What Federal Election Candidates Need to Know About: Disability-related Supports

A Message from Marie White, CCD Chairperson

Disability-related supports are the critical priority of persons with disabilities. Organizations of and for persons with disabilities support an appropriately targeted investment in disability-related supports.

Will your party invest in disability-related supports?

Disability-related supports are any good or service a person with a disability uses to live independently in the community. Examples: interpreters, voice synthesizers, attendants, wheelchairs.

Without new investments in disability-related supports we remain excluded. We can be skilled, but without the support that we need to be able to actualize those skills, we will not be able to take advantage of the opportunities Canada presents. We are relegated to lives of exclusion.

An appropriately targeted investment in disability-related supports would change the lives of Canadians with disabilities. It would assist us participate in early learning and childcare, become educated and employed, live more independently, and look after our families.

Targeted investments include:

• Deinstitutionalization. In no dictionary does institutionalization equate with a safe and welcoming home. We must never forget the many who remain within the walls of these institutions.
• Work with provinces and territories to provide support for the building of safe, affordable, accessible and supportive housing.
• Work with Bands on access to disability-related supports on reserves for First Nations people with disabilities.