Rituals of degradation:

1

• Rituals of degradation
• Administration as policy in the Ontario Works
  Program

2

• A three-year study into the changing nature of
  social assistance
• The research program
• A longitudinal panel of people on social
  assistance in Toronto in the fall of 2002
• A quantitative study of the economic
  circumstances of people leaving social assistance
  
• A qualitative study of how local employment
  programs function in the decentralized policy
  context of Ontario Works
• The changing regulatory and legal frameworks of
  social assistance

3

• The panel study
• 90 people drawn from current caseload in Toronto
  in September 2002
• More likely to be single
• Skewed older than current caseload
• Have been on assistance longer than is typical of
  the current caseload
• Nearly one in five had immigrated to Canada
  within the past five years

4
The Panel Study

• The first round of interviews focused on
• personal histories and baseline information
• the new two stage application process
• quasi-contractual participation agreements
• participation in employment program options
• specific participation issues affecting sole
  support parents
• participants relationships with caseworkers
• intensified scrutiny through the Consolidated
  Verification Process

5
The Panel Study

• Centrality of administrative practices to
  peoples experiences of social assistance
• The new Service Delivery Model acts as
  secondary barriers to welfare receipt and a key
  component of work-enforcement bureaucratic
  designs in deterrence

6

• Criticisms of Existing Delivery Model
• 30 years old outdated technology
• Largely paper-based and labour intensive
• Little time to serve clients
• Encouraged error and fraud

7

• Stated Aims of New Delivery Model
• New business practices and technologies to
• -- Reduce rising costs
• -- Target fraud
• -- Improve program integrity and client services

8

• Key Features of the SDM
• Province-wide database
• Two-stage intake process 
• Third Party Interfaces
• Interactive Voice Response
• Streamlined case management
• Automated Support for Employment Assistance
• Increased monitoring and accountability

9

• Overview of Research Findings
• Complicated application and appeals processes
• Deliberately confusing procedures and language
• Excessive and inappropriate requests for
  information
• Real intent to restrict entry and accelerate
  exits  
• Evidenced by two key components the two-step
  application process and ongoing eligibility
  verification

10

• Restricting Entry Intake Screening Units
• Two-step intake process to limit ineligible
  applicants continuing to verification interviews
  and improve service for those eligible
• First Stage Preliminary Assessment --
  pre-screening through call centres called Intake
  Screening Units (ISU)
• Second Stage Full Determination face-to-face
  interview

11

• Findings around ISU
• Deliberately complicated and confusing design
• Misleads people into believing they are
  ineligible
• Problems of accessibility and suitability
• Social Distance

12

• Accelerating Exits Continual Surveillance
• CVP requires rigorous/ongoing review of cases  
• Shift from time to risk-based reviews
• Risk factors include
• -- high accommodation costs
• -- receipt for 3 years
• -- additional residents at address
• -- SIN beginning with a 9

13

• Findings around CVP
• Excessive amount of information requested
• Costs/Time Limits associated with requests
• Inefficiencies and inappropriate requests
• Overall impact climate of suspicion and
  surveillance which undermines relations with
  workers and acts as a deterrent

14

• Overall Impact Continual Surveillance
• What is the real need for this repetitive
  information? How many times do they need to see
  the same divorce paper? How many times do they
  need to see the same birth certificate? They
  already have this on file and this information
  hasnt changed. Why do they need to see it all
  again? (Evonne, R153)
• Its dehumanizing having someone go line-by-line
  through your bank statement, wondering where you
  are spending your money and asking you to explain
  this deposit and that deposit. Its none of their
  business if I spend 25 in Shoppers Drug Mart,
  or if I happen to have a coffee at Starbucks
  (Jane, R169)

15

• Overall Impact Continual Surveillance
• I was asked the same questions at the
  face-to-face interview as on the telephone, but
  it was much more invasive and made me feel like a
  criminal for applying for benefits from a system
  I have been paying into longer than most of those
  people have been alive. It felt like I was being
  interrogated for fraud and they were working on
  the assumption that anyone applying was trying to
  commit fraudIts degrading and humiliating and I
  think its that way on purpose. It seems as
  though the system has been adapted to make people
  feel bad for using it (Bruce, R1117)

16

• Regulation Theory
• Welfare states universality needs-based
  eligibility entitlements
• Workfare states compulsion over voluntarism
  sanctions over incentives and individualised
  obligations rather than collective rights.
  Closer supervision of a broader range of clients,
  with detailed job plans, regular meetings, and
  micro-regulation of job search and personal
  behaviour.
• Workfarist welfare regimes, and the
  administrative apparatus that is a key element,
  have coincided with and reinforce fundamental
  shifts in the nature of work and the organisation
  of labour markets.
• Administration as policy the New Paternalism

17

• Further information
• www.socialwork.utoronto.ca/sane/index.html
• Dean Herd ( dean.herd_at_utoronto.ca 416-946-8607)
• Andrew Mitchell (andy.mitchell_at_utoronto.ca )