Human Resources Committee on Oct. 26th, 2022

[Mike Morrice, Green, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Will there also be an open round, as was mentioned at the beginning?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

It depends on how our time goes. The committee will have to agree.

[Mike Morrice, Green, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Okay, I'll get started. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My questions are about the urgency of this benefit and ensuring that the disability community is actively heard from throughout, in particular because there is limited or no support in Parliament for an emergency disability benefit.

Mr. Conrad, I appreciate that you mentioned urgency in some of your remarks earlier. You also mentioned a number of round tables that have been held since June 2021, which is good to hear, but what's also true is that the language of the bill is exactly the same as what we had in June 2021.

I'd like to understand better what you heard at those round tables. Did you not hear anything that merited inclusion? Why is it that, despite all that consultation, the bill is exactly the same?

[Krista Wilcox]

Thanks for that question.

There are two pieces to the answer. I can give you a sense of what we've heard so far, but I'll just remind the committee of what Mr. Conrad mentioned in terms of what's going on right now.

We did hold round tables, but there is also a really important engagement process with persons with disabilities that's happening and that we've provided funding for through the department. We're receiving right now and over the next months the results of that engagement process. I can give you a sense of what we've heard so far.

This is just a summary in terms of round tables and what we've heard from the funded projects.

We've heard about the despair that people with disabilities have in living in poverty and that really, the CDB has the potential to transform their lives and enable them to live with dignity, choice and freedom. We've heard that people are having to make tough choices between their basic needs and necessities such as buying groceries or paying their rent. They're living in unsafe conditions. They're taking expired medications.

We've heard that intersectionality impacts disability experience in accessing government programs and that marginalized populations face systemic racism. They have a discomfort or a mistrust of government authorities and there's medical racism and misdiagnosis in the system.

We've heard that they struggle with the costs associated with having a disability, including out-of-pocket expenses. They want the CDB to be equivalent to the amount of CERB. They don't want it to reduce other benefits.

They're concerned about the marriage penalty and would prefer to have income tested individually.

They want to move away from the medical model of disability.

They want to avoid creating new systems or adding complexity to existing systems. They want us to try to find a way to make this an automatic payment for persons with disabilities. They don't want to have an employment test. They want to have little, if any, asset testing.

They want us to fund community organizations that could support persons with disabilities in navigating the complex system of benefits for persons with disabilities. These could address some of the psychological barriers that people with disabilities face in applying for any benefits that could be created by this new benefit.

They don't want to have clawbacks of their existing benefits. They want to have a generous earnings exemption so that people with disabilities can continue to earn income in the labour market.

Those are some of the top messages—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mr. Morrice.

Ms. Chabot, it's over to you now for two and a half minutes.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

I have a question concerning section 3, which says that the purpose of this bill is " ...to reduce poverty and to support the financial security of working-age persons with disabilities."

Some of the groups of persons with disabilities that we met have been asking themselves a lot of questions. What do you mean by the expression "working-age"? Some pointed out that the way things are now, people who are 65, 66 or 67 years old could consider themselves employable. So it's not clear. Can you clarify this for us?

Not only that, but section 4 says: "A person is eligible for a Canada disability benefit if they meet the eligibility criteria set out in the regulations." But the regulations have not yet specified these eligibility criteria.

Would it be possible to have more specific details? Are you really conducting consultations with a blank slate or do you already have some amounts in mind? Have you determined what the minimum income threshold would be? Do you have any suggestions about what the expression "working-age" means? Do you have eligibility criteria to suggest so that we could discuss these rather than start from scratch?

[Krista Wilcox]

It's a great question. Thank you.

Working backwards, in terms of the approach to the engagement we've done so far, we've done it thematically. We've asked questions to provide the community with the opportunity to give us their perspective. As we get into the regulatory process, we will provide more detailed information that will enable us to engage more specifically on proposals for the regulations.

In terms of working age, you're right; it does not define it in the legislation. The intent, in terms of trying to target this population, is that there are benefits for children up to age 18 in Canada, through the Canada child benefit and the child disability benefit. There are benefits for seniors over the age of 65. The gap we are trying to fill is in that age group in between, where there are currently no federal benefits that are specifically targeted to that population, unless they've been in the workforce and have access to programs such as Canada pension disability or EI sickness, for example.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Ms. Wilcox.

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

We go to Ms. Zarrillo for two and a half minutes.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

I just have so many more questions. I was really hoping to get some confidence in today's messaging.

I'm going to follow up on what Madame Chabot just said. There was some testimony that this is going to fill the gap. I was looking at census data today, just around immigration and poverty levels for immigrant children, which are high.

I'm getting input every day from folks who are making a decision between eating more than one meal a day and taking their medication. It's frustrating to have a meeting like this and not get any more information.

My question is just about this lack of urgency. How are we going to deliver support to people before the three-year window, the two-year window, the one-year window? We don't even have an answer on how soon this is going to get rolled out. I'm looking for some sort of confidence that we're going to be supporting people in their worst times right now because I don't want to lose another person to MAID. I don't want another child to go hungry, or another mother.

Could you just give us some idea of how you're going to solve that in an urgent manner?

[Alexis Conrad]

I can't comment on other government programs that are ongoing. I obviously follow what's going on in terms of affordability programs that have been put forward.

Nothing about what we've said should suggest a lack of urgency. Persons with disabilities have been in the most precarious situations for far too long in Canada. The whole purpose of this benefit is to fix that. There is a heightened sense of urgency, which is why the government is doing this.

What I've tried to do is just lay out the steps we need to take and why we're doing them so that we get it right. As I said, the last thing anyone wants to do is accidentally harm people. In this kind of environment, if we do it wrong, we can have unintended consequences: either it gets them no further ahead or it puts them behind where they were. That is something I don't think any of us want.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Do I still have time, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

That concludes your two and a half minutes.

It also concludes the first round and the first hour that this session was scheduled for. As per the agreement, I now have to suspend.

Go ahead, Mr. Morrice.

[Mike Morrice, Green, Kitchener Centre, ON]

This is a brief question to you, Chair. As I'm not a member of the committee, do I need consent from the committee to receive the documents that were promised to various members? If so, can that be asked for? We heard a commitment about the engagement with provinces and territories, for example.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Is the committee agreeable that whatever documents are provided to the committee can be provided to Mr. Morrice?

I don't see anybody objecting. Mr. Morrice, whatever documents are provided to the committee from the officials will—

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Mr. Chair, I have a point of clarification. I'm sorry.

Were you referring to the public documents? Are they documents that would be in the public, or are they documents that would be coming to committee members?

Are these public documents? Is that what you're referring to?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

They'd be any documents that were asked for and that would be provided to the committee.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

They would be the tabled documents that would be provided only to the committee. Therefore, from a process standpoint, they should be for committee members only. It has nothing to do with the question.... I thought the member was referring to what was coming in from stakeholders, not the tabled documents that were....

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

We have to get unanimous consent. I do not see unanimous consent.

I have to suspend at this time, as per the agreement. I'm going to suspend the meeting for voting purposes, as we agreed to.

I did not see unanimous consent, Mr. Morrice.

Thank you.

The meeting is suspended. Let's vote, as we agreed.

[Proceedings continue in camera]