Barrier Free Manitoba

Minister Jennifer Howard, along with the Province of Manitoba, made a range of initial announcements regarding the Accessibility Advisory Council on Friday, December 2nd. We are pleased to provide you with an overview:

The News Release: The government issued a press release on Friday providing background on the Council, announcing the appointment of it's 12 members and re-confirming that recommendations for accessibility-rights legislation are one of the Council's first tasks.

The news release also announced that a new website (see below) has been developed to keep the public informed about the ongoing discussions of the Council, as well as future opportunities for community involvement.

The New Website: The new Council website also went live on Friday. Significant content on the website includes:

Terms of Reference: These set out the basic rules of engagement (including mandate and guiding principles) for the Council. The terms include two important commitments related to public access, as well as guidelines on conflict of interest:

• Summaries of discussions at meetings will be posted on the site within 14 days of each meeting.
• The Council will hold community-based open houses to invite public feedback as they work to develop recommendations.
• The conflict of interest guidelines are very general making it difficult to assess how or when a member's personal, professional or employment interests might conflict with matters before the Council.

Profiles of Council Members: Short biographies are provided for each of the 12 Council members. The profiles describe member experience/interests related to disability issues and their organizational affiliations. The combined qualifications of members are very impressive. Points of particular note are:

• The 12th member just recently appointed is Karen Pirnie, representing the Manitoba Council of Aging.
• The representational responsibilities of members remain unclear. This is of particular concern as any group with a representative can block consensus on recommendations for strong and effective legislation.
• It is not clear if the Manitoba Human Rights Commission is or is not formally represented on the Council (the short list of members cites the Commission, the profiles of members with the longer bios do not).

Summaries of Discussions: The discussion summary from the Council's first meeting held on November 15th is already posted.

• This and future summaries will provide a window into the Council's work, deliberations and progress. The effective accountability and transparency provided by the summaries, however, will depend on the level of detail provided.
• The Council has scheduled semi-monthly meetings (except for the month of December) through to the end of April 2012.
• The next discussion summary (from the second meeting) is scheduled to be posted on or before December 13th.

Invitation for Comments: The site invites the pubic to send questions, comments or concerns regarding the Council to the following e-mail address accesscouncil@gov.mb.ca.

The new website also states that it will post information on future public consultations or calls for public comment.

Barrier-Free Manitoba very much welcomes the release of this information. The details are very promising and suggests that the government is serious about tackling the systemic reform required to make Manitoba a leader in promoting and protecting the rights of persons with disabilities.

Clearly there is a lot of hard work ahead - for those concerned with disability rights and particularly for the Council - to move this agenda forward.