Social Policy Archives
Social Policy
January 29, 2009
Federal Budget Sends New Signal to Disability Community
In these challenging times, CCD urges you and your colleagues to ensure that those who already face significant disadvantage are not forgotten. Canadians with disabilities struggle when times are good to have their needs met and when times are bad sadly we are often the first to feel the effects of cutbacks or loss of employment. Read more.
National Action Plan on Disability
October 7, 2009
National Action Plan Video
Jim Derksen presents the National Action Plan. Read more.
September 22, 2009
End Exclusion 2009 Agenda
Roundtable Dialogue “Disabling Poverty/Enabling Citizenship”
October 1, 2009
Ottawa City Hall Council Chambers
110 Laurier Avenue West
Objectives:
• To build solidarity within the disability community and with other anti-poverty groups.
• To highlight our shared priorities regarding Poverty Alleviation and inform key decision makers of our policy proposals.
• To build understanding of how a disability poverty alleviation agenda fits within broader anti-poverty proposals being advanced.
• To build on the success of End Exclusion 2006 and 2007.
July 14, 2008
Your Help Is Needed!
June 1, 2008
Your Help Is Needed!
CCD explains what individuals can do in support of an accessible and inclusive Canada. Read more.
November 1, 2007
From Vision to Action: Building An Inclusive and Accessible Canada: A National Action Plan
The National Action Plan presents a shared vision for an inclusive and accessible Canada. Read more.
National Action Plan on Disability Archives
Poverty
December 15, 2009
Open Letter to Members of Parliament Re: Eradicating Poverty for Canadians with Disabilities
July 29, 2009
Dignity For All, the campaign for a poverty-free Canada
The Council of Canadians with Disabilities (CCD) is pleased to announce that it has accepted an invitation to serve on the steering committee of Dignity For All, the campaign for a poverty-free Canada. Read more.
April 16, 2008
Poverty and Disability: Senate Committee Hears From Canadians with Disabilities
CCD explained that it is calling on the Government of Canada to address the poverty of Canadians with disabilities by taking a greater role in addressing income security for persons with disabilities. Read more.
November 9, 1999
CCD Takes Its Case for Fairer CPP to Supreme Court
February 14, 1997
Disabled citizens lose once again, unfairly blamed in CPP Changes
Employment
March 31, 2009
Make EI Accessible and Inclusive to Canadian Women with Disabilities
Today, the Council of Canadians with Disabilities (CCD) appeared before the House of Commons Standing Committee on the Status of Women and called upon the Federal Government to make EI more accessible and inclusive to women with disabilities by expanding eligibility criteria and expanding its coverage. Read more.
Disability Supports
December 2, 2009
Letter to the Editor Re: Advantage Disabled?
CCD is hopeful that the attention being focused on the benefits of technical aids in the area of elite sports translates into increased support for public programs providing technical aids to Canadians with disabilities. Read more.
October 19, 2005
Question and Answer Fact Sheet
October 19, 2005
Canadians with Disabilities Call for Action, Not More Study
February 1, 2005
A National Snapshot of Home Support from the Consumer Perspective
Access/Inclusion
May 27, 2010
Immigration and Disability
CCD urges you to undertake a review of the excessive demand clause of the Immigration Act. Canadians with disabilities are insulted by Canada’s immigration law. Our current law belittles our contributions and reinforces the old stereotypes that people with disabilities will be a drain upon our society, not contributors to it. Read more.
May 13, 2010
PALS and Data Collection on Persons with Disabilities
The Department is in the process of designing the new strategy for data collection on the status of persons with disabilities in Canada. PALS has been a very important tool for the disability community and frankly it is the only source of reliable data on persons with disabilities available to researchers, governments and the disability community. Only with good data can good programs be developed and implemented and only through ongoing data collection can we ascertain over the long-term whether programs are having positive impacts. HALS and PALS were developed over the years through supported consultation with our community. We urge you to ensure that the new strategy engages and seeks input from the broad community of persons with disabilities as well as from a technical committee of end users of that data. Read more.
May 10, 2010
Affordable Accessible Housing- A Critical Issue for Canadians with Disabilities
The Council of Canadians with Disabilities (CCD) urges all Parliamentarians to support Bill C-304 – An Act to ensure secure, adequate, accessible and affordable housing for Canadians. One of the major issues people with disabilities have is finding affordable and accessible housing. Read more.
February 24, 2010
Disability Group Challenges Canada on 'Excessive Burden': $5,259
In the short term, CCD is calling upon the Minister of Immigration to allow the Barlagne family to remain in Canada on humanitarian grounds.In the long term, CCD is calling upon the government of Canada to overhaul Canada's immigration policy to remove the discriminatory practices that put the Barlagne family's immigration to Canada in jeopardy. Canada's immigration policy is based upon a negative and outdated understanding of disability that fails to recognize the contribution that people with disabilities can, and do, make.
Read more.
February 23, 2010
Immigration and Disability
Federal Disability Act
October 1, 2006
A Federal Disability Act: Opportunities and Challenges
May 14, 1999
A Canadians with Disabilities Act?
October 7, 1998
Disabilities Act must have teeth
Income
May 27, 2010
Nortel Employees on Long Term Disability Benefits
CCD urges all Members of Parliament to find ways of protecting the income and benefits of the Nortel employees on long term disability benefits and of also addressing the similar problems that many other Canadians may face in the future. The Nortel Employees on LTD describe their “insurance” as “toxic insurance” and we would agree that this maybe an apt description. We support Senator Eggleton’s Bill S-216 and urge all Members of Parliament and the Senate to find ways of ensuring the intent of this bill is realized as soon as possible. Bill S-216 is non-partisan and protects disabled Canadians. Read more.
January 24, 2008
Proposal for A Refundable Disability Tax Credit
CCD explains why it supports a refundable Disability Tax Credit: it would vastly improve the lives of hundreds of thousands of Canadian residents with disabilities. Read more.
Disabling Poverty/Enabling Citizenship
July 8, 2010
Canadian Legal Literature Addressing Social and Economic Rights of People with Disabilities: An Annotated Bibliography
CURA team members have created an annotated bibliography which is intended as a resource for academics, students, advocates, and community members interested in the role that law has played—and can play—in remedying poverty experienced by people with disabilities. Read more.
June 30, 2010
How Human Rights Legislation is Dealing with Serious Disabilities that Tend to Result in Social Judgment and Social Exclusion
This report considers whether statutory human rights litigation is serving the needs of persons with permanent, lifelong disabilities who are chronically unemployed, underemployed, and marginalized in Canadian society. Read more.
June 30, 2010
Overview of Complaints under Human Rights Legislation Regarding Access to Services for Persons with Disabilities
The report addresses issues, trends, and obstacles facing complainants in cases involving discrimination in services and accommodation. These cases tend to be critical for persons with disabilities, as they often have far-reaching implications regarding accessibility to, and the inclusivity of, core institutions, facilities, and services (e.g. education, transportation, communication, public buildings, etc.). Read more.
June 30, 2010
An Overview of the Duty To Accommodate and Undue Hardship in Human Rights Jurisprudence
This report highlights the key human rights cases that have contributed to the principle of the duty to accommodate and the defence of undue hardship under human rights legislation. It further assesses how the duty to accommodate has affected the claims of persons with disabilities. Read more.
June 30, 2010
Disabling Poverty and Enabling Citizenship: Understanding the Poverty and Exclusion of Canadians with Disabilities
Despite Canada’s obligations under international agreements and the staggering costs associated with the non-employment of people with disabilities, relatively little has been written about people with disabilities who are living on low incomes. The present report aims to help close that knowledge gap. The research draws primarily from Statistics Canada’s Participation and Activity Limitation Survey (PALS) of 2006 and provides a profile of people with disabilities in terms of their general socio-demographic characteristics such age, gender, visible minority and Aboriginal person status, education level and labour force status and in terms of selected disability-specific characteristics that are discussed in the body of the report. Read more.
June 29, 2010
An Overview of the Comparator Group Analysis in Human Rights Jurisprudence
The report addresses a relatively recent trend in Canadian human rights jurisprudence: the importation of the comparator group analysis from the section 15 Charter context into the analytical framework for statutory human rights adjudication. The comparator group analysis, which requires claimants to prove that they have been treated differently than a specific group which mirrors their characteristics save for the alleged ground of discrimination, has been sharply criticized for being antithetical to substantive equality. The details of this argument and the pitfalls of the comparator group analysis are provided elsewhere, and are not the focus of this report. Suffice it to say that this development is particularly troubling for persons with disabilities and other equality-seeking groups who have spent years fighting for judicial recognition that equality is not always achieved by same treatment, but rather often requires that true differences be taken into account and accommodated so as to render society inclusive and accessible. Read more.
Disabling Poverty/Enabling Citizenship Archives
Federal Elections
March 23, 2010
CCD Perspective on Canada At 150
February 12, 2010
Canadian Human Rights Tribunal Decision Safeguards Access on Voting Day
In James Peter Hughes and Canadian Human Rights Commission and Elections Canada and Council of Canadians with Disabilities, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ordered Elections Canada to "cease from situating polling stations in locations that do not provide barrier-free access". "CCD regards this decision as a victory, because the Tribunal's order compels Elections Canada to keep access considerations front and centre as it conducts elections," states Marie White, CCD Chairperson. Read more.
September 29, 2008
Building An Inclusive and Accessible Canadian Transportation System
Accessibility standards are a thing of the past for Canada's federal transport system. Voluntary codes of practice are the current Canadian way. The result: travel denied. Once a world leader in accessibility, Canadian access levels fall below other developed countries. CCD seeks the adoption of the US regulatory accessibility model and utilization of US Access Board guidelines and expertise. The disability community's National Action Plan on Disability includes a focus on transportation access. "We are hoping that all the Federal Parties will commit to working with the disability community to regulate the federal transportation system for access," states Marie White, CCD Chairperson. Read more.
September 22, 2008
Access to Justice: A Disability Issue
CCD has been calling on all Federal Political Parties to commit to the reinstatement of the Court Challenges Program. To date, the Liberal, NDP, Bloc and Green Parties have agreed to reinstate it if elected. The Conservative Party has not indicated a willingness to alter its course on this issue. Read more.
September 19, 2008
Harper Announcement on Disability Falls Short of National Action Plan
The Conservatives have missed the point that Canadians with disabilities have been making for the last thirty-five years. We don't want to be looked after; we want to be contributing members of society. The Canadian community of persons with disabilities has presented the Conservative Party, indeed all the Parties, with the National Action Plan on Disability that outlines new initiatives geared to assist people with disabilities become contributing, participating members of Canadian society, enjoying their full citizenship. Read more.
September 18, 2008
Waiting to Be Tax Payers
Having a job, gives many Canadians with disabilities the financial means to develop the lifestyle they want, feelings of personal satisfaction and contribution, a personal network of friends and colleagues, as well as many other benefits unique to the individual. The disability community has created a National Action Plan on Disability, which provides a short and long term strategy, that among other initiatives will get people with disabilities working and paying taxes. Read more.
End Exclusion supporters rally in support of an accessible and inclusive Canada.