Barrier Free Manitoba

Following is the contents of Liberal Leader Jon Gerrard's September 14th blog commenting on the Second Reading of Bill 26: The Accessibility for Manitobans Act.

The Accessibility for Manitobans Act is good, but not good enough. This bill should have set a date when all newly constructed buildings in this province will be fully accessible.

On Thursday this week, on the second last day of the Legislature Session, I spoke on second reading of Bill 26, The Accessibility for Manitobans Act. It has taken a long time to get this far. The bill is good, but not good enough. It should have set a target for when all newly constructed buildings in Manitoba will be fully accessible. My speech is below. For those who are interested in presenting at Committee Stage on this bill, you should call 204-945-3636 to the Clerk's office to get on the list of presenters.

Hon. Jon Gerrard (River Heights): Mr. Speaker, this bill, Bill 26, The Accessibility for Manitobans Act, you know, is being presented by the NDP government.

I want to, first of all, say that I have for many, many years been a very, very strong supporter of improved access for people with disabilities, whether that's physical or mental disabilities. In many speeches that I've given, in many blog notes that I've posted, in what I have done both as a Member of Parliament, as an MLA, this has been a major and important cause that I have strongly supported.

I have seen over the last 14 years how slowly, in fact, this government has often moved. We had, I think it was about four years ago, a big campaign because this government, for 10 years, was all talk with very little action. And that campaign and the effort by many people in the disability community finally put enough pressure–plus the pressure that I and others were providing in this Legislature and outside the Legislature to act–have finally given us legislation which may start to move the process forward.

This bill is about the process but, Mr. Speaker, I want to point out that there is a major problem with this bill, and that major problem is this: that there is no target, there is no goal. This is a government which has set in place a process but has not set a target. You know, when Kennedy in the 1960s said, we are going to go to the moon in this decade, he said we're going to set a target. We're going to go for the moon. We're not going to set standards for O-rings and hope that we can get to the moon at some point. He said we're going to set a standard. We're going to set a target.

This bill should have included a target that all newly constructed buildings in this province should–would be fully accessible by 2018, 2020, 2025, 2030? It could be any of a number of dates, but we need that target, and we need the time to get to that target, to implement it and make sure that buildings, as a starting place, are fully accessible to all.

We don't have that now. We have not had it in the last 14 years of this government. We still don't have a target. This bill has a major, major deficiency because it doesn't have that target. Now, I'm going to vote for this bill because I think that any step in terms of improving the process and moving in this direction is positive, but I would hope that when this comes to committee stage, there are others there who will take up the call and say, this bill is not good enough. We need a target. We are not, in 2013, going to accept this bill alone without at least a major target of when we're going to have every newly building–new building constructed in this province fully accessible.

We can do that. It requires planning but people with disabilities should no longer be in the position that when they become disabled as they age, they are not able to go into or use their own home. They're not able to go into or use some public buildings. It's time that we set a target and a target for new construction and a target further down the road for the conversion of older construction. But we need to set that standard. We need to set that target. This bill is not good enough. It needs to be amended. It needs to have a target.

I'm going to say a couple more things. One is the importance of recognizing people with mental disabilities and that they have barriers just as people with physical disabilities do, and I hope we have people coming forward who have mental disabilities who will explain and help people understand what those barriers are and how we can overcome them.

The last point I want to make is that accessibility is not just about legislation. It's about the whole compendium of programs that a government put forward. It's very hard to have faith in a government which talks accessibility and then doesn't provide the shelter rates at a level that people don't have to use the food money from their kids in order to contribute to the rent. It is shameful what is happening in this province by this government in 2013. That we are having shelter rates which are so low that people must take the money for basic nutrition and food from their kids in order to pay for their rent in order to survive. This is no longer tolerable and that is something that this government also needs to change. Thank you.