Auditor suggests series of fixes for Saskatchewan Income Support program

The Saskatchewan Income Support (SIS) program has been a point of contention between advocates and the provincial government since before it was even fully implemented.

Now the provincial auditor is weighing in.

Advocates have been saying for years that SIS is too difficult to navigate, doesn’t provide enough to live on, and is contributing to a growing homelessness problem. All the while, the provincial government and social services ministers have defended the plan.

Read More:

• ‘SIS is a nightmare’: Single parents floundering with social assistance
• ‘It really makes it impossible:’ Advocates say SIS, SAID increases nowhere near enough
• ‘Failing system’: One year of full SIS in Saskatchewan

Now, the provincial auditor’s office has taken a look at how SIS is delivered, and she had some recommendations.

The first is to make the program more accessible to potential clients.

In the report that was released Tuesday, the auditor’s office looked at the 255,000 calls the Ministry of Social Services got to its income assistance phone lines, and found that more than 60 per cent of the 50,000 regarding SIS went unanswered.

“We attempted to apply for SIS three different times over the phone and never connected to a ministry client service representative,” Tara Clemett, the provincial auditor, explained during a media conference.

“People experiencing difficult circumstances and struggling to meet their basic needs need clear and accessible ways to apply for income assistance.”

Clemett said potential clients can apply online but computers aren’t readily available at all ministry offices to facilitate that for people who don’t have online access otherwise.

She did note that ministry officials have started going out to community-based organizations to help potential clients make applications in person.

The auditor also recommended the ministry should analyze the causes of evictions for clients on SIS and unpaid utility bills.

While the Ministry of Social Services does meet with utilities like SaskPower and SaskEnergy to talk about clients’ bills, it doesn’t assess the data as a whole.

The auditor’s report said there were 5,281 SIS client accounts outstanding for more than 30 days with amounts of more than $100 owing. The total was almost $4.2 million as of this past February.

“In one specific example, we found a SIS client in northern Saskatchewan receiving the Ministry’s alternate heating benefit of $130 per month who incurred almost $5,600 in unpaid power bills over an 11-month period (i.e., an average unpaid monthly power bill of almost $510) — highlighting the challenges some clients face in having sufficient income to pay their utilities,” read the report.

The auditor also found the ministry wasn’t keeping accurate track of how many clients were being evicted from their homes.

The ministry’s numbers said 35 income assistance clients, not necessarily SIS clients, had been evicted between May and November of last year. But when the auditor’s office looked into it, it found 228 SIS clients had been evicted in those same 10 months.

“They should be getting that data and they should be analyzing why is that and are there adjustments that need to be made to the program,” said Clemett.

The auditor’s office is also recommending that the ministry:

• “Establish a reasonable time frame for completing initial planning meetings with SIS clients requiring supports”
• “Regularly follow up with clients on their individualized case plan goals”
• “Provide referrals (e.g., to employment services, addictions counselling) consistently and follow up on referrals timely,” and
• “Implement further performance measures to assess SIS’s effectiveness.”

The report talked about initial case planning taking months to be finished and in some cases that it wasn’t properly documented. As well, the report suggested ministry staff don’t always follow up with clients on their goals, provide referrals or follow up on those referrals.

The ministry does have some performance measures, but the auditor’s office found that, for example, the ministry doesn’t track how many clients have had their benefits suspended because they didn’t talk to Immigration and Career Training like they’re required to, or that it doesn’t have a specific target for assessing the percentage of SIS clients accessing the education and training incentive. The auditor found only about three per cent were.

The auditor’s report said measuring how many SIS clients no longer need assistance is a key measure to knowing how effective the program has been.

“Most clients do not specifically inform the Ministry about why they are leaving the Program, whether it be a result of finding stable employment or another reason (e.g., leaving the province, enrolling in training programs). Without having a solid understanding of the reasons clients no longer require income assistance, it is difficult to analyze results for this specific performance measure,” read the report.

“Without sufficient measures to assess the effectiveness of SIS, there is increased risk of the ministry not having the necessary information to determine whether SIS is meeting its intended objectives,” said Clemett.

The auditor’s office didn’t assess whether benefits on SIS were high enough. Clemett did say that the way the ministry looks at things would be considered best practice, but the report did point out some difficulties that clients can face, such as the shelter benefit for a single person is $128 lower than the average rent for a bachelor apartment in Regina.

“In terms of specifically increasing the rates, I’m not saying that that needs to be the answer. It’s about continually assessing the effectiveness of your program and determining what modifications you need to make,” said Clemett.

Winter highway maintenance

Among the other assessments the auditor’s office undertook was looking at the Ministry of Highways’ winter maintenance.

The report said the ministry does consistently update the Highway Hotline at least four times a day, as is the benchmark, and often more frequently when there’s severe weather. It also found the ministry has adequate training, safety protocols and addressing of complaints.

But there were three recommendations, including clarifying some of the terminology on the Highway Hotline.

“Unclear terminology could result in drivers misinterpreting information on the Highway Hotline, which could cause them to decide to travel on a highway when it may not be safe to do so,” read the report.

The other recommendations included:

• Sufficiently tracking whether winter maintenance equipment operators meet work scheduling safety requirements, which is a period of 10 consecutive hours of rest in every 24-hour period, or waive the mandatory rest period; and
• Setting a time frame for reporting instances when not meeting service level expectations (e.g. not clearing snow within six hours of a snowstorm ending). Also, managers should be required to review these reports.

Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to clarify the number of unanswered calls which came into the Ministry regarding SIS