Category Archives: Articles & Reports

McIvor v. Canada 2021

By Patrick Clark | Published: May 3, 2022

Since the decision in her favour, handed down in January 2019,  the United Nations Human Rights Committee has engaged in a follow-up procedure to assess whether Canada has provided an effective and enforceable remedy for the sex discrimination in the Indian Act. In June 2021, the petititoners, Sharon McIvor and Jacob Grismer, submitted new information. […]

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Kanahus Manuel and Tiny House Warriors Receive Human Rights Award

By Patrick Clark | Published: November 9, 2021

Carole Geller Human Rights Award Kanahus Manuel and Tiny House Warriors Receive Human Rights Award (Blue River, British Columbia) On November 9, 2021, Kanahus Manuel and the Tiny House Warriors were awarded the Carole Geller Human Rights Award for their role as Secwe?pemc land defenders, taking action to protect their unceded lands – Secwepemcúlecw. The […]

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The Carole Geller Award

By Patrick Clark | Published: November 5, 2021

Carole Geller, a dedicated, principled and tireless advocate for human rights, was a feminist and a supporter of the rights of Indigenous peoples. To honour Carole’s contribution to progressive work in the human rights field over 20 years, the Carole Geller Human Rights Award was established in the fall of 1987. The award is given […]

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The Vicious Circle

By phrc | Published: November 10, 2012

The Vicious Circle, A Report from Advancing the Rights of Poor Women, A Project of the Poverty and Human Rights Centre, Gwen Brodsky, Melina Buckley, Shelagh Day and Sharon McIvor, 2010. The Vicious Circle Report

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Women and the Canada Social Transfer: Securing the Social Union

By phrc | Published: May 30, 2011

Gwen Brodsky & Shelagh Day, Women and the Canada Social Transfer: Securing the Social Union, (Ottawa: Status of Women Canada, 2007) Social assistance and civil legal aid are in trouble in Canada. These social programs are vital to the realization of women’s rights to equality and security of the person. Since the repeal of the […]

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Human Rights and Poverty: A Twenty-First Century Tribute to J.S. Woodsworth and a Call for Human Rights

By phrc | Published: May 30, 2011

Gwen Brodsky, “Human Rights and Poverty: A Twenty-First Century Tribute to J.S. Woodsworth and a Call for Human Rights, in Human RIghts, Human Welfare and Social Activism: Rethinking the Legacy of J.S. Woodsworth, J. Pulkingham ed., (Toronto:U of T Press, 2010) The Canada for which J.S. Woodsworth and the Co-operative Common- wealth Federation (CCF) party […]

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The Subversion of Human Rights by Governments in Canada

By phrc | Published: May 30, 2011

Gwen Brodsky, “The Subversion of Human Rights by Governments in Canada” in M. Young, S. Boyd, G.Brodsky and S. Day, eds. Poverty: Rights, Social Citizenship and Legal Activism (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2007) Rights to equality and life, liberty, and security of the person in our modern Canadian Constitution must be understood to encompass an obligation […]

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Human Rights Denied: Single Mothers on Social Assistance

By phrc | Published: April 25, 2005

Human Rights Denied documents the very difficult conditions in which single mothers are raising their children in British Columbia today. It is a call for the Government of British Columbia to abandon its current policies – because they are a cruel failure. Human Rights Denied: Single Mothers on Social Assistance (PDF)

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Gosselin v. Attorney General (Quebec): Autonomy with a Vengeance (2004)

By phrc | Published: August 1, 2004

In Gosselin v. Quebec (Attorney General), the first poverty case under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to reach the Supreme Court of Canada, the Court ruled against the applicant, Louise Gosselin and the class of social assistance recipients she represented. The decision is deeply divided, and the majority decision turns on a finding that the evidence […]

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Beyond the Social and Economic Rights Debate: Substantive Equality Speaks to Poverty (2002)

By phrc | Published: August 1, 2002

An emerging issue in Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms1 jurisprudence is the defeat of poverty-related challenges based on their characterization as ‘social and economic’ rights claims. In a variety of cases, governments have argued, with some success in lower courts, that the Charter is a negative rights instrument—a document of civil and political rights rather than of social […]

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