Thank you for the question. It's something the March of Dimes has as a priority—identifying those barriers and working to dismantle them with the federal government over the last several years.
I think the biggest one we hear about all the time is access to government programs and services. The disability tax credit is the gateway to many very helpful financial security programs. That tax filing is also a barrier we've found. A lot of barriers have to do with trust in government to empower, enable and facilitate organizations like mine and many others you've heard from over the last several meetings, and I think we'll hear from them again, later in the hour. It's such a challenge to take up the benefits and the programs and services that are available to people.
We know this because accessible services are being worked on. We see it at the CRA. We see it at Service Canada. They've identified this need and this barrier, but progress is very slow. In Ontario, if you are a single person with a disability who is receiving provincial disability income support and you file a DTC, it's worth over $1,850 to you to do that in federal- and provincial-level benefits. That's about a month and a half of ODSP in Ontario.
Breaking down and dismantling the barriers people have—we enumerated these in our “A Benefit without Barriers” report—are very important parts of enabling accessibility to public programs and services.