Why Does Ontario Need the AODA?
Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Strengthens Access
The AODA will force stakeholders to remove barriers by 2025. This proactive legislation will reduce the need to file complaints to enforce rights for Ontario's disabled.
Why do we need the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, especially when Ontario already has the Human Rights Code, a quasi-constitutional law that binds most other legislation and government to ensure equal treatment and accommodation for persons with disabilities? Further, does our Charter of Rights and Freedoms not further bind the Crown and other parties to treat persons with disabilities with equality?
While laws are in place to protect persons with disabilities from discrimination and harassment in the workplace, services and other areas of the community, nothing stops businesses, employers or other stakeholders from discriminating against persons with disabilities. If they discriminate, they do risk a complaint being filed with the Ontario Human Rights Commission, but there is little other enforcement other than through filing a complaint or a lawsuit – something that can be time-consuming and expensive for a person allegedly targeted by discrimination.
During the 2005 hearings for Bill 118, which eventually became passed as the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act in Ontario, the legislative committee charged with consulting individuals and organizations that wished to comment on this proposal learned that although we have laws on the books, the quality of life for persons with disabilities continues to be substantially less than optimal.
In its 2001 Participation and Activity Limitations Survey (published in 2007), Statistics Canada reports there were 815,930 working age Ontarians with disabilities. For example, it is learned that only 41.2% of persons with disabilities were employed, while 74.3% of persons without disabilities had employment. Among those with disabilities, 49.5% identified themselves as being ‘not in the paid labour force’, while only 19.1% of persons without disabilities stated the same thing.
Those with disabilities are also more likely to be working part-time than those without disabilities (22.7% versus 17.1%, respectively). Further, persons with disabilities are more likely to be working part-time, temporary, contract or otherwise, in non-permanent jobs. It has also been found that immediate family members of persons with disabilities (e.g. spouse, child) also tend to work fewer hours and are more likely involved in non-standard work with fewer benefits and legal protections than regular employment.
While persons with disabilities tend to be half as likely to hold a post-secondary diploma or degree, there are still a substantial number of persons with disabilities with college or university education. While the PALS survey did show that the better educated a person was, disabled or not, the more likely it would be that they were employed; however, higher education did not benefit those with disabilities as much as those without.
In 1998, the Canadian Council on Social Development (CCSD) showed that 51.8 per cent of men and 41.1 per cent of women with disabilities with post-secondary degrees were employed, while 82 per cent and 73 per cent of their respective counterparts without disabilities held jobs. Three years later, a Statistics Canada survey showed only 51 per cent of people with disabilities aged 25 to 54 were employed compared with 82 per cent of their able-bodied peers. Among those aged 55 to 64, 27 per cent of people with disabilities were employed compared with 56 per cent without disabilities.
The only indication these statistics show with respect to quality of employment appeared to be the number of those working who felt they were not applying their skills in their current job. In 2000, CCSD revealed that persons with disabilities of all ages were more likely than those without disabilities to feel overqualified for their job; however, the gap between both groups increased after the age of 35. After 35, 25.4% of persons with disabilities felt overqualified compared to 19.2 % of their non-disabled peers. This gap in accessing and maintaining quality employment for educated persons with disabilities has led to the formation of the Canadian Association of Professionals with Disabilities.
According to the 2005-2006 Annual Report of the Ontario Human Rights Commission, 54.11% of complaints filed with the Commission include disability as a ground of complaint, with the majority of these issues made with respect to employment. In response to this critical situation, the Ontario Government is hoping the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act will be part of the solution. This legislation will be a pro-active agent to remove barriers and in the process, possibly educate employers, transit providers, businesses and others about working with persons with disabilities.
