Host: Ivan Angelovski
After receiving her social assistance last month, Regan Sunshine Brussé (@ReganBrusse), a local advocate for the poor, and currently unemployed single mother of three, looked into her bank account, to find it almost empty. Scotiabank, garnisheed the only funds she and her kids had left to handle the pandemic.
“Technically they’re in the right to be doing what they’re doing, according to our current laws.” Brussé said. After being contacted about the issue Scotia bank did return the funds to Regan’s account.
On this episode of CKMS News, we discuss impacts of COVID-19 on people who are on social assistance or otherwise have a low monthly income. We also speak about what banks and the various levels of government are doing to ease these impacts.
Along with Regan Sunshine Brussé, we speak with Laura Mae Lindo, the Kitchener Centre representative in provincial parliament and Lea Caragata, a professor of social policy at Wilfrid Laurier University.
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This program is a part of the “Local Journalism Initiative” grant program and is funded by the Community Radio Fund of Canada, the Government of Canada, and the CKMS Newsroom.