Ford Government Made Shocking Bogus Claims in the Legislature About Progress on Accessibility, on the Day Ontarians with Disabilities Came to Queen’s Park to Mark the 30th Anniversary of the Grassroots Movement for a Barrier-free Province

Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance Update

United for a Barrier-Free Ontario for All People with Disabilities

Website: www.aodaalliance.org

Email: aodafeedback@gmail.com

Twitter: @aodaalliance

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/aodaalliance

 

Ford Government Made Shocking Bogus Claims in the Legislature About Progress on Accessibility, on the Day Ontarians with Disabilities Came to Queen’s Park to Mark the 30th Anniversary of the Grassroots Movement for a Barrier-free Province

 

November 29, 2024

 

SUMMARY

 

On November 25, 2024, the Ford Government made the shocking and palpably preposterous claim that 88% of Ontarians think Ontario is accessible to people with disabilities. Speaking for the Ford Government, Seniors and Accessibility, Minister Cho said this in the Legislature on Monday, November 25, 2024. That was the same day that people with disabilities converged on Queen’s Park to mark the 30th anniversary of the birth of the non-partisan grassroots movement to make Ontario barrier-free for 2.9 million Ontarians with disabilities.

 

During Question Period, opposition NDP disabilities critic Lise Vaugeois pressed the Ford Government to recognize that Ontario is in an accessibility crisis. On June 6, 2023, the Ford Government had received the final report of the 4th Independent Review of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, which Premier Ford appointed Rich Donovan to conduct. The final Donovan Report declared that Ontario is in an accessibility crisis. In the year and a half since then, the Government has neither recognized this crisis nor announced any action plan to address it.

 

In Question Period, Seniors and Accessibility Minister Raymond Cho stated in part:

 

“88% of Ontarians believe Ontario is now accessible…”

 

In a similarly shocking claim, Minister Cho stated:

 

“We are the government that is seeking 50 new hospitals, 60 new schools—projects all exceeding accessibility standards.”

 

Yet the AODA actually sets no accessibility requirements for the construction of hospitals and schools, apart from the height of public service counters and the design of queuing lines. The Government is boasting that it is exceeding AODA standards that in reality require virtually nothing to be done.

 

In fact, the Government’s record of building new public infrastructure is far from glowing. Last August, the AODA Alliance made public an online video that documents serious accessibility problems at Toronto’s new Armoury Street courthouse – a billion-dollar accessibility bungle.

 

The Ford Government’s claim is an especially cruel irony, since the Government has taken no action to enact the recommendations of the K-12 Education Standards Development Committee or the final report of the Health Care Standards Development Committee that it received almost three years ago. For example, the K-12 Education Standards Development Committee’s final report includes some 20 pages of recommendations on how to design an accessible school facility. The AODA Alliance has urged the Government to implement those recommendations as it spends hundreds of millions of dollars on new schools. The Ford Government has never agreed to do so.

 

It is extremely worrisome that the Government that is required to lead Ontario to become accessible to people with disabilities somehow thinks there is a pervasive public belief that Ontario has already achieved this goal. In our 30 years of grassroots advocacy, first from 1994 to 2005 as the Ontarians with Disabilities Act Committee and then from 2005 as the AODA Alliance, we’ve encountered no one, including no public official, who believes that Ontario is now an accessible province.

 

On January 31, 2019, former Lieutenant Governor David Onley delivered the final report of the 3rd AODA Independent Review to the Ford Government. Drawing on feedback from his consultation with Ontarians with disabilities, David Onley had concluded that Ontario is full of “soul-crushing barriers,” that progress on accessibility has been “glacial” and that the goal of an accessible province was “nowhere in sight.” On April 10, 2019, speaking in the Legislature, Minister Raymond Cho said that David Onley did a “marvelous job.”

 

It is unconscionable that the Ford Government would make such bogus claims just a month before we reach 2025, the AODA’s deadline for this province to become accessible to people with disabilities. It is widely recognized that Ontario will be far from that goal on January 1, 2025.

 

There is a massive disconnect between Minister Cho’s glowing claims in the Legislature on November 25, 2024, about progress on accessibility and the wrenching stories about disability barriers that individuals with disabilities described that same day during the AODA Alliance’s community public hearings. You can watch the video of those hearings on the AODA Alliance YouTube channel. Drawing on volunteer effort, we are working on the accuracy of the captions there. There is American Sign Language on the screen, but only after the first few minutes. This was due to a technical glitch at the time.

 

You can also watch the AODA Alliance’s November 25, 2024 Queen’s Park news conference that took place earlier that day. Here too, we are working on improving the captioning.

 

We bring you this Update on November 29, 2024, the AODA movement’s actual 30th Birthday! Happy birthday to us! Of course, we welcome your birthday wishes at aodafeedback@gmail.com As a great birthday gift to us, please get more people to go to the AODA Alliance website and sign up to get our AODA Alliance Updates!

 

For more background

 

 

MORE DETAILS

 

Ontario Hansard November 25th 2024

Question Period

Accessibility for persons with disabilities

MPP Lise Vaugeois: My question is to the Premier.

Twenty years ago, the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act passed, with the goal to make the province accessible to Ontarians with disabilities by 2025.

Unfortunately, the rate of progress has been glacial. The 2019 report by former Lieutenant Governor David Onley described the state of inaccessibility of the province as “soul-crushing.” In 2023, the latest independent reviewer of the AODA, Rich Donovan, told this government it would not meet the legislated deadline to achieve full accessibility by 2025 and that Ontario has an accessibility crisis.

With the deadline only a month away, does the government agree that Ontario has an accessibility crisis?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): To respond, the Minister for Seniors and Accessibility.

Hon. Raymond Sung Joon Cho: Mr. Speaker, Ontario is meeting, achieving and exceeding the AODA standards each and every day. All 444 municipalities in Ontario have accessibility plans to meet the goals of the AODA in their own communities.

This year, school boards received $1.4 billion for AODA improvements. We have built the standards of the AODA into the Ontario building code. All new GO Transit stations, train platforms and bus stations adhere to the AODA. We have delivered over 2,200 accessible buses to municipalities.

The province is making historic investments to make Ontario more accessible today and for the future. We are getting it done, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The supplementary question.

MPP Lise Vaugeois: Students with disabilities face crushing disability barriers in school and university. Patients with disabilities face multiple barriers in our health care system. In 2022, your government received final reports and recommendations from the K-12 Education, Post-Secondary Education and Health Care Standards Development Committees, but not one of these reports has been implemented.

Premier, can you tell us today when your government will enact the promised health care and accessibilities standards recommended by experts almost three years ago?

Hon. Raymond Sung Joon Cho: Thank you for the question again. Our government is working really hard for accessibility and that is why 88% of Ontarians believe Ontario is now accessible and 86% rate public space positively for accessibility. This is because we are the government that built AODA standards into the building code. We are the government that created the Skills Development Fund so people with disabilities can find meaningful jobs and training. We are the government that is seeking 50 new hospitals, 60 new schools—projects all exceeding accessibility standards. We are the government that has been a champion for accessibility.