funds and councils, aging and housing. It has also been closely identified with the professionals, officials and voluntary opinion leaders among the so-called social welfare es- tablishment - to use that trite word. In fact, David Allen, of the Toronto Daily Star re- ferred to the Council, before its structural re- organization last year, as "the good gray lady of the social welfare establishment". 1. Executive Director, The Canadian Council on Social

Development, 55 Parkdale, Ottawa, Ontario.

We at the Council are not too unhappy about this connection with the establishment - its leaders have been responsible for some of the most advanced social thinking in the past, and are today. Nevertheless, we consid- er that we speak directly on behalf of all Ca- nadians - particularly people of low in- come, the disabled, the neglected and abused in our society, people who until quite recent- ly have been rendered almost entirely mute by circumstances not of their making.

The Council's defence of the rights of low-income people is evinced in its policy statements, such as Social Policies for Cana- da and the most recent one (May 1971) on family allowances. Our family allowances proposals reject those of the federal govern- ment white paper on income security because the amounts of the allowances are inadequate to really help the poor and because the type of selective method suggested by the white paper for paying the allowances stigmatizes the poor still further.

Both statements base their arguments on the need for recognition of the "social rights" of individuals, as set down in Article 25 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which says, in part, "Every- one has the right to a standard of living ade- quate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary so- cial services. .

The Council's concern with health, and all its related aspects, is a natural concomitant of its commitment to the total well-being of the individual. The Council sees adequate health care not as a privilege but as a right , and it has declared that ensuring adequate

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standards and accessibility of services, re- gardless of the income status, race or religion of the person in need, is a proper responsibil- ity of government.

In addition to the right to adequate health care, about which readers of this Journal are principally concerned, the Council has pressed for recognition of social rights in oth- er, interrelated, fields. For example: • In our comment in the fall of 1970 on the federal government's white paper on income tax, which we called The Social Implications of Tax Reform , we stated that our purpose in commenting on the tax proposals was to show how they affect lower income people. The fact that so few organizations appeared before the Commons tax committee to speak specifically on behalf of lower income people should be of some concern to Canadians. The Council was one of only six bodies speaking on behalf of poor people, compared with 205 others representing corporations, resource in- dustries, professions, and other Canadians with the knowhow and the means to make their objections known. • In our submission on the federal govern- ment's unemployment insurance white paper we tried to show that it was wrong to try to meet the problems of poverty through a wage-related insurance program for two rea- sons: the people who are most in need are often not able to work and therefore cannot pay into an insurance scheme; and a wage-re- lated program cannot be said to meet the needs of a family because wages themselves are not based on need but on what the work- er can command in the labour market. • The Council's Canadian Conference on Housing in 1966 recommended first, that every Canadian has a right to adequate and decent housing whether he can afford it or not. The relationship of "adequate" and "de- cent" housing to health and well-being need not be underlined here. The most recent pub- lication of our housing staff has been "Ten- nant Rights in Canada which shows that tenants still have a long way to go to secure their rights to decent housing and equitable treatment before the law. • Our recent report on visiting homemaker services laid heavy emphasis on the work of homemakers in preventing family breakdown and in performing services for sick or dis- abled people in their own homes when they are unable to do ordinary household tasks themselves. The vital role of the homemaker in preventive and rehabilitative care and as

an adjunct to medical and paramedical serv- ice is apparent. • In our surveys on the transient youth phe- nomenon in Canada since 1969, and our rec- ommendations for transient youth services, we showed that adequate first-aid and emer- gency health care can prevent many of the problems of young people on the road from becoming tragedies. We also pointed out that for many severely troubled and sick young people, medical and hospital facilities are ur- gently needed where the youth can be re- ceived and treated with the same compassion as other patients.

This concern with health care and its re- lated problems is not recent with the Council. Its interest goes back to October 1920, when it was formed as the Canadian Council on Child Welfare under the aegis of the Domin- ion Department of Health. To begin with and for a long time after, its chief interest in the field was health education.

Maternal and infant mortality were alarm- ingly high in the years following the first world war, and the need was evident for some national effort in health education. The Council published and widely distributed a series of health education pamphlets, a pro- gram that continued and expanded until it was appropriately taken over by the new De- partment of National Health and Welfare in 1945.

Since that time, the Council's concern with health services has become very broad. The keynote was stated in Better Health Care for Canadians , the summary of the Council's submission to the Royal Commission on Health Services, 1962: "The objectives of health and social welfare programs are so in- terdependent as to be, in most instances, in- separable".

Specific Council projects in the health field have been carried out through special com- mittees and, since 1966, through a standing Board of Governors committee on The Health Aspects of Welfare. Under a reorgan- ized Council structure, completed in 1970, this committee no longer exists, but the social aspects of health have been identified as one of the half-dozen major areas of concern. There is every expectation, therefore, that the work in this field will expand in the future.

In addition to the Royal Commission brief already noted, major Council projects related to health services include the publications Health Insurance : What Are the Issues ?, Health Services for Canada (a critique and

May/June 1971 Canadian Health Agencies 237

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recommendations on the Report of the Royal Commission), and The Medical Care Act (comments and recommendations). The Council played an important part in

the establishment of disability and rehabilita- tion allowances during the 50's, and co-spon- sored (with 20 other national voluntary or- ganizations) a national Conference on Health Services in Canada that took place in the au- tumn of 1965.

The Council operates from a modern, four-storey office building in Ottawa. Staff has grown from one in its early years to over 70. Our revenue, of some $1 million, comes from federal, provincial and municipal gov- ernments (21.5 per cent) ; contributions, memberships and special grants (35.9 per cent), and recoveries for special services, sales of publications, etc., (42.6 per cent). The Council has no formal regional, provin-

cial or local branches, or official local repre- sentatives, though it maintains liaison with key government and nongovernment bodies and individuals across the country. Our gov- erning body is a 60-member Board of Gover- nors, which represents every region of Cana- da, and our membership includes people from many professions and fields of interest; government; church and labour organiza- tions; health and social agencies; citizen and ethnic groups.

Since our structural reorganization in 1970 we have aimed to broaden our membership base and encourage more member participa- tion in policy-making decisions. This is in line with our long-held belief in the rights of individuals to have a voice in policies which affect them - the belief that working not only for people but also with them is the key to effective planning and action.

JOURNAL FLASHBACK

June 1948

The National Health Program for Canada

A new era has opened for public health in Canada. Because of the vastly increased expenditures now possible for

public health services, we stand on the threshold of a further and finer stage of our public health development.

In the history of public health in Canada, last Friday, May 14th, marked a memorable occasion. For it was on that day that the Prime Minister of Canada announced the three-point program to marshal the financial resources of this nation in support of the health campaigns so vigorously being carried on by each of the Canadian Provinces.

To you who have chosen the honoured profession of public health, this program is of vital importance. But it is important, too, for every citizen of this land because its long-range objective is no less than more healthful living for all Canadians. From this time forward no picture of the Canadian way of life will be com- plete without reference to this Federal action to strengthen the already extensive and effective health services that have been de- veloped in all our Provinces and that have given this country, in the councils of the nations, an honoured place as one of those most advanced in health services for its people.

The Hon . Paul Martin.

238 Canadian Journal of Public Health VoL 62

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