Human Resources Committee on Dec. 6th, 2018

[Tammy Yates]

What we envisioned was describing it as units, so rather than having 15 weeks for the year, you have 175 units, let's say, hypothetically, whatever that may look like. Then when you do have an episode or you don't have an episode, you still know that you have this number of units for the rest of the year.

I'm sure the corollary question is whether the units will then be rolled over into another year in the same way that you have leave benefits from your employer. For example, on my staff, you have a certain number of days, but if they roll over and you have an episode, then you can actually take a longer—

[John Barlow]

I'm almost out of time. What would be a unit? Is that a measure of time or days? Can you tell me how you came up with that number and what a unit is?

[Tammy Yates]

That's a very long conversation, so I'll send that to you in the full submission.

[John Barlow]

You can't give five seconds' worth?

[Tammy Yates]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you so much.

[John Barlow]

Could somebody else ask that question, please?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Yes, we can get that in this submission. Thank you.

Go ahead, MP Sangha, please.

[Ramesh Sangha, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Thanks, everyone, for your very valuable input. Again, I'm coming back to the definition only because you know we want a definition that can assist the committee, as we have already discussed.

Questions were asked by my colleague Mr. Morrissey, and he brought it very close to the definition that we wanted for who is to be granted and who is not to be granted.

Madam Adele, you have already said that it is an operationalized model and regionalized model, decided upon on a regional basis.

When a disabled person fills out the form and the application goes to the department, we want the form to be easy because it should not trap people. It should be transparent. That's what you say, Maureen.

Once an officer is deciding on that, after going through the form, what are the factors that he has to look into so that he's not easily giving it to everyone but he's also not adding more restrictions so that it looks as if bureaucratic persons are refusing everyone. At the stage where you want a flow of disability entitlement, what are the qualifications, actually? What is the definition? How do you decide what should be granted and what should not be granted? Do you want to see a doctor's note? Do you want to see some experts or specialists, those who have studied the patients? What should be the criteria he or she should use? Who is the person deciding there? What is he or she thinking?

[Adele Furrie]

There are a number of things that I'm chomping at the bit to tell you.

There are three reports that have come out over the last three years that would be great source documents for you to review.

One is a document I prepared for Employment and Social Development Canada. It was a summary of all the income support programs that were in place for people with disabilities. It explored the definition, as well as the application and appeals processes. I don't know the name of it, but I can give it to Elizabeth, the analyst.

The second was a really good report called “Leaving Some Behind: What Happens When Workers Get Sick”, produced by IRPP, the Institute for Research on Public Policy. It has an excellent overview of the support programs for people with disabilities.

The third is a report I did for the federal-provincial-territorial working group on disabilities. It covered some of the same information, but with a broader scope. We looked into what is a short-term disability, what is a moderate disability, what is an episodic disability, and so on. I did an international scan, as well as a scan of the programs available in the provinces and territories. To me, those are three good resource documents for the committee to have access to.

[Tammy Yates]

If I could add to that, Adele, I don't know if you recall that maybe three or four years ago the Ontario government actually had a report prepared as well, on short- to medium-term and episodic disabilities, specifically in the workplace.

[Adele Furrie]

I did that. The Ontario government funded it, but it was for part of the three-year research plan that this advisory committee was putting together to feed into the whole discussion of episodic disabilities.

[Maureen Haan]

At CCRW, we believe it's very important that everybody has the right to work. We have to do whatever we can in order to get people into employment. We need to start from the understanding that people want to work, and then design the system around that, instead of assuming that people don't want to work and want to stay on assistance.

[Ramesh Sangha, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

Okay, but there are people who don't want to work and want to just take advantage of the system by sitting at home. What do you suggest as the definition of “severe”? How severe should it be, and then do you want it to be prolonged? How long is prolonged?

As you have suggested, Adele, there should be a review of the system every so often. What do you suggest in that definition of severe and prolonged?

[Adele Furrie]

“Severe and prolonged” does not reflect episodic disability. It's severe when it's happening, but “prolonged” implies that it's going to last for a long period of time. That's not episodic.

[Ramesh Sangha, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

Would you provide all three documents, please?

[Adele Furrie]

Yes, I'll do that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you.

MP Falk is next, please.

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Thank you so much for being here.

Maureen, I found your testimony quite interesting. My mom has spent her whole career working with people with developmental disabilities. She worked at home with them, helping with day-to-day activities. Then, as she moved along, she ended up job-coaching. She would find them employment, help them build a resumé and just help with skills that would be useful in the workplace. Employers love having people like this come in and work for them, because they bring something different to the team, right? I found your testimony quite interesting.

There is something I wanted to ask you. You mentioned that people with episodic disabilities need an advocate or the ability to advocate for themselves. I'm just wondering: In your experience, who is usually doing the navigation and the advocacy for a person with an episodic disability?

[Maureen Haan]

That's a really good question.

It depends. It depends on what system you're talking about. If you're talking about going into the work system, then through the workforce development agreements there are a number of federal-provincial funded agencies that work. There are also some at a federal level through the opportunities fund that do direct services for work. With regard to navigability around support networks, it's a hodgepodge, and it depends on where people land.

When I sit on the CPPD round table, there are people with lived experience there, and they all talk about the struggles that they had to finally find an advocate who could help them navigate the system to get into CPPD. There isn't one that I know of.

[Dr. Monique Gignac]

I'll just add very quickly that when we talk to people—thousands of people—they say that there is no one, that they're on their own, reinventing the wheel. Again, they don't necessarily define themselves as people with disabilities, but they don't know where to begin or who to go to.

[Dr. Emile Tompa]

Yes. Because of the stigma that people have mentioned too, they don't necessarily want to disclose, so they take advantage of whatever kinds of opportunities you have within.... If they are working, they might take advantage of the flexibility the work might offer through regular sick days, flexible work hours or things like that.

[Tammy Yates]

I want to add, just echoing in terms of the stigma of labelling disability, that people self-navigate, and then that cascades their conditions even further. They're already trying to navigate living with these conditions, and then they have to navigate self-stigma, as well as the discrimination that exists.

We keep talking about those who may not want to work almost like a deficit perspective. We keep talking about those who may take advantage of the system. Right now, there are millions of people who want to work—

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Sure.

[Tammy Yates]

—who will add to our GDP and who will add income. As for all of the people living with disabilities generally, the statistics that have just come out demonstrate how many people who want to work are not working, people who would actually contribute to pensions, contribute to EI and so on. When you do a cost-benefit analysis, you can see that we actually are costing ourselves money right now.