2019 BC Child Poverty Report Card
Last week, the 2019 BC Child Poverty Report Card: Summary Report was released. It provides a snapshot of child and family poverty in the province. Despite a federal, all-party resolution in 1989 to end child poverty by the year 2000, child poverty persists.
Some of the report card’s preliminary findings include:
- In 2017, 19.1% of children in BC lived in poverty, representing 163,730 children.
- Overall, BC had the 8th highest child poverty rate of all the provinces and territories, slightly higher than the Canadian average.
- Over half of the children living in poverty (53%) are living in lone-parent families.
- The child poverty rates across BC’s regional districts varied from 15.3% in the East Kootenay Regional District to 42.5% in the Central Coast Regional District.
Accompanying the report are Regional Factsheets that focus on statistics in regions and indicate the disparities between areas within BC.
The current report is a preliminary summary. First Call has a list of 9 preliminary recommendations accompanying this summary. Full data will be released in the spring at still1in5.ca/.
2020: Setting the Stage for a Poverty-Free Canada, the national child and family poverty report card, was released at the same time. A larger report, it covers child poverty in Canada as a whole and describes a number of recommendations for eradicating child and family poverty.
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