For example, while persons with disabilities are supposed to be protected before and under the law under our Charter of Rights and Freedoms, there are so many areas of living where they do not matter and where the law and our own government continue to abuse and diminish the quality of life most persons with disabilities can live. For example, the employment rate of persons with disabilities is less than half of what it is for the general population, and even among those who are employed - persons with disabilities are over-represented among workers in low-wage, unstable and precarious jobs. Further, persons with disabilities disproportionately make up the population of persons forced to live, or more accurately, barely exist on our society's loosely termed safety net. Even the safety net in question with its rules and regulations arbitrarily create a different set of laws and further disadvantages for persons with disabilities. In fact, these very programs and so-called supports that are supposed to protect persons with disabilities in fact actually cloak them with a cloud of stigma, forcing many into silence, thus preventing members of the public from realizing how we continue to hurt them and shut them outside of our society. These issues are those that people without disabilities or disadvantages, in general, take for granted: the right to earn an income, the right to personal privacy, the right to mobility and choice, and the right to engage in a partnership with a significant other (and build their lives together).
First, the right to earn an income is an issue. People naively assume that people with disabilities are "taken care of", or have social benefits to support them and pay for a semi-reasonable lifestyle. We might have heard about specific programs of the government geared to finding employment for persons with disabilities, or more rarely - entrepreneurship initiatives. We assume that persons with disabilities can all partake in these programs and that they "work" to their benefit. In return for a reasonable effort, persons in these programs "should" be able to achieve equality in the workforce. Unfortunately, in a Statistics Canada survey, about 12% of those surveyed felt they had been denied a job because of their disability. The reality is that discrimination in the workplace against persons with disabilities exists, although it is rarely as explicit as a complete refusal to hire. One glaring example I personally have experienced is being shut out of most jobs due to not being able to drive, even if the job did not involve travel. While this is technically only supposed to be required if the job included travel as a bona fide requirement (e.g. courier, delivery, bus driver), employers outside of major metropolitan areas well served by public transit almost always "require" this. Other times, jobs are deliberately located outside the areas served by transit, or shift work is "required" whereby one would be scheduled even when transit isn't operating. This is just one example of discrimination. If you always drove, this issue is invisible to you. This does not mean you might not have other barriers to employment due to disability, but this is a clear example of how ableism pervades society. Assumptions in other areas, such as management positions (seen as too "stressful" for someone with mental illness), writing jobs being not for blind or visually impaired persons, customer service jobs being too difficult for those with cognitive or certain physical impairments, or seizures being a risk in most workplaces. As a result of discrimination, lack of willingness to accommodate persons with disabilities and occasionally, the disability itself, many are forced to live in abject poverty through our so-called social safety net.
People with disabilities are no less eager to work than those without disabilities. In fact, many who have been kept out of the workforce for the above reasons are often desperate to work, because today's social programs rarely provide enough for people to survive, let alone live with any dignity. For example, it is not uncommon for persons deemed to be severely disabled to try working, if only to escape the deep poverty they are forced in. In fact, I recall one of my clients a few years back getting twenty-three jobs in less than a year, only to lose them due to his disability issues. Failing to find work or stay working has left too many people with disabilities in abject poverty, poorly housed and living lives of low quality. It is past the time where a guaranteed annual income for persons with disabilities is put into place that does not have the rules, complexities and abysmal rates that typical welfare programs have. Those with disabilities that can and want to work that manage to find work are also under attack. We hear about how our wealthy people complain about how paying more taxes will dampen their interest or "incentive" to invest, grow their companies or even start businesses in the first place. However, our provincial government in an unpublished report on marginal effective tax rates on those working and receiving ODSP benefits, cites that for many of those that make more than a small amount of money are losing approximately 70 - 87% of every dollar earned, of course not counting the further impact of any outside income on one's subsidized housing or how one is expected to cover the expenses of actually having work. If high taxes "hurt" wealthy billionaires, how does clawing back income from persons with disabilities at even a higher rate than that paid by these same whining billionaires make this an incentive for them? I once quipped with a Cabinet Minister and their staff about taking this same proposal to the private clubs they often raise funds at to tell their wealthy donors that the province will not tax the first $200 each month they earn or receive from investments, but for every dollar above that the province will tax it back at fifty percent? What do you think the chances of a government like that are for getting re-elected? If this is good enough for persons with disabilities, it is good for the billionaires too!
