A preliminary human rights-based analysis of Winnipeg's municipal budget
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Date
2024-09-11
Authors
Maybituin, Trixie
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Abstract
Each year, the City of Winnipeg formulates an operating and capital budget for municipal-ran services, including Water and Waste, Fire Paramedic Services, Community Services, Property and Development, City clerks, and the Police Service. The two departments that receive the most money in the tax-supported operating budget are the police services and public works despite community demands in Winnipeg for more resources towards libraries, public washrooms, transit, and housing due to its declining conditions. The continued prioritization of these services poses a question: are economic, social, and cultural rights (ESCR) priorities of the City of Winnipeg? Article 2(1) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) obliges States to use its maximum available resources to progressively realize ESCR. Using the ICESCR’s Article 2(1) framework, the study conducts a preliminary human rights-based budget analysis of Winnipeg’s municipal budget from 2020 to 2024. The findings reveal that, in addition to the disproportionate allocation of resources between services benefitting civil and political rights (CPR) and ESCR that prioritizes the former than the latter, the City of Winnipeg is failing to utilise its maximum available resources to progressively realize the ESCR under Community Services by underspending resources already adopted for the department.
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Keywords
economic and social rights, human rights budgeting, municipal budget, economic and social rights budgeting, International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights