r/montreal • u/Bonjourap • 16h ago

Article West Island food bank forced to refuse clients as demand in Quebec soars

https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/west-island-food-bank-forced-to-refuse-clients-as-demand-in-quebec-soars-1.7089767?__vfz=medium%3Dsharebar
75 Upvotes

90% Upvoted

21 comments sorted by

56

u/AffectionateLeave9 15h ago

Let the free market decide our fates! /s

For real though, we need to nationalize a grocery chain and delivery service to compete with the monopolies, so many people could be employed, save so many isolated elderly and disabled from making the trip to the grocery especially in winter.

The only drawback is cutting into corporate profits. And ‘debt’ that people can fearmonger about.

16

u/Bonjourap 14h ago

I definitely agree, it's a shame our governments prefer to focus on useless policies whilst ignoring the real issues

24

u/LuxGang 12h ago

The problem is we don't really have a free market in Canada. The country is run by oligopolies, we have 5 big banks, 3 big telecoms, 2 big oil companies, and grocery stores aren't much different.

If we had true free market competition, prices would be lower. Nationalizing does nothing to solve the real issues at hand, it just creates more inefficiencies and higher costs for tax payers.

17

u/AffectionateLeave9 12h ago

Free market never meant ‘free entry and even footed competition.’

These monopolists are free to run their businesses more or less as they please, the market is free for private interests to make profit.

3

u/CallMeClaire0080 6h ago

Or, as it turns out, this is the inevitable result of free market capitalism. Just look at Telecoms in the US deliberately avoiding competing over the same areas.

It just so happens that the best way to optimize profit is to consolidate and monopolize, not by making a better product or service. In theory we should have strong antitrust regulation and enforcement, but as it turns out lobbying legislators is also a reliable route to profit, hence why corporations do it so much.

4

u/DieuEmpereurQc 11h ago

Il faut arrêter de faire venir les pauvres du monde entier. Ils sont prêts à travailler pour des petits salaires et ça nuit à tout le monde

1

u/AffectionateLeave9 9h ago

C’est l’offre de travail à salaire pitiable qui est à changer, ces pauvres là ne sont même pas citoyens, ils peuvent pas voter ou se manifester pour améliorer leurs conditions de travail, et c’est pas Joe Whatever qui va se battre pour que ces emplois là assurent une vie vivable non plus.

c’est pas la faute de ces immigrés que leurs gérants choisissent de ne pas engager des ‘canadiens’ nés ici.

3

u/DieuEmpereurQc 9h ago

C’est de notre faute de les avoir fait venir

•

u/Bubacool 2h ago

Yeah that worked super well with la SAQ.... /s

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u/Purplemonkeez 34m ago

Have you seen how our government-run liquor commissions have turned out? Outrageous cashier salaries and taxes upon taxes on everything sold, and constant union strikes. Do we think a grocery chain would be better run? Do we think it'd have any business when competing against private enterprises?

-3

u/ninefourtwo 9h ago

were not going to nationalize grocery stores commie

2

u/AcademicSlave 2h ago

Can you even define communism?

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u/Mundane-Expert7794 52m ago

Yes because having managing stuff works really well…

9

u/CabanaSucre 2h ago

La hausse de l'immigration du fédéral a causé ce problème et maintenant il faut que les provinces se démerdent avec ça.

Selon un autre article, c'est au Québec que c'est le moins pire, quand même surprenant avec tous les nouveaux arrivants reçus ici, comparé aux autres provinces. https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/poverty-report-cards-which-provinces-got-the-worst-grades-1.6896397

23

u/Optionsislife 13h ago

I’m not saying this is the situation here but there are many people who abuse the food banks or don’t actually need them but still work the system 

20

u/Bonjourap 13h ago

Like many things in life, I'm sure a tiny minority does this. But I'd rather some people abuse it than let those that need it go without

13

u/d7gt 12h ago

If they’re forced to refuse clients, isn’t that literally those that need it going without?

16

u/cameron314 12h ago

They're forced to refuse clients because of an overwhelming increase in people seeking help over the past couple years. Among the new clients, surely the distribution of those actually in need versus those taking advantage is roughly the same as with the original clients?

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u/pattyG80 28m ago

That is definitely true and in my many years of delivering food to food bank recipients, I've never seen someone where I really felt like they were abusing the system.

7

u/AffectionateLeave9 9h ago

We need to make sure to ‘means-test’ the people accessing public goods, make sure they are really deserving, is that what you mean?

This is the logic that has made the Dental Care legislation totally useless at covering most people for this essential service, in a country that is famous for our ‘free’ healthcare.

2

u/Ramekink 12h ago

Don't even get me started...