Secondly, one of the cases I am working on involves privacy and persons receiving public disability support. At one of my hearings, I asked the case worker involved if I have the right to know not only where she lives, but also the right to knock on her neighbours' doors to ask questions like: (a) who she lives with; (b) if she appears to be working; or (c) how she spends her money. She was offended by the question, but she did not understand that she seems to take the liberty to do the same to those individuals on her caseload. In fact, these intrusions and similar types of policing take up a large proportion of case worker time, taking time away from assisting people they serve in improving their own lives or accessing benefits and services to aid them in maximizing their potential. These daily intrusions are exactly why people with disabilities are often afraid to take the steps they need to take to improve the quality of their lives. In another case, I was told that my client who had received a substantial inheritance was required to have a trustee to manage her monies. This policy in itself implies that the person has limited or no capacity to manage their own affairs or make their own decisions. The Human Rights Tribunal might take a dim look at something like this, but then again, those making the rules count on people being too beaten down to fight these things. How would the caseworker like it if s/he were required to have a trustee manage his/her pay cheques? This is no different. If one makes (or enforces) the rules, then they must live by them as well.
Thirdly, most of you reading this have mobility and at least some choices. People that do not drive and do not live in a metropolitan community where public transit is deemed a necessary part of its infrastructure, do not have that. They have limited mobility and often, few choices. Many of the progressive folks I meet talk about how they will never shop at Walmart or Loblaw's or some other major grocery chain, often times for good reasons. However, these same people have the option of getting into their cars and voting with their wheels to go elsewhere, such as a farmer's market, an independent grocer or some other less 'oppressive' company. Have you ever wondered why stores like Walmart and so forth tend to locate near poor neighbourhoods? Low income persons with disabilities, or those that do not drive and therefore do not have the freedom of choosing where to go, cannot vote with their dollars like those that can drive and have the funds to pay a little more for locally grown produce, for example. Until we have self-driving cars or start to value effective and reliable forms of public transportation as a matter of right for all citizens, this will be the case.
Even for those of us that can get to the larger discount chains, those of us with disabilities continue to remain invisible. The place where I shop has a very large and spacious parking lot, along with close by parking for people attending the smaller stores in this "outdoor mall". Those of us that do not drive do not routinely stop by the grocery store on the way home from work to grab a few groceries to cook up for dinner that night. We have to make a day of it and get enough to last a couple of weeks or so. Because this is too much to carry on a bus, we need to transport by taxi. Many times, we need to wait for a considerable period of time for a taxi, which means we need somewhere to sit down. The store where I shop removed the benches in the front for no good reason. I presume they think nobody needs them or uses them because EVERYBODY simply takes their groceries to their cars and drives away, so there is no need for this. It doesn't matter anyways, as people with disabilities and their needs are invisible to these types of organizations. It is not like I have much of an option to "drive" off to another store that might serve us better.
Finally, most of you who are reading this are living with a partner (other than those of you who are recently divorced or who are choosing single life for now). Your partner could be your legal spouse, your common law partner, your same sex partner or partner of a second marriage, etc. The face of Canada is changing with the popularity of marriage itself declining with the uptick in the number of common law partners, many of whom live together in the same manner as those in a long marriage. About 27% of households are people living alone. For most of you with life partners, you likely did not have to think about the risk to your paltry entitlements or health benefits once you moved in with your partner. In most cases, both partners contribute financially to the relationship, as well as in other areas and these arrangements are set by the people involved. However, if you were disabled and forced to live on public disability benefits - you do not have the same rights. ODSP Statistics are published monthly by family type: single, couples and lone support parents, versus all family types. I calculated percentages at the back of a paper napkin to determine that the ODSP caseload consists of 78.6% of households where there is only one person, 12.7% of households where there is a couple (married, common law) and 8.7% of households that are led by a single parent. Something is definitely wrong when only 27% of the general population lives alone, while 87.3% of households on the ODSP caseload are single or a single parent. A closer look at the statistics show that the raw number of couples tend to vary dynamically each month, suggesting that partnerships in receipt of ODSP tend not to last long and can go through cycles where they are split up and again, together.
It is about time that the elephant in room is pointed out and eloquently deciphered. The ODSP Action Coalition has published broadly that most recipients are afraid to get involved in relationships, fearing they would then become part of a "benefit unit" and whoever it is that gets together with them will have both their income and assets counted against them, thus putting them at risk of losing most or all of the benefits. Ironically, because of more liberal attitudes to granting "equal rights" to same sex partners, even those engaging in non-conjugal roommate situations are hesitant to get involved as almost everybody who "lives with" another adult can risk being deemed a "spouse" by ODSP officials, and therefore, liable to be forced to almost solely support the person with the disability. For those already involved in relationships, the albatross weighs heavily because if the relationship ends, the one receiving ODSP will be forced to seek support from the "ex-partner" (regardless of what the Family Law Act of Ontario requires). For those that remain together, the disabled partner loses most of their independence and this can't be healthy for anybody. The one who tells it like it is writes a blog, but there are many others coming forward today. In fact, there are legal professionals taking this up as a cause to change. As Eric Letts states on his site in his video, this rule may in fact be in direct violation of human rights and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
When I have raised this issue in the past, I have received very questionable responses. Remember: those who make the rules should be made to live by them. We would see swift change in this if everybody in relationships were treated like this. Not very long ago, women who were married were considered the property of their husbands. They were not allowed to sue and be sued, not allowed their own income, not allowed to vote, not allowed to do anything apart from their husband. People with disabilities are almost in this position today. If it was unacceptable for women to not have their own identities, their own incomes, their own bank accounts, their own legal status, etc. (as it is stated clearly under the Family Law Act), why is it okay to treat persons with disabilities like this? It states, as follows:
PART VI
AMENDMENTS TO THE COMMON LAW
Unity of legal personality abolished
64 (1) For all purposes of the law of Ontario, a married person has a legal personality that is independent, separate and distinct from that of his or her spouse. R.S.O. 1990, c. F.3, s. 64 (1).
Capacity of married person
(2) A married person has and shall be accorded legal capacity for all purposes and in all respects as if he or she were an unmarried person and, in particular, has the same right of action in tort against his or her spouse as if they were not married. R.S.O. 1990, c. F.3, s. 64 (2).
Purpose of subss. (1, 2)
(3) The purpose of subsections (1) and (2) is to make the same law apply, and apply equally, to married men and married women and to remove any difference in it resulting from any common law rule or doctrine. R.S.O. 1990, c. F.3, s. 64 (3).
ODSP unfortunately retains some of the unity of legal personality with respect to married couples where one or both are receiving benefits. In a regular marriage, where one of the spouses can run up a credit card and max themselves far into debt, they can no longer bind the other spouse (unless the spouse is signed on or is a guarantor of sorts). However, when ODSP has "overpayments", regardless of how they arose, both spouses are deemed by the Crown to be liable for it (e.g. if they split up, they will go after both spouses for the same overpayment). This brings us back to the early days when women were not permitted to have their own credit lines. Couples not involved with ODSP have a lot more freedom in determining their relationships. If one of the spouses works and earns $100,000 a year, for example, and the other has chosen to stay home to raise the children, the working spouse is under no legal obligation to hand over fifty percent of their income to the stay-at-home spouse. The working spouse can provide a bit of an "allowance" or pay for expenses, but there is no law that they ought to. While ODSP couples are still together and not separating, the disabled spouse loses over fifty percent of their benefits and the more the other spouse makes, the less they get (and the higher the clawback or marginal effective tax rate). This can be cut off at relatively low levels. It is quite possible that a spouse might be only earning poverty level wages where the other might lose most of their income support. This is what forces many of these relationships to end, or in worse cases, keeps the vulnerable person trapped in an abusive situation. A couple of years ago, I fought a case that desperately needed to go further, although I did make movement on this issue ... exemplifies the very difficult bind this puts people into. At one point, I had three different clients at the same time in a women's shelter because of an abusive relationship they were in (and they were on ODSP). All three went right back to their alleged abusers because they did not have the financial resources to get out.Attempts are being made to address this issue at the human rights level. It is being chiseled away at the Social Benefits Tribunal and HRTO, but not chiseled down enough where both spouses are independent legal entities with rights and entitlements of their own. In particular, this is repugnant because a person with a disability that cannot work or cannot financially contribute to a relationship is now forced to either live alone or risk losing everything, whereas a spouse in a relationship where both are merely unemployed, their situation is temporary and their legal status is intact once they both work again. In effect, it is the disability that is the impugned variable that leads to the gross inequity of this situation, as this person is not going to suddenly get a job and start contributing.
These above facts are not well known by members of the public that are reading this and many assume that if this were changed and disabled persons were able to get benefits in their own right, that suddenly they would get married to millionaires, this is silly. First, the types of people who are likely to become eligible for ODSP in the first place do not regularly attend the same places that the so-called millionaires attend. I've never met too many people on ODSP who are regular members of the St. Catharines Golf & Country Club, or the St. Catharines Club. Most of them have virtually exhausted all of their resources and have nothing left to spend on these pursuits. Besides, people tend to get into relationships with people who are more like them than not like themselves. Teachers, lawyers, doctors, nurses and so forth tend to marry people who are in similar occupations. How many times have we noticed the so-called "power couples" on the front pages of newspapers or magazines or online? They certainly do not have a lot of ODSP recipients in their wider circle of friends. Even if there is the one off case where somebody earning good money does marry a recipient ... so what? The time for slavery, peonage and people-as-chattels has ended for most people, except for people with disabilities.
I am seeking out people who have read this and are getting angry and/or motivated by this post to get in contact with me to start something. A stone in the water starts a ripple; several stones can cause a wave ... and we need to turn this tide before too many more people get hurt. Your thoughts?
