Evidence of meeting #70 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was deaf.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Ed Komarnicki
Mr. McColeman, your time is up. We'll let Mr. Cudmore answer, and Mr. Roots if he wishes.
Go ahead.
Executive Director, Prince Edward Island, Canadian Paraplegic Association
It depends on the corporation and the culture of the corporation. To tell you the truth, it depends on, say, whether a person in charge knows someone with a disability or has someone with a disability in his family and understands the disability a bit. Then that person can change the culture of the organization. If it's left up to goodwill, it just won't happen.
Executive Director, Spinal Cord Injury Canada
I'd just add that the project we're presenting here today, that we're calling the Discovering the Power in Me program.... Basically we have a bank that's interested in the project, interested in investing in it and bringing it forward. They like the concept. The idea is that we're working on this through the social bond concept to develop some type of partnership between us, this organization, and the federal government in order to deliver on that program.
I think there is an opportunity there. As to the extent that they want to engage, I don't know, but there is a willingness.
President, Canadian Association of the Deaf
My concern is that this is a government program; it's top down. As our example has proven, those who need the power and resources, those who need to manage the project, are the disabled people themselves—not government people, not bureaucracy. To put it crudely, give us the money, good-bye, we will spend it, we'll make all the jobs and report back to you. That's the way it works.
Conservative
NDP
Mike Sullivan NDP York South—Weston, ON
Yes, although my name card here reads “Ryan Cleary”. I just noticed that—
Conservative
NDP
Mike Sullivan NDP York South—Weston, ON
I'm not from Newfoundland.
To start with, my question is for all of you. The nature of work in Canada and in the world has changed in the past 15 to 30 years. Many jobs are now contract jobs, short-term, and cyclical, and we have not changed our income support structures to match those jobs.
This will affect persons with disabilities and persons of a different linguistic group more dramatically than it will others. For example, the EI structure, the Canada Pension Plan structure, old age security, which is now two years later for persons with disabilities, and the provincial disability programs don't talk to one another, and they are not conducive to supporting persons with disabilities. What would you do to change that?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Ed Komarnicki
Go ahead, Mr. Cudmore, if you're going to comment. You and then Mr. Roots can comment.
Conservative
Executive Director, Prince Edward Island, Canadian Paraplegic Association
Especially with contract work, it's very limiting for a person with a disability. If you have a base income support that you're surviving on, and you can go back to work but it's a contract position, you're not sure what's going to happen after that. It's a disincentive to take that job.
A lot of the time, if you leave, especially if you have an insurance program, it's hard to get back to the income level you were at before. With a contract, maybe you're not provided with insurance within that company to provide for your medical needs. Then you're not getting all the benefits you would need as well to support your disability. It's really a disincentive for you to go to work.
It's true that the programs have to change so that they encourage people to get out and work and then accept you back in if that position fails. You need a safety net there in order for people to pursue employment.
President, Canadian Association of the Deaf
I don't think we're likely to ever go back to the kind of employment situation we had in the past, when we had long-term, permanent jobs for life. But this is one more reason why people are moving more and more toward self-employment: they can control their own fate that way.
I can tell you that if you ever go to the Internet and google something like “deaf videos”, you will be absolutely stunned at the sheer volume of videos being made out there by deaf people, because we can see with signing now, and we don't have to rely on people talking. We can see and we can communicate with each other. There are millions out there, and, really, the potential for growth there is just amazing. If you can get sponsors or corporate sponsors involved in these things, they'd realize what's going on out there. Some 65 million people around the world are deaf, and they're all on the Internet. They're all searching for deaf videos.
NDP
Mike Sullivan NDP York South—Weston, ON
My next question is specifically for Mr. Roots.
The government indicates so far that a large part of their view of the problem is that it's an issue of education for employers and that enlightened employers will in fact hire people.
I'm aware of an employer who I dealt with for many years in eastern Ontario who employed a significant number of deaf people. I think it was in the order of 20 people in a workforce of about 70 or 80. Those people worked at the very bottom of the financial ladder in that workplace, though, and made very little money. When the enlightened employer was relocated, the next manager didn't have the same kind of loyalty. He discovered that he could find workers to do the work cheaper. He outsourced the work and all those deaf people lost their jobs.
Is merely enlightening employers enough to counteract the corporate greed that goes on in this country?
Conservative
President, Canadian Association of the Deaf
I'm not clear on what the question is.
NDP
Mike Sullivan NDP York South—Weston, ON
Yes. Is merely enlightening employers enough or is more needed?
President, Canadian Association of the Deaf
Well, we've had employment equity legislation for, what, 30 or 35 years now? What kind of a dent has it really made? Not much.
Coercion doesn't work. Volunteerism doesn't work; we know that.
I really don't have a simple answer to that. What we've tried up to now has not worked.
It's interesting that you mentioned that company in eastern Ontario, because Boeing, in Winnipeg, for many, many decades was a fantastic employer for deaf people. They hired many, many deaf people to work in their noisier areas, and they did a great job.
But when Boeing started cutting down, who was the first to go? I don't know how many deaf people were thrown out of work over the past two years when Boeing downsized, but there were over 20, I know that. They are an enlightened employer, and yet it didn't stop them from cutting deaf people first.
Conservative
Conservative
Colin Mayes Conservative Okanagan—Shuswap, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses for being here today.
I know we're talking about employment opportunities and seeing how we can assist in making those opportunities more available in the Canadian economy, but one of the issues we've dealt with at this committee, in looking at skills training, is preparing young people to get the skills training.
I'm wondering if your organizations reach out to younger people with disabilities to give them ideas of the opportunities there might be, so that they can be looking at some sort of training where they could enter the workforce with their disability. Are there any programs that support that assistance?
Mr. Cudmore, perhaps you can answer that first, and then Mr. Roots.
Executive Director, Prince Edward Island, Canadian Paraplegic Association
That would be a great project for us to do, and to make a funding application for to the federal government.
We do work closely with the transition coordinator who works with high schools and into university and post-secondary education. She deals with all people with disabilities. She has transition meetings, and she has member groups from all of our organizations come in.
If we're dealing with someone with a mobility issue, or with autism or whatever the case may be, we'll be there to let the person know what opportunities are available for them in the community and what training there is. But it's not an official skills program, and there's a real need for that. I think it's a need for employers too. They could have somebody, an ombuds-type person, go out and actually do the awareness training.
Some people call it sensitivity training, but I couldn't care less if you're sensitive; I'd just like you to be aware of disability and of what people can do in your organization. There really needs to be that, because it would answer a lot of questions about how to really take corporations and make them sensitive or make them aware of the abilities that people with disabilities have.
You actually do need to have somebody go out and physically do that.