The Coalition is a provincial group advocating for people with disabilities on ODSP and considers the Social Assistance Review the most important opportunity in decades to improve ODSP so that people with disabilities can live with dignity. Unfortunately, the Coalition is increasingly worried that any restructuring that comes out of the review will be more about reducing the costs of ODSP than improving the lives of people with disabilities.

This Lobby Kit lays out the Coalition’s key messages to MPPs and also provides helpful lobbying tips and templates.

Download the full 18-page lobby kit:

• Coalition Lobby Kit – Word version
  
• Coalition Lobby Kit – PDF version

The Coalition has also created the following additional background materials for advocates to give to MPPs or distribute in their communities.

These materials can also be helpful when preparing for meetings with MPPs.

• Social Assistance Rates and Adequacy Backgrounder
  
• Key Messages Backgrounder
• Coalition’s Response to the Commission’s Options Paper (second discussion paper)
  
• Positive or Punitive?
• Coalition’s Responses to the Commission’s First Discussion Paper
• Dignity, Adequacy, Inclusion: Summary or Full Submission
• An Activation Agenda for ODSP: Summary or Full Submission

Here is ISAC’s complete submission in response to the discussion paper

La présentation est disponible en français ici

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Originally posted March 15:

Since the release of the Commission’s second discussion paper, ISAC has been reviewing the paper in detail to both provide information on what the paper says, and to craft the best response possible by the Commission’s March 16 feedback deadline.

To create a response that addresses the issues that affect groups that deal with the most disadvantage in our economy and in society, we’ve been working with partners in the community legal clinic system and community partners with concerns around the impact of social assistance on people with disabilities, women, members of racialized communities, and newcomers.

We are still hosting meetings with our community partners, but have reached the point at which we can share draft elements of our submission to the Commission. While some aspects of these documents may change, we hope that that they will be of assistance to others who are writing their own submissions to the Commission.

Please check this page frequently over the coming day or two for additions or updates:

• Introduction and Overview
• An Equity Approach to Employment Supports
• Redefining Income Tradeoffs
• Simplification and Adequacy
• Audits and Rule Changes
• Assets
• Program Delivery
• Interactions with Other Programs
• Program for People with Disabilities 

Positive or Punitive?

We must state at the outset that this kind of understanding of the needs and reality of life for people with disabilities did not come through in “Approaches for Reform”. We know from the companion document, “What We Heard”, that the Commission was told a lot about the barriers and stresses of dealing with disability and poverty. But most of the suggested changes discussed in the Commission’s second discussion paper do not reflect that understanding. Instead, they seem to put the burden of dealing with disability and health concerns, as well as with coping with societal, attitudinal, and environmental barriers, on people with disabilities themselves.

As one among many groups working to contribute to the Social Assistance Review process ongoing since early last year, we were dismayed to see the Drummond Commission weigh in so significantly on recommendations around social assistance.

One of the most troubling of Drummond’s recommendations is to limit annual spending growth in Ontario Works and the ODSP to 0.5% for the next six years.

If adopted by government, this low rate of growth will not only cause further despair for people whose incomes have been stalled far below the poverty line since 1998, it will indefensibly delay making the degree and range of investments in improving the social assistance system that we are all hoping will come out of the Social Assistance Review.

But just because Drummond says so, doesn’t make it true. The Doomsday scenario is not upon us yet.

Abandoning the Social Assistance Review process due solely to Drummond’s recommendations would be deeply counterproductive. Now is the time for people on social assistance, their advocates and allies to fight even harder for the kind of system that can and must be built in Ontario. But it’s going to take efforts in two distinct areas to get the job done.

It’s crucial to push back against the austerity agenda that the Drummond Commission represents. Cutting public services is the wrong way to respond to a deficit caused by the 2008 global economic crisis – which was generated by the reckless actions of bankers and financial speculators. Choosing austerity will hurt those Ontarians who are most vulnerable – including people on social assistance – and make a mockery of the government’s poverty reduction efforts. It also has the potential to slow economic growth in Ontario, making it even harder to get the province out of the financial doldrums.

Use resources online – like www.policyalternatives.ca/newsroom/updates/drummond-commission-report-countering-cutbacks-ontario from the CCPA – to give you the arguments you need. Phone, write to, or meet with your local MPP and tell them the austerity agenda is the wrong way to go.

But equally importantly, continue to engage in the Review process. Responding to the second Discussion Paper is critical. If we don’t engage, we have no ability to impact the outcome of the Review and the Commission’s final report and recommendations.

And getting the best recommendations possible from the Review is going to be essential. Government will have the final say on how to move forward with reforming social assistance. If we get good recommendations from the Review Commission, we have something positive to fight for on the political stage. But if the recommendations are bad, we lose a critical position from which to advocate for positive change.

Download It Doesn’t End with Drummond in Word.

In this webinar, Jennefer Laidley of the Income Security Advocacy Centre presents information that will help groups and individuals understand and respond to the Commission’s Options Paper.

The webinar explains where the review process is now and what some of the problems with the paper are, gives a brief overview of the current political and economic context, dissects the paper to construct a picture of what is actually being proposed, and goes through some of the implications.

Download the backgrounder that accompanies the webinar – “The Options Paper – Feb 16″

Information sheets referenced in the backgrounder are available below:

• Tax Delivered Income
• Moving Benefits Out of OW and ODSP

Download the webinar slides (in PDF) here

Watch the webinar below:

The Commission for the Review of Social Assistance in Ontario is expected to release an Options Paper in early February 2012 with options for reforming Ontario Works (OW) and the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP), followed by a very short period for public response and feedback. The options could have far-reaching implications for people on low incomes.

In this webinar series, Jennefer Laidley and Dana Milne of the Income Security Advocacy Centre (ISAC) present information on 3 different options expected in the paper and offer a variety of tools to help groups across Ontario organize consultations in their communities and make submissions.

The Options Paper was released before the third webinar – as a result, the third webinar addresses the content of the Options Paper directly.

The toolkit – the information and organizing package that accompanies all three of these webinars – can be downloaded here.

NOTE: We updated the toolkit after the Options Paper was released, and before Webinar 3. The updated toolkit is here.

1. Tax Delivered Income – Thursday, January 26

• Download the slides here (in PDF version): Webinar 1 – Tax delivered Income

• Watch the webinar below:

2. Moving Benefits outside OW and ODSP – Wednesday February 1

• Download the slides here (in PDF version): Webinar 2 – Moving Benefits Out

• Watch the webinar below:

3. Merging OW and ODSP – Monday, February 6

• Download the slides here (in PDF version): Webinar 3 – Merging OW and ODSP

• Watch the webinar below:

PLEASE USE THE LOBBY KIT AT THIS LINK INSTEAD

The ODSP Action Coalition has created a lobby kit for advocates to use in meetings with their MPPs on the Social Assistance Review.

The Coalition is a provincial group advocating for people with disabilities on ODSP and considers the Social Assistance Review the most important opportunity in decades to improve ODSP so that people with disabilities can live with dignity. Unfortunately, the Coalition is increasingly worried that any restructuring that comes out of the review will be more about reducing the costs of ODSP than improving the lives of people with disabilities.

This Lobby Kit lays out the Coalition’s key messages to MPPs and also provides helpful lobbying tips and templates.

Download the full 42-page lobby kit

• for a Word version click here
• for a PDF version click here

Or download individual parts of the lobby kit, depending on what you need:

Using the Lobby Kit

• Title Page and Table of Contents
• Why Lobby
• How to Use this Lobby Kit

Key Messages

• The Case for Adequacy in a Time of Austerity (Social Assistance Rates)
• Respect for People with Disabilities in the Social Assistance Review

Questions for MPPs

• Questions for Liberal MPPs
• Questions for NDP MPPs
• Questions for PC MPPs

Background Materials

• “Can” and “Cannot” Work is the Wrong Question
• Accommodation and AODA
• Mandatory Participation in Work-Related Activities
• Mandatory Treatment or Rehabilitation
• Special Diet
• Summary of the Coalition’s First Submission (Dignity, Adequacy, Inclusion)
• Summary of the Coalition’s Second Submission (An Activation Agenda for ODSP)

Meeting with your MPP

• Lobbying Key Messages and Personal Story Sheet
• Writing Your Local MPP Tipsheet
• MPP Letter Template
• Lobbying Tipsheet: Meeting with Your Local MPP

Follow-up

• After the Meeting: MPP Letter Template
• MPP Report Back Form

COP-COC sees the Review as an opportunity to improve access to income security for members of racialized groups – both Canadian born and immigrant communities, as well as other low-income Ontarians, and we hope to achieve this by ensuing that the particular experience of racialized and immigrant communities are being captured in the Review. Racialized communities and immigrant communities do not access social assistance the same way as do individuals from the rest of society.

To facilitate the participation by social assistance recipients from the various racialized communities (largely voices of peoples of colour) in the review, COP-COC – in partnership with its member organizations – undertook a series of activities with a view to gathering input from members of these diverse communities, especially those who have either accessed the social assistance system or have worked with individuals who do rely – or have relied – on social assistance.

The collective views of the individual social assistance recipients and organizational representatives form the basis of this COP-COC report and its recommendations, and are summarized in this report.

Download the Racialized Communities Consultations Report here

A number of groups across Ontario used the Guide to conduct workshops in their community, and wrote submissions to the Commission based on those workshops.

The submissions are below:

Across Boundaries

Algoma Community Legal Clinic and Sault Ste. Marie Community Soup Kitchen

Canadian Mental Health Association Grey Bruce Branch

Canadian Mental Health Association Toronto Branch (PDF)

Community Advocacy and Legal Centre – Belleville (PDF)

Community Living Tillsonburg

Parkdale Community Legal Services

Poverty Reduction Committee of Sarnia-Lambton and Community Legal Assistance Sarnia (CLAS) (PDF)

Regent Park Community Health Centre (PDF)

Toronto Drop In Network (PDF)

Voices for Change – Halton (PDF)

Western Ottawa Community Resource Centre

In addition, ISAC partnered with Ontario Campaign 2000 on the Bringing In Women’s Voices project.

Through this project, which was supported by the Ontario Trillium Foundation, workshops were held with low-income women in 10 communities across Ontario to help ensure that their voices – and especially those of lone mothers – are heard in the discussions around economic security, including in the Social Assistance Review.

You can read the Key Messages from this project here.

All submissions made to the Commission for the Review of Social Assistance are available on the Commission’s website:

http://www.socialassistancereview.ca/written-submissions.

Our submission sets out a vision for social assistance and an analysis of how the current programs support or undermine that vision. And while this submission references the Commission’s Discussion Paper, it does not follow the questions asked in the Commission’s Workbook. As we expect a robust consultation on program design options in the second consultation, we are instead focusing on what we see as the key policy issues for social assistance in Ontario.

In particular, this submission examines why the current Ontario Works (OW) program cannot reach objectives consistent with poverty reduction under its current policy framework. It will also look at the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP). While ODSP shares many of the same problems as OW with respect to financial eligibility, unlike OW it has promising legislative objectives that have been given effect in judicial decisions at the highest level. While these objectives have not been fully realized, the program nonetheless has some important features that should not be discarded but instead built upon.

We have developed our analysis based largely on the experience of our colleagues in the clinic system who work with recipients of OW and ODSP and the hurdles that they face every day. We have also worked closely with recipients of those programs through the ODSP Action Coalition, and several community development projects that have also acted as qualitative research into the issues that the Commission is grappling with.

While there are several discrete groups in disproportionate risk of poverty, our remarks in this submission focus particularly on the issues facing single mothers, newcomers, and members of racialized groups in the OW and ODSP systems. We understand that First Nations issues are being addressed through a separate consultation process, which we believe is appropriate in order to best address how Ontario’s income security programs can meet their unique needs.

Download the entire ISAC submission in Word here