(Queen’s Park) – MPP Randy Hillier joined the debate this week to address continued burdens placed upon our province’s most vulnerable with the McGuinty Government’s Bill 77, Services for Persons with Developmental Disabilities Act, 2008. Hillier pointed out that with this Bill the Government adds nothing for those with disabilities, instead entrenching wait times in law and legislating warrantless entry, all while eroding privacy rights and eliminating Ministerial accountability.
During the debate Hillier shared the concerns of his constituents, referencing the Community Forum on Disability Services he hosted earlier in the year. “During my community forum in Lanark County it was presented that 234 people are on a wait list for residential services; 273 people are on a wait list for program services, and of those 273, 134 are children and another 142 people are on wait lists for day program support services.” Hillier pointed this out during the September 25th debate. “We have wait times. Now, instead of just being unacceptable and intolerable that we have wait times, they will be legislated as acceptable. I find this totally reprehensible, that the government intends not to fund, not to provide and not to protect those most in need, and is willing to entrench its mediocrity in legislation,” Hillier charged.
Warrantless entry remains in the bill, meaning Ontarians with disabilities are asked to sacrifice their rights for security, and establishing them with a “diminished class” of citizenship, Hillier believes.
“A government's role is to provide protection and not to abrogate the rights of its citizens, least of all its most vulnerable citizens. This idea that because someone is disabled they no longer have the protection of privacy that we all enjoy is the reality this Bill presents. The disabled have no privacy under this legislation,” Hillier asserted.
“Minister Meilleur has taken a ‘hands-off’ approach, creating arms-length arrangements where really any minister of this portfolio will be able to sit back and say, ‘I'm only responsible for funding, you have to deal with others for services’. Over the last number of years politicians and government are willing to abdicate ownership and responsibility to the citizens of this province, and this Bill serves to provide absolutely no legislative accountability,” Hillier concluded.
