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37th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION

Sub-Committee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Tuesday, April 16, 2002

1540

The Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.))

Mr. Robin McLay (Director, Governance and Social Policies Division, Canadian International Development Agency)

The Chair

Mr. Robin McLay

1545

1550

The Chair

Mr. Robin McLay

The Chair

Mr. Adrian Norfolk (Acting Director, Multilateral Affairs, Human Rights, Humanitarian Affairs and International Women's Equality Division, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade)

The Chair

Mr. Adrian Norfolk

1555

The Chair

1600

Mr. Tony Tirabassi (Niagara Centre, Lib.)

The Chair

Ms. Diane Richler (Executive Vice-President, Canadian Association for Community Living)

1605

1610

The Chair

Mr. Laurie Beachell (National Coordinator, Council of Canadians with Disabilities)

Mr. David Shannon (Member, Council of Canadians with Disabilities)

1615

Mr. Steve Estey (Member, Council of Canadians with Disabilities)

Mr. David Shannon

1620

Mr. Steve Estey

Mr. David Shannon

1625

Mr. Steve Estey

1630

Mr. David Shannon

1635

Mr. Steve Estey

The Chair

Ms. Joan Westland (Individual Presentation)

1640

1645

The Chair

Mr. Michael Bach (Vice-President, Canadian Association for Community Living)

1650

1655

The Chair

Mr. Tony Tirabassi

Mr. Laurie Beachell

1700

The Chair

Ms. Joan Westland

1705

The Chair

Mr. Adrian Norfolk

Ms. Diane Richler

The Chair

1710

Mr. Robert Lanctôt (Châteauguay, BQ)

1715

The Chair

Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP)

The Chair

Ms. Nancy Karetak-Lindell (Nunavut, Lib.)

1720

The Chair

Mr. David Shannon

1725

The Chair

Mr. Laurie Beachell

Ms. Diane Richler

1730

Mr. Steve Estey

Mr. Michael Bach

1735

The Chair

Ms. Joan Westland

1740

Mr. Michael Bach

Mr. Adrian Norfolk

1745

Mrs. Kirsten Mlacak (Deputy Director, Human Rights and Social Policy Branch, Canadian International Development Agency)

The Chair

Mr. Adrian Norfolk

The Chair

CANADA

Sub-Committee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

NUMBER 020

1st SESSION

37th PARLIAMENT

EVIDENCE

Tuesday, April 16, 2002

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

¹ (1540)

[English]

The Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.)): We will call the meeting to order.

We welcome all our friends, and our new friends, from CIDA and the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

As you know, today we are hoping to look at the issue of Canada and the international disability community, or the Canadian disability community and international affairs, or all the toing and froing of all of this.

We have Robin McLay, Donna Schwartzburg, and Kirsten Mlacak from CIDA, and then Adrian Norfolk from DFAIT.

Mr. McLay

Mr. Robin McLay (Director, Governance and Social Policies Division, Canadian International Development Agency): Okay. Well--

The Chair: Do you know all these other wonderful people? Maybe I should do that first.

We have Tony Tirabassi and Robert Lanctôt. Mado Dalphond-Guiral is travelling, as is Anita Neville. We have Michael Bach from the Canadian Association of Community Living, Laurie Beachell from Council of Canadians with Disabilities, David Shannon, ditto, Steve Estey, ditto, and Joan Westland, one of our favourite alumni. And Diane Richler is here too, the executive vice-president of the Canadian Association for Community Living.

Okay, carry on.

Mr. Robin McLay: Okay.

I'm with CIDA as director of the governance and social policies division. With me here today are Donna Schwartzburg, who's the senior program analysis with the non-governmental organizations division of our canadian partnership branch, and Kirsten Mlacak, deputy director of human rights and social policy within my division at the policy branch of CIDA.

The Canadian International Development Agency's primary goal is to reduce poverty in developing countries. The purpose of Canada's official development assistance is to support sustainable development in developing countries in order to reduce poverty and to contribute to a more secure, equitable, and prosperous world. CIDA's aid program amounts to approximately $1.7 billion for fiscal year 2001-2002. CIDA provides assistance to more than 120 countries through a range of program instruments, including more than 3,000 projects.

CIDA's approach to poverty reduction with respect to specific groups, such as persons with disabilities, is to promote activities aimed at equality and full participation in economic, political, social, and cultural development. In these fields of activity CIDA aims to address the conditions of poverty and exclusion confronting persons with a disability, as well as to empower and provide services for people with disabilities by supporting the skills, training, and capacity building activities of organizations of disabled persons.

CIDA's programming in support of persons with disabilities in developing countries addresses a range of issues, including human rights, equalization of opportunities, capacity development for individuals, families, and organizations, barrier-free design, prevention, and rehabilitation. CIDA also contributes to initiatives designed to reduce the incidences of preventable disabilities stemming from illness or injury, including injury due to land mines. For example, CIDA is supporting Inclusion International's “Building Inclusive Futures” project to strengthen the capacity of persons with a disability and permit their families to contribute to the development of policies that affect their inclusion, including the development of a global network to share knowledge about disability issues.

In India, with the participation of the Roeher Institute, the National Resource Centre for Inclusion has been established with the Spastic Society of India, Mumbai. The centre includes a policy research and change unit to support inclusive education for children with disabilities, a demonstration resource centre to examine and develop pedagogical practices on inclusion, and a public education, social, and community development unit to raise awareness about inclusion and to empower persons with disabilities and their families.

The disability rehabilitation project initiative by Queen's University's International Centre for the Advancement of Community-Based Rehabilitation aims to introduce the concept of community-based rehabilitation for persons with disabilities to the Slovak and Latvian medical communities in particular, and society in general. It also aims to increase the national profile and awareness of general disability issues and improve access to a broad scope of high-quality responsive health, social, and community services in these countries.

The rehabilitation of land mines survivors project in Cambodia assists persons with a disability to become reintegrated in society with employment or an established business that enables self-sufficiency. World Vision Canada is providing a comprehensive range of services and training at rehabilitation centres and community-based agriculture training and loans for those who cannot leave their homes to study. CIDA support has been a $500,000 grant to cover two years of project work to September 2002.

Overall, CIDA has approved $32 million for 511 projects related to disability between 1993 and 1997, $58.3 million for 1997 to 2001. The most recent figures available for fiscal year 2001-2002 amount to just under $4.5 million. This funding from CIDA includes long-term support to non-governmental organizations in Canada and internationally.

Through a partnership that began over 20 years ago, CIDA has provided approximately $8.5 million to Disabled Peoples' International, DPI. This includes institutional support funding through the international NGO program, youth internships, and land mines assistance.

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CIDA's non-governmental organization project facility, NPF, contributed approximately $1.4 million from 1996 to the present to the activities in Central America of the Canadian Association for Community Living.

In addition, the building community capacity to address sources of social exclusion of children who have a disability project, which runs from April 1, 2001, to March 31, 2004, aims to strengthen the capacity of family organizations by building self-esteem of parents, to help national organizations to engage in policy dialogue with their respective governments, institutions, and community partners, and to engage in regional-level policy dialogue through institutions and agencies such as the Organization of American States and the Inter-American Childrens' Institute.

Through CIDA's social development priorities announced in September 2000, CIDA is strengthening its programming in four priority areas: basic education, basic health and nutrition, HIV-AIDS, and child protection. The action plans in these priority areas address disability concerns and issues, for example, children with disabilities, polio eradication, and the right to education of marginalized groups, including people with disabilities.

One of CIDA's six programming priorities as set out in “Canada in the World”, Canada's foreign policy framework of 1995, is human rights, democratization, and good governance. CIDA has been engaged in human rights programming for many years. Programs supporting this priority comprised approximately 16% of the total project disbursements for fiscal year 2000-2001, second only to those made under basic human needs.

In addition to specific human rights programming, there is increasing interest in the international community of donors about how integrating human rights into development programming can support poverty reduction and sustainable human development and make programming more effective. This emerging human rights-based approach to development involves recognizing individuals as the holders of rights, and thus their inherent dignity and worth, and offers the potential to enhance development cooperation by focusing on empowerment of marginalized groups, including persons with disabilities. Participation, non-discrimination, accountability, transparency, and sustainability are essential characteristics of this approach.

It is increasingly clear, as we review our development experience over the last 20 or 30 years, that we need to continue to find ways to improve what we do. That is what the strengthening aid effectiveness exercise is all about, ensuring that our contributions as a development agency are achieving our objectives and are effective and sustainable.

CIDA is also interested in continuing to discuss with partners, including disabled persons organizations, approaches to development cooperation that, along with traditional approaches, focus on equalization of opportunities and inclusion in order to address the human rights of persons with disabilities. In this regard, the UN's special rapporteur on disability, Mr. Bengt Lindquist, was invited to be the keynote speaker at a panel held during CIDA's international cooperation days back in June 2001. On “The Challenge of Inclusion: a Human Rights Approach to Disability,” a round table was also organized for CIDA staff and key partners in organizations of persons with disabilities with the special rapporteur to discuss disability and development cooperation.

We are able to provide additional examples of support to programming in this area, and can provide a few of these should you wish. However, conscious of time, I'll conclude with the following statements.

CIDA recognizes that persons with disabilities are among the poorest of the poor and that addressing the empowerment, inclusion, and human rights of persons with disabilities is a necessary part of our poverty reduction mandate. The implementation of CIDA's policies on human rights, democratization and good governance, gender equality, and the social development priorities is the foundation of CIDA's approach, which focuses on equality and full participation in society, as well as prevention. Our aim is to ensure that persons with disabilities can contribute to and benefit from development in a context where the human rights are realized. We are always open to discussion and actions that can assist us as a development agency to more effectively contribute to the inclusion and full citizenship of persons with disabilities, as well as to better support governments and partners in developing countries in their efforts to promote full inclusion and equal participation of persons with disabilities.

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CIDA is committed to continuing to provide support for the creation of inclusive societies where there are equal opportunities for men, women, girls, and boys with disabilities to live with dignity, to make decisions about their lