Disability poverty: F for feds
December 5, 2024
Canada has received a failing grade in the 2024 Disability Poverty Report Card for its inadequate efforts to address disability poverty.
The 2nd annual report card, released Dec. 3 in in recognition of the International Day for Persons with Disabilities (IDPD), was co-authored by the advocacy group Disability Without Poverty and Campaign 2000, a non-partisan, pan-Canadian network of 120 national, provincial and community partner organizations committed to working to end child and family poverty, hosted by Family Service Toronto.
The report underscores how current measures fail to address the root causes of disability poverty in Canada and highlights the urgent need to strengthen the Canada Disability Benefit to ensure it delivers meaningful support and significantly reduces poverty among people with disabilities.
“Today’s report card underscores the failure of the federal government to address disability poverty,” said Rabia Khedr, National Director of Disability Without Poverty. “A $200 Canada Disability Benefit is inadequate. We are calling on the government to triple the benefit in 2025. This will be a better start toward ending disability poverty.”
The report card finds people with disabilities experience disproportionately higher rates of poverty. There is a trend across most indicators of rising poverty rates and deeper levels of poverty in 2021 and 2022 after significant reductions in 2020.
Visit https://www.disabilitywithoutpoverty.ca/ to read the full report card and principles/recommendations.