Click here to learn how basic income can work on PEI.
C-BIG PEI: Campaign for a Basic Income Guarantee PEI / Campagne pour un revenu de base garanti Île-du-Prince-Édouard
We believe ending poverty is possible. Since its beginnings the PEI Working Group for a Livable Income has supported a guaranteed annual income as a way of ensuring that all people would have enough to cover basic needs and to live with dignity. Over the past year the Working Group, as one of the first community organizations in Canada to establish a Basic Income Guarantee (BIG) Campaign, has dedicated a great deal of time and energy to BIG for PEI. There is now a Canada-wide movement developing, and we are part of that.
A basic income guarantee – sometimes called a guaranteed annual income or a guaranteed livable income – is a promise that each and every Prince Edward Islander would receive enough income to meet basic needs. Basic income is being looked at many places around the world, from Switzerland to Brazil to Alaska, as a way to eliminate poverty.
A basic income is an investment in people. It is designed to guarantee that every woman, man, and child will have an income that supports their dignity, their health, their well-being, and their freedom to participate fully in their society. These are the basic human rights of every person.
The basic income is not another hand-out model. It is a re-envisioning of how we share our resources so that every person has enough to live on. Basic income does not make people rich: it does as it implies – it covers the basics. Those who can and desire to can top this up by personal income.
Un revenu de base garanti – parfois appelé revenu annuel garanti ou revenu de subsistance garanti – assure que chaque Insulaire reçoive un revenu assez élevé pour subvenir à ses besoins essentiels. La Suisse, le Brésil et l’Alaska ne sont que quelques pays qui envisagent cette stratégie de lutte contre la pauvreté. La garantie d’un revenu de base équivaut à un investissement dans la population.
Cet investissement assure que chaque femme, homme et enfant ait accès à un revenu qui appuie sa dignité, sa santé, son mieux-être et sa liberté de participer pleinement à la vie sociale. Il s’agit là des droits fondamentaux de la personne.
Le revenu de base ne constitue pas un autre modèle de charité. Il nous permet plutôt d’envisager une meilleure répartition des ressources pour que chaque personne reçoive un revenu suffisant. Le revenu de base ne vise pas à enrichir les gens qui le perçoivent; il ne fait que couvrir les besoins essentiels. Les personnes en mesure de le faire peuvent y ajouter leur revenu personnel.
Basic Income projects have been tried in many places.
Les projects de revenue de base ont été testés dans plusieurs régions.
Since 2013 C-Big PEI has had a clearly defined strategy:
There are four interest areas for engagement: the community; media; public policy makers and the national network. In all of these, we take care to make collective decisions on what we are going to present and how we will present it. Important to this is a concept of communication which responds to two areas: how C-BIG PEI chooses to express itself; and how it hears and interprets the voice, suggestions and concerns of the various sectors.
- Because we were trying to represent the interests of all low income Island residents and indeed the interests of the whole Island community, we set out first of all to learn from the everyday people in Island communities…
- Our work with policy makers involves presenting BIG to all political parties and keeping on-going communication with them. We have an ongoing dialogue with the provincial government, having met with the Premier and the various Ministers and Deputies responsible. We talk with them especially about the feasibility of establishing BIG as a demonstration project for all of PEI…
- Over the years C-BIG PEI has involved the formal media in various ways on 15-20 occasions with media releases, Op Eds; and interviews initiated by the media. We are in several social media forums.
- Finally, we have communications with other BIG groups across the country and with national policy and advocacy organizations.
PEI Working Group for a Livable Income 