An advocacy group for persons with disabilities says they were left out of the federal government’s fall economic statement at a time when there is a growing demand for disability resources and services.
“The main funding commitments of the economic statement didn’t consider disabled people at all,” said Carly Fox, communications and partnership director for The National Education Association of Disabled Students.
The group expected “expected disabilities to be more mainstreamed in the economic update,” said Fox, including more long-term funding commitments.
She said that disability is only mentioned four times in Tuesday’s statement and seven times in the accompanying annexes.
Fox also noted disabilities are “often included in EDI statements but not always meaningfully considered outright.”
Canada’s Housing Action Plan chapter of the economic statement, for example, lists people with disabilities as a marginalized group benefiting from more affordable housing projects.
“Affordable housing does not equal accessible housing,” Fox pointed out. She said disabled people continue to face access barriers.
Fox said her organization was also disappointed in the amount of sustainable funding allocated to disability programs. The group had hoped for specific funding allocations for the Canadian Disability Benefit, intended to ensure people with disabilities meet their basic needs.
Fox said the benefit was “top of mind” prior to the statement, so its exclusion was “pretty disappointing.”
Existing resources available to people with disabilities have been under strain for a while now with increasing demand for services, according to Bruce Hamm, director of Carleton University’s Paul Menton Centre for Students with Disabilities.
Funding “has been sustainable at incremental levels, but it is not rising at the same pace as the increased number of students needing it,” he said.
The lack of specific attention given to persons with disabilities in the economic statement seems to depart from the growing demand for these services, Fox suggested. “More and more people are identifying as disabled,” she said.
Fox noted the economic statement had its advantages, such as disabled people benefitting from general cost-of-living supports.
