Mr. Speaker, I wish I could answer the member's question, but I cannot because I did not get that information. However, I will say from personal experience that people with emotional disabilities had the most difficulty qualifying for Canada pension disability and also for the disability tax credit. When someone has an emotional disability an x-ray cannot be taken of it to show the problem.
It is so difficult to define it and difficult for people with emotional disabilities to convince the authorities that they have a disability. It is the most difficult type of disability to qualify for and it is difficult for people to go through this process. When people with emotional disabilities receive these government forms, demands, appeals and rejections, they cannot handle it. They already have an emotional problem in many cases.
In my experience people with physical disabilities end up with an emotional disability as well because they cannot contribute to their families any more, they cannot work or contribute to their communities. This must be taken into consideration. We throw all these hurdles in front of them and make it more difficult for them to receive the Canada pension disability as well as the disability tax credit. I know that we must have rules and parameters, but it seems to me that we throw more hurdles in their way than we do trying to reach out to help people with disabilities.
There is a third disability that eventually affects almost all people with disabilities. First of all, they start with a physical disability and end up with an emotional disability because they cannot contribute. Then they end up with a financial disability because they cannot work.
I refer to the man that was run over by a train in 1979. He cannot contribute. He cannot earn a living and his disability tax credit was taken away after having received it since 1979. He has now been informed that he is no longer disabled. The man has a sense of humour. He looked down and said, “My legs are gone, but I have a letter saying I am no longer disabled”. God bless the man for having a sense of humour and being able to handle that, but what the government has done is wrong.
In answer to the member's question, there is no way to tell how many of these people are emotionally disabled and how many are physically disabled, but often they are both.