FAMILY BREAKDOWN

Breakdown of family blamed for child poverty
Liberal MP urges return to traditional values
By William Walker
Toronto Star Ottawa Bureau Chief

OTTAWA - Canada needs to attack the ``national disgrace'' of marital breakdown before it can begin to reduce child poverty, a Liberal MP says.

In a 120-page report to be released today entitled ``The Child Poverty Solution,'' Mississauga South Liberal Paul Szabo argues that Canada's divorce rate is a root cause of child poverty.

Szabo authored the report on his own initiative at a time when child poverty is rapidly becoming the major political issue in Ottawa. But the MP notes that his views on reducing marital breakups may not be considered ``politically correct.''

``Family breakdown is by far the single largest cause of poverty in Canada,'' he says, noting that although single parent families comprise only 12 per cent of Canadian households, they produce 46 per cent of all children living in poverty.

Child poverty has increased by more than 50 per cent since the House of Commons voted in 1989 to eradicate it by 2000. Only nine months before the deadline, one-in-five Canadian children live in poverty, or about 1.5 million kids.

The Liberal government of Prime Minister Jean Chrétien has already begun to hold caucus meetings to discuss how to address the problem. A parliamentary committee is conducting hearings on children at risk and will report this summer.

Szabo's report is based on previous parliamentary studies, reports by Canadian anti-poverty groups and social activists, work by academics, United Nations reports and U.S. government policy.

In his most controversial recommendation, he calls for a renewed commitment to families and efforts to reduce Canada's 40 per cent divorce rate (70 per cent among common-law couples) as the best means to attack the problem.

``Since the real victims of family breakdown are the children, we cannot ignore this national disgrace,'' he says in the report, to be released today at a press conference.

``Strong families make a strong country and we need to invest in our family relationships each and every day,'' said Szabo, who has been married 25 years and has three children.

A battle against marital breakdown could be conducted through tougher measures against domestic violence, Szabo recommends, including mandatory counselling for anyone convicted of spousal assault.

Infidelity, alcohol and drug abuse and immaturity are also major factors in marital breakdown, but ``governments cannot legislate moral and social values,'' he says.

But governments could begin to teach children at a younger age about the importance of fidelity and marriage, Szabo recommends.

``We need to teach our children at school and at home how to nurture relationships, what it means to make a lifelong commitment to a partner and how to deal with problems without walking away from them,'' his report says.

As a result of breakups, Statistics Canada reports that 25 per cent of Canadian children enter adult life ``with significant emotional, behavioural, academic or social problems,'' he says.

The emphasis in any attack on child poverty needs to be on prevention against such factors and a return to ``family values,'' the MP concluded.

``If we were to raise one healthy, well-adjusted generation of children with sound social, moral and family values, we will have taken the first meaningful step towards eliminating poverty in Canada.''