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Government of Canada Response to Accessibility for All
Access to programs
The Government of Canada welcomes the Committee's continuing interest in the Canada Pension Plan (CPP), particularly the Committee's suggestions for improvements to assist applicants and recipients of disability benefits. Listening to Canadians, the Government's first progress report on its response to the Committee's 2003 report on CPPD, outlines important strides in implementing several of the Committee's key recommendations.
The CPPD is the largest long-term disability insurance program in Canada, providing basic earnings replacement for eligible CPP contributors who cannot work regularly at any job due to a severe and prolonged mental or physical disability. CPPD provides monthly benefits to more than 290,000 individuals and 90,000 of their children. The program receives some 60,000 new applications each year. A new Automatic Reinstatement provision to the CPPD provides a substantial safety net for program beneficiaries who wish to attempt to return to work.
The Government shares the Committee's conviction that accessibility to government programs is as important as access to buildings, services and public goods. Access to statutory programs for Canadians with disabilities, such as CPPD, is directly related to the goals and legislative intent of each program.
Government as a model of accessibility
A true measure of Canadians' commitment to equality for people with disabilities is employment, which assures them access to the same standard of living and quality of life as other Canadians. Unfortunately, most sectors of the Canadian economy would not meet this standard. Employment rates and average levels of remuneration for people with disabilities remain lower than for other Canadians, contributing to the significant number of Canadians with disabilities living in poverty.
Across Canada, the employment rates of people with disabilities were about 25 to 30 percentage points lower than those of people without disabilities between 1999 and 2002, and were even worse for women than men. Employers' attitudes and assumptions about the abilities of Canadians with disabilities frequently create major barriers to employment.
Many employers know that hiring Canadians with disabilities gives them access to a diversity of largely underutilized skills and talents that improve their productivity and competitiveness, an illustration of the value of knowledge in affecting attitudes and removing barriers. This knowledge is a major asset for employers at a time when Canada is beginning to experience skills and labour supply shortages in many sectors. They also know that, with Canada's aging population, there is a growing market for disability supports, services and products.
The Government of Canada has taken steps to capitalize on the skills of Canadians with disabilities within the federal workforce. It has demonstrated that recruiting and retaining workers with disabilities is desirable, achievable and beneficial to the employer. It has yet to fully meet its target of hiring people with disabilities equal to their availability in the Canadian labour market, which is currently 3.6 percent. Canadians with disabilities accounted for 3.1 percent of all new hires for 2003-2004. However, workers with disabilities represented 5.7 percent of the federal public service as of March 31, 2004 - far in excess of their availability in the Canadian labour force.
These workers make up a growing percentage of the federal workforce, which reflects the valuable contributions they make to public service and to the Government's leadership as a model employer.
In meeting its ongoing obligations under the Employment Equity Act, the Government will continue to develop strategies to facilitate employment for Canadians with disabilities in the public sector. It will work with employees and managers to raise awareness of the duty to accommodate employees through educational services developed by Social Development Canada and the Canadian Human Rights Commission.
The Government of Canada has also established high standards for physical accessibility to federal buildings and will continue to demonstrate its commitment to inclusion by consistently meeting these standards. The Government will work with researchers and other employers to provide models of inclusion and accessibility for Canadians with disabilities that can be adapted to workplaces outside the public service.
The Government recognizes that physical access to government buildings, and to the Office for Disability Issues at Social Development Canada in particular, is important for both practical and symbolic reasons. The Government endorses the Committee's observation that accessibility is more than the absence of physical obstacles to a building. It agrees that it also means fostering work environments that value and facilitate the full participation of employees with disabilities, as well as increasing the fairness of approaches to recruitment, retention, advancement, and workplace accommodation.
Public Works and Government Services Canada and Social Development Canada plan to provide barrier-free space to the Office for Disability Issues by September 2006. The two departments have developed an interim plan to improve access to the Office for Disability Issues by the autumn of 2005. The Office for Disability Issues will represent an exemplary workplace where technology and modern employment practices combine to foster accessibility. Work to establish these particular premises as a model will be supplemented by the development of a program to audit the accessibility of other spaces that the Government owns or leases.
Public Works and Government Services Canada will establish a program to audit the physical accessibility of the buildings that house over 210,000 public servants across the country. The Department will also work with other Government of Canada departments and agencies that manage their own buildings to raise awareness of the importance of physical accessibility and encourage other administrators of public buildings to participate in the audit program. Public Works and Government Services Canada will work with Social Development Canada to ensure that the offices of Social Development Canada and its Minister are among the first public spaces to be audited for accessibility.
The way forward
Knowledge is key to understanding the context of disability, creating sound policies and programs, and measuring progress. Appreciating the first-hand experiences of Canadians with disabilities, being fully informed about the nature and severity of disabilities, and recognizing the need for and access to assistance, education, employment, income, housing and transportation are essential in discharging the responsibilities of Government. Public involvement strategies are being modified and developed to ensure that first-hand experiences become part of the information and knowledge that are used to shape policies and programs. The Minister of Social Development has held several roundtables with citizens, and in May 2005, Social Development Canada launched an online consultation with Canadians about issues affecting people with disabilities, caregiving, and seniors to enrich its knowledge base and the range of policy choices.
Disability research will continue to provide the evidence base for policy and program development. The Government will carry on its work with its current partners and build new relationships to develop the necessary knowledge to ensure Canadians have access to the best possible research and indicators of success. It is equally committed to communicating progress on disability to all Canadians.
Statistics Canada's Participation and Activity Limitation Survey (PALS) provides important information about the nature and severity of disabilities and how these affect education, employment, income, housing and transportation. As well, Advancing the Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities provides a regular report to Canadians on progress in promoting full inclusion based on key indicators.
Continued research and reporting of high calibre will contribute to the Government's achievement of meaningful and measurable progress in enriching the lives of Canadians with disabilities and their families, and demonstrate to Canadians how their tax dollars are spent and how outcomes are achieved.