Changes in the Economic Landscape

Society has decided who’s valuable, who’s not. We’ve seen a drastic change since the ’80s, where Kingston used to have the ‘spinners factory’ – you could have a grade 10 education and feed a family of three – it’s closed. Renfrew had the Coca-Cola bottle [plant]. And now we penalize these people who want to work; this whole concept that people want to be on welfare, want to be on ODSP [Ontario Disability Support Program]. They don’t want a hand-out. They don’t actually even really, necessarily, want to ask for help for something, because we force them to have to come to us, you know? And I really have a hard time with that.