We demand that you keep your campaign promise, and complete the basic income pilot that is improving the lives of participants and offering hope to many more.

I am a mother, a wife, and a daughter. I am a recipient of basic income. We are not statistics to be dismissed, we are humans.

Doug Ford made an explicit campaign promise to protect this pilot project through to its completion in 2020. A guaranteed unconditional income has proven to provide security, stability, and human dignity, and the government made a commitment to me and 4,000 Ontarians to deliver that security.

Yet less than a month into his term, Doug Ford has already violated that trust and destroyed a program that was restoring hope to us and gathering evidence that could give hope to many more Ontarians and Canadians. Promises broken in an instant and with no warning will change our lives, and not for the better.

Basic income has allowed me to go back to school, afford hospital parking passes each month for my special needs child. Across the pilot sites, people who were previously struggling and often desperate are now starting businesses, getting educations, and providing for their families. [1] It has given us a moment where life was a little easier and a glimmer of hope that we will be ok!

Doug Ford and Lisa MacLeod are ripping that away. Even a Conservative former Senator is calling Ford and MacLeod out for the heartless and deceptive move. [2]

This is an outright betrayal not only of our core Canadian values of compassion and care, but also of a promise this government made and the people to whom they made it.

This is unfair and unjust, and we deserve better. Sign the petition telling Doug Ford and Minister MacLeod to keep their promise and complete the pilot - and get ready to help us to keep up the heat until we win this back.

SOURCE:

[1] http://lindsayadvocate.ca/basic-income-gone-fords-abrupt-cancellation-of-program-devastates-lindsay/

[2] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-doug-ford-speaks-for-the-people-just-not-low-income-people/