The objective of this report is to identify programs that reconnect social assistance recipients with the workplace, and offer them a serious chance to escape dependence, improve their lives, and build their self-respect. Programs must therefore fulfill the following conditions: voluntary participation, genuine benefit to the community, and utility for the participant. This report examines welfare policies and includes sections on distinguishing welfare-to-work from workfare programs, a case study on workfare in Quebec, voluntary sector-based welfare-to-work programs in Winnipeg and Nova Scotia and municipal initiatives to welfare-to-work programs. It concludes with discussion of the Manitoba provincial government’s return to workfare programs.

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