Accessibility to the parliamentary process is one of the most fundamental rights of a citizen of this country, and there is no group that is more disadvantaged or faces more barriers and more obstruction that people with disabilities and their advocates, which they themselves often are. People with lived experience are a critical part of the way in which evidence is produced and experience is understood, and policy needs to be developed and needs to change.
I think a parliamentary committee studying the issue of disability that makes the barriers and the obstructions so much more of a challenge to allowing those voices to be present around the table and to provide evidence and experience is creating, quite literally, a barrier to democracy and a barrier to people's civil rights and liberties being pursued. In particular because one of the people who has spoken about this is a strong advocate for seniors, who often face even more challenges with disabilities because of age and because of barriers, I would strongly and hopefully urge the opposition—in this case, the Conservative members—to reconsider the advantages that would be gained, the experiences that would be seen, and the voices that would be heard by reaching out and moving towards people with disabilities, as opposed to making them march to Ottawa.
I will be very frank with you. The disability community is watching this very closely and understands exactly who puts barriers to participating in their way.