Community groups have applied to the Tribunal administratif du Québec to strike down a regulation that restricts the freedom of movement of people receiving social assistance.
Since May 2015, a welfare recipient who leaves the province for more than seven consecutive days, or 15 cumulative days in a calendar month, loses the right to social assistance. The travel restrictions include travel to another province.
In response to the provincial government’s cutbacks on welfare, six community groups, including Project Genesis and Community Legal Services of Point St. Charles and Little Burgundy, launched Poor+Captive, a campaign protesting against the travel restrictions. The initiative has posted details of the regulations on their website, where people have also shared testimonies.
Poor+Captive said the restrictions makes life difficult for people on social assistance who have relatives outside the province. The group said the cutback hits especially hard in neighbourhoods with a large proportion of newcomers like Pointe-Saint-Charles and Côte-des-Neiges.
In March 2015, the Quebec Human Rights Commission said the regulation “will increase prejudices against people who are beneficiaries of financial assistance, leading people to believe that welfare recipients use state benefits to travel.”
