Our Recommendations:

1. Ensure that all babies born in Canada to mothers without legal status can access the full Canada Child Benefit, the BC Child Opportunity Benefit and all other benefits. Find out more about the constitutional challenge around access to the Canada Child Benefit here. 

2. Ensure all caregivers such as Grandparents raising grandchildren can access the full Canada Child Benefit, BC Child Opportunity Benefit, and all other benefits. 

3. Introduce a distinct stream of both the SPEI program and any new ministry-provided employment program that is trauma-informed, culturally appropriate and in line with the implementation of BC’s UNDRIP legislation and (draft) action plan to meet the unique needs of off-reserve Indigenous lone-mothers accessing income or disability assistance. 

4. Re-focus the BC Child Opportunity Benefit to better target low-income lone-parent families by decreasing the benefit reduction rate and varying it based on the number of children in a family, as recommended by the Basic Income Expert panel report.