By Angela Hill

Single parent families common in North

Jun 27, 2011 | 6:50 AM

More single parent families live in Northern Saskatchewan than anywhere else in the country.

“It is a point of concern,” said Gilles Rheaume, vice-president public policy and founder of Centre for the North, a research program designed to show the realities of living in the northern parts of Canada.

He is part of the research team that found that nearly 38 per cent of families living in Northern Saskatchewan, with Northern Manitoba next by less than four per cent.

Single parent families face major challenges and it creates greater challenges for communities trying to support them, Rheaume said.

“With situations when you have single parent families and higher incidences of single parent families, it is harder for communities to be able to thrive because there is so much more effort that is required to be able to address the challenges that are being faced by these parents.”

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In the northern parts of the country the struggles are made worse because of high costs of living, inadequate house and higher unemployment rates, he said.

“We hope that through this type of data information it will lead to a dialogue about how can we go about addressing some of these issues, how can we go about the challenges of single parent families and how can we address the route cases of it so that the incidences can be reduced over time,” Rheaume said.

While there hasn’t been an official study into the reasons for the higher number of single families, Rheaume said researcher believe it has to do with a greater number of teenage pregnancies because these often lead single-parent families.

This study is just one of many looking at factors surrounding the North.

“The purpose of these is really to sensitize Canadians about the realities of the north and the differences in realities when you compare those with the south,” Rheaume said.

The Centre of the North hopes that this research will mobilize leadership, national government and business communities to address these socio-economic inequities, he said.

ahill@panow.com