Kathleen Harris
CBC News. Sept. 18, 2020

More than six months into the global pandemic, the Liberal government is being accused of failing to meet the needs of the Canadians with disabilities who number among those hardest-hit by the public health crisis.

Marie-Claude Landry, chief commissioner of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, said COVID-19 has “expanded the circle of vulnerability” in Canada but people with disabilities still aren’t getting the support they need.

“We urge the government to immediately address the unmet financial needs of people with disabilities in an equitable way,” she said in a media statement.

Advocates for Canadians With Disabilities Say the Federal Government Isn’t Doing Enough to Help People Struggling With New Barriers in the Midst of A Pandemic full article

By Rebekah Taussig
TIME, August 31, 2020

I am a magnet for kindness. Like the center of a black hole, my body attracts every good deed from across the universe to the foot of my wheelchair. I move through parking lots and malls, farmers’ markets and airports, bookstores and buffets, and people scramble to my aid.

O.K., so there are plenty of people who don’t seem to notice me, and some people who are actually repelled. They look down, pull their bag or their child closer to them, draw their legs up to their chest as I roll by. (Yeah, it doesn’t feel great.) But it’s the abundance of that gets me all tangled. It’s the fly that won’t stop buzzing, won’t hold still long enough for me to swat it, won’t die.

I’ve Been Paralyzed Since I Was 3. Here’s Why Kindness Toward Disabled People Is More Complicated Than You Think full article

Deaf Citizens are calling for change at the Canadian Hearing Services (formerly the Canadian Hearing Society). The petition is in ASL, LSQ, and English and it lays out some of the issues taking place in the organization.

Concerns by deaf stakeholders and their allies include:

Deaf Citizens Petition full article

• Reducing the number of employees who are Deaf
• Failing to appoint deaf board members in contravention of CHS bylaws
• Switching its role from a major voice representing deaf people to working mainly as a provider of audiological services
• Revising its bylaws to eliminate all memberships except for the board meaning that annual general meetings are now close to the community

WINNIPEG The Council of Canadians with Disabilities (CCD), a national disability rights organization, is expressing its support for 43-year-old Jonathan Marchand as he begins a protest to obtain his and his friends release from long-term care facilities in Quebec.

Marchand, who uses a ventilator, has escaped from his long-term care facility (CHSLD) and is camping out in the public space in front of Quebecs National Assembly. He is requesting an in-person meeting with Premier François Legault in order to discuss his proposal for providing community-based personal care supports for people with disabilities so that they can live dignified and fulfilling lives in the community instead of being warehoused in long-term care facilities.

The Council of Canadians with Disabilities Supports Quebecer, Jonathan Marchand, as he brings his cage in front of the National Assembly in Quebec to obtain his and his friends’ release from long-term care facilities full article

Adina Bresge
The Canadian Press, August 6, 2020

Karyn Keith says she isn’t asking for much. All she wants is the same support she’d receive if she was out of a job because of the pandemic, rather than unable to work because of her disabilities.

The 44-year-old mother in Brampton, Ont., said she lives with constant pain and fatigue from multiple chronic conditions, including trigeminal neuralgia, a debilitating nerve disorder characterized by searing spasms through the face.

She was forced to leave her career in supply chain and logistics management in 2013 when her health deteriorated after the birth of her daughter. Since then, she’s received $1,150, plus $250 for her child, every month in federal disability benefits based on her contributions to the Canada Pension Plan.

‘Do our lives count for less?’: COVID-19 exposes cracks in disability aid full article

Hanna Warsame
The Pigeon, Aug. 4, 2020
Editor’s Note: The source interviewed for this piece uses disability-first language to describe herself, and The Pigeon has adapted our language accordingly. We acknowledge that this is not a universal preference.

The Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) was announced in March 2020 to support Canadians struggling financially due to COVID-19. Since then, 8.46 million Canadians have applied for the benefit, and 86 per cent of Canadians have agreed the CERB is a necessary and useful aid. However, while the federal government has extended COVID-19 support to countless Canadians, those with disabilities were left in the lurch.

Delayed COVID-19 Support Another Example of government’s Inequitable Treatment of Disabled Canadians full article

Al Etmanski and Kathleen O’Grady
Globe and Mail, August 4, 2020

A decision to issue one time, $600 federal payments to Canadians with disabilities, in order to cover the extraordinary expenses they have incurred because of COVID-19, has finally received royal assent. But it’s too little, too late, and reaches too few.

The $600 amount is nowhere near the extra monthly costs many people with disabilities have incurred during the pandemic. It was issued four months after most other Canadians have received support and well after the country has emerged from lockdown. And it leaves around 60 per cent of Canadians with disabilities behind. Payments will also not be issued until the fall.

Opinion: It’s Time to Unify the Disability Movement full article

By Julia Carmel
New York Times, July 26, 2020

The disability civil rights movement has many distinct narratives, but the prevailing themes are of community, justice and equity.

As with every other civil rights movement, the fight for disability rights is one that challenges negative attitudes and pushes back against oppression. But it is also more complex.

Often the movement has diverged into a constellation of single-issue groups that raise awareness of specific disabilities. It has also converged into cross-disability coalitions that increasingly include intersections of race, gender and sexual orientation.

Regardless, the prevailing demands of the movement are the same: justice, equal opportunities and reasonable accommodations.

15 Moments Within the Fight for Disability Rights full article