Poverty, Mental Health, and Counsellors for Social Justice: Reflections on an Interactive Workshop Pauvreté, Santé Mentale, et Les Conseillers et Conseillères Pour la Justice Sociale : Réflexions Sur Un Atelier Interactif

First, we must come to act on poverty less from charity and more from justice. Concern for the marginalized is rooted not so much in pity towards the poor but comes from our inner compass of right and wrong. (Rainer, 2009)Poverty is a social issue, affecting a significant portion of the world's population. Although poverty rates have declined in the last several decades, the global poverty rate was 23% in 2005, and the optimistic target of the United Nations' (UN) Millennium Development Goals is 15% by 2015 (UN, 2011). Canada is in the G20 and is one of the world's economic powers, yet 9% of its population lives below the poverty line (Statistics Canada, 2012). According to the United Nations Children's Fund [UNICEF] (2012), Canada's relative child poverty rate is consistently higher than most other wealthy nations, ranking 23rd out of the 35 industrialized nations (UNICEF, 2012). There is a profound gap between Canadian health promotion word and deed (Raphael, 2008, p. 30). In 2009, the first full year following the recession of 2008, the richest 20% of Canadians earned on average $117,500 more than the poorest 20%. The author of the 2010 report titled The Rise of Canada's Richest indicates Wages and work related compensation are the leading measure of income inequality in Canada, accounting for two thirds of the income held by the richest 1% (Yalnizyan, 2010). The recent recession has pushed Canadian families already living in poverty into dire straits (Campaign 2000, 2011; Pasma, 2010b; Townson, 2009b).Despite these statistics, poverty may not be an issue that regularly captures the attention of counsellors and researchers (Albanese, 2010; Black, Stone, & Hutchinson, 2007; Caldwell, 2009). The magnitude of the effect of poverty on mental health is also difficult for counsellors who live among the economically privileged to fully grasp (Black et al., 2007; Caldwell, 2009). Thus, poverty has emerged as a focus in ongoing discussions within the Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy Association's (CCPA's) Social Justice Chapter, particularly related to the lack of dialogue among counsellors about poverty, the dearth of curriculum related to socioeconomic issues in counselling programs, and the weak attention to poverty and economic privilege in literature related to multicultural counselling and social justice. These discussions enabled us to observe that, to a large degree, our own position of economic privilege shielded us from full consciousness of the depth and breadth of client issues related to poverty.Members of the Social Justice Chapter offered an interactive workshop at the CCPA 2010 annual conference that aimed to raise the consciousness of participants about Canada's poor track record in ensuring basic supports for mental and physical well-being for all and the impact of poverty on mental health. Approximately 35 participants engaged in exercises and activities designed to bring to life the experiences of those living at or below poverty levels. The workshop highlighted the role of counsellors committed to social justice in effecting change locally and nationally, and participants generated ideas for interventions designed to address the needs of clients living in poverty.This article will first describe the issue of poverty in Canada and highlight the implications of poverty for counselling practice. We then provide a summary of the activities and outcomes of the workshop, with a view to raising awareness about poverty as a social determinant of mental health and encouraging counsellors and other healthcare practitioners to more fully comprehend the impact of poverty on their clients and initiate social justice action within their practices.LITERATURE REVIEWPoverty in CanadaWe preface this section by noting that there has been increased debate about poverty in Canada since the 1990s. According to our review, the debate appears fuelled by-if not mired in-the fact that the Canadian government has yet to establish a definition of poverty. …

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