Barrier Free Manitoba

Still Room for Significant Improvement

The time has passed for celebration of the historic tabling of the landmark accessibility-rights legislation. Now its time to step back, gather our best thoughts, focus our energies and ensure that the Bill is strong and effective enough to make our vision of an inclusive society a reality for all Manitobans.

Barrier-Free Manitoba has just completed our preliminary review of Bill 26. Our review has focused on three key criteria:

1. Consistency with the nine principles for this legislation developed by Barrier-Free Manitoba and endorsed widely within and beyond Manitoba’s disability community.
2. Clarity and rigour of requirements to ensure that the Bill is as effective and practical as possible in meeting the Government’s goal of achieving accessibility.
3. Durability to ensure timely and sustained progress by this and each successive provincial government and Minister responsible for implementing the new law.

We have found many wonderful things about the Bill. However, we have also found many areas where the Bill can and should be improved (click here for more information on the areas for improvement)

We will be developing a package of proposed amendments over the next short while. We look forward to sharing these with you in the near future.

In the interim, please read the findings from our review (Word / PDF) and provide us with your feedback and suggestions:

• What did we get right?
• What have we missed?
• What are the most important changes that are needed to Bill 26?

You can also view the Bill online by clicking here or download the PDF version. As the Bill is 25 pages long, we are pleased to post a brief one-page summary that has been developed by Government (Word / PDF).

We have also requested that the Government prepare a fuller plain language version of the Bill but have yet to hear back on what we think is a very reasonable request (it is a Bill about accessibility-rights, isn't it).

Barrier-Free Manitoba is a non-partisan, non-profit, cross-disability initiative. We have been working since 2008 to secure strong and effective accessibility-rights legislation in Manitoba.

Nearly 200,000 Manitobans with disabilities face barriers everyday that prevent their full participation in activities that most others take for granted.

These barriers harm individuals, families and communities. These barriers are also in fundamental conflict with the basic rights of persons with disabilities established in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and in federal and provincial human rights codes.

It’s the sad and unjust reality. But we are on the road to change it!

With the support of many, Barrier-Free 1.0 concluded with the passage of The Accessibility Advisory Council Act. Barrier-Free 2.0 represents the next stage of our work – the drive to the passage of substantive and landmark legislation that requires the timely removal of current barriers and the prevention of new ones.

It has been a rather exceptional journey to date. We invite you to join us along this rights path toward an inclusive Manitoba that ensures and celebrates opportunity and equity for all.