Blacklocks- Inflation Hikes Poverty Rates

“We noted a growing sense of hopelessness and desperation,” said a Council report Blueprint For Transformation. “Persons with lived expertise of poverty and service providers alike told us things seem worse now than they were before and during the first years of the pandemic.”

“Recent increases in the cost of living represent one of the most important socioeconomic challenges faced by people living in Canada following the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic,” wrote the Council. “It is expected this will put upward pressure on poverty rates.”

Reached by phone Wednesday, an NDP spokesperson said Ashton was in Quebec City “to discuss language priorities”…

An NDP MP who frequently joins parliamentary proceedings remotely from her riding billed the House of Commons for a trip she took to reportedly meet with “stakeholders” over the Christmas holidays in Quebec — travel that included bringing her husband and kids along at taxpayers’ expense.

Parliamentary travel records indicate NDP MP Niki Ashton was only in Ottawa on one occasion for four days during the fall 2022 sitting.

But on Dec. 21 of that year, Ashton flew from Thompson, Man. to Ottawa — five days after the House of Commons had already risen for its Christmas break.

Ashton’s partner Bruce Moncur, a former NDP nomination candidate, and their two children also made the trip with the MP to the nation’s capital.

Then, on Christmas Day, 2022, the family of four travelled to Quebec City. Ashton billed the Commons for some of the expenses they incurred along the way.

Social media posts show Moncur and the children took in some of Quebec City’s winter attractions, including an ice slide and snow tubing at Village Vacances Valcartier outside the city centre.

Ashton is also seen in those posts skating with her children and visiting the city’s German Christmas Market.