Thank you.
We hear about the notion of trickle-down economics. I can only say to you, it trickles down maybe to some, but it ain't trickled down to us.
Some of you worry about the coming recession. We all ought to be concerned about that, but we've never known anything but recessionary times. I hate to tell you that, but that's the reality.
Part of this involves changing the climate. That means fighting the discrimination and isolation that has been our reality. That should include reinstating funding for the court challenges program that was recently cut by the current government. It means focusing on the various pillars of the national economic strategy; they involve employment and employability, they involve training, they involve transportation, and they involve mobility. They involve lots of things.
Looking at employment alone is not the answer. Employment is one aspect of a much broader problem that confronts blind, deaf and blind, and otherwise disabled Canadians. We have to develop a strategy that looks beyond simply employment. Employment is not simple--I'm not suggesting it is--but only by looking at the issue in a broader context do we have any chance to address the problem that has been our nightmare.
In a country as affluent as Canada, the unemployment and underemployment rate of disabled Canadians is a national disgrace that cries out for redress.
Thank you.