AODA Alliance
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
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Looking Back at the 2025 Federal Election Campaign from a Disability Perspective
May 8, 2025
SUMMARY
With the federal election now behind us all, it is worthwhile to take a moment to reflect on the results from a disability perspective.
It is always absurdly difficult to get public and media attention focused on disability issues during an election campaign. It was even harder during this recent federal election, because the Donald Trump trade war with Canada sucked up much of the media oxygen.
Yet an election campaign should be the time when it is easiest to attract public attention to our issues. They concern the urgent and vital needs of millions of people. They are or should be non-partisan issues.
This is all the truer with this federal election. A CBC reporter told AODA Alliance Chair David Lepofsky last month that audience feedback to the “Ask CBC News” initiative revealed that there was a substantial audience interest in disability issues in the election. The general media failure to address these issues, with a few shining exceptions, constitutes a large institutional failure by the mainstream media and its reporters, editors and pundits.
We were proud that during this federal election, for the first time in memory, we got a national TV news report on disability issues. CBC’s The National included a detailed report on April 13, 2025. Also, several local media outlets published reports on disability issues in the election. But major outlets like CTV, Global News City TV, the Globe and Mail, the National Post, and the Sun newspapers left our issues out of their election coverage.
Two days before Voting Day, and well after millions of votes were cast at advance polls, the Toronto Star ran one article on the election’s disability issues. We set that article out below. It’s of course better late than never, but earlier would have been far preferred.
It is deeply troubling that of the three major national parties that won a number of seats in Parliament, none answered the AODA Alliance’s written request for election commitments. We heard nothing back from the Liberals, Conservatives, or NDP. Only the Green Party answered and commendably made the entire Accessible Canada Pledge that we were seeking.
This is hard to fathom, since the issues on which we sought commitments were ones on which all the major parties voiced strong commitments in debates in Parliament during the last government. These parties tried to show that they were stronger on disability issues than the other parties. When it came to turning that into election commitments, however, they were inexcusably unresponsive to us.
This of course does not mean that we can or should give up our efforts on these issues. Canada has a new Parliament with many new MPs. We have a new prime minister and will soon have a new Cabinet. The Liberals won a minority government and will need the support of at least one other party to get legislation enacted. We have lots to work with.
Let’s look positively on what we presented to Canadians during this election campaign, which occurred on the heels of what we presented Ontarians in the provincial election that came right before it. People with disabilities and their supporters advocated effectively when faced with back-to-back snap elections, called sooner than was necessary. The AODA Alliance was honoured to be part of the consortium that convened successful candidates’ debates on very short notice in both elections. It is a compelling argument that Donald Trump presents Canadians with an important issue, but it is not the only issue that our new Federal Government is obliged to effectively address.
We thank everyone who tried to raise disability issues in the two elections that have preoccupied us in the opening months of 2025. Let’s now look forward to the next steps in our campaign to make our society barrier-free for all people with disabilities.
You can review our non-partisan efforts during this federal election campaign on the AODA Alliance website’s Canada page.
We always welcome your feedback and your creative ideas. Write us at aodafeedback@gmail.com
MORE DETAILS
Toronto Star April 26, 2025
Originally posted at https://www.thestar.com/politics/federal/is-the-canada-disability-benefit-high-enough-what-the-major-federal-parties-are-saying-about/article_6c18d9bd-2e1c-4587-9bc9-7cc5c7f367e2.html
Is the Canada Disability Benefit high enough?
Activists lobby to raise payments above poverty line
Serena Austin Toronto Star
Working-age Canadians with disabilities are scheduled to receive their first Canada Disability Benefit payments this summer, but advocates say $200 a month isn’t enough.
“Our Parliament’s united commitment to end disability poverty by enacting the Canada Disability Benefit is a commendable goal, but the benefit they actually created falls miles short of what’s needed,” said David Lepofsky, who is blind and the chair of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance.
The Canada Disability Benefit Act, in place since 2024, aims to provide financial support for low- and modest-income working-age people with disabilities.
Ahead of Monday’s election, the AODA Alliance and 27 other disability organizations signed a letter urging the federal party leaders to make the “Accessible Canada Pledge,” ensuring the act lifts people with disabilities above the poverty line so they can afford clothing, food, transportation and shelter. So far, the Greens have made the pledge, but in its platform, the NDP has committed to doubling the benefit. The Conservatives and Liberals have plans to reform the Disability Tax Credit, which people need to be approved for to qualify for the benefit.
Asked about a potential minority government, NDP spokesperson Anne McGrath said in an email the party will continue to fight for the rights of people with disabilities, adding that “it’s because NDP MPs worked alongside people with disabilities and forced the Liberal government to act that we have this benefit in the first place.”
Lepofsky feels doubling the benefit is helpful, though “it doesn’t address the commitment that no person with a disability in Canada should ever live in poverty.”
As of 2022, 27 per cent of Canadians, or eight million people, 15 or older had one or more disabilities limiting them in daily life, according to the Canadian Survey on Disability. In the same year, Statistics Canada says 12.3 per cent of Canadians with a disability 15 and older lived below the poverty line.
The Canadian Down Syndrome Society is one of the groups that asked party leaders to make the pledge. Its website has a letter that users can fill out that advocates for increased Canada Disability Benefit payments, expanded eligibility and for the Disability Tax Credit to be reformed so people with lifelong disabilities will be automatically approved for the benefit, and so that the cost of professional assessments required to apply for the credit are covered.
“Most individuals with Down syndrome have a disability tax credit,” but the Society doesn’t want them to have to submit another application to get the Canada Disability Benefit, said executive director Laura LaChance.
The Liberals’ platform says they’ll review and reform the Disability Tax Credit’s application process, and consider expanding eligibility to other ailments. The Conservatives have said they would stream- line the tax credit to make eligibility for its related benefits automatic, renaming it a “Certification of Disability.”
LaChance also wants the next government to prioritize inclusive education and employment, building accessible housing and investing in research and resources to improve the health of people with disabilities.
The Liberals’ platform includes plans to make workplaces more accessible by boosting the Enabling Accessibility Fund, and incorporating more “barrier-free” designs in- to housing plans.
The pledge also asks leaders to ensure the “effective implementation” of the Accessible Canada Act to achieve a barrier-free country by 2040, and to ensure equal access to air travel. The act took effect in 2019 and calls for the development of voluntary accessibility standards which could then be adapted into mandatory regulations, but both Lepofsky and Marcia Yale, president of the Alliance for Equality of Blind Canadians, say progress has been lagging.
As of this April, Accessibility Standards Canada has 19 standards un- der development, and has recommended its standard for information and communication technologies products and services to the minister responsible for the Accessible Canada Act. So far, the only regulations in place under the act require organizations to publish and keep accessibility plans and progress reports, to make them available in different formats and to develop processes for accepting feedback.
“We have the Accessible Canada Act, but we’ve still got no regulations to tell federal bodies what they’re supposed to do and how they’re supposed to do it,” said Yale, who was born blind.
“Nothing is going to change until there is either the will to do it — and that’s very doubtful — or there’s regulations that say you must do it, or else.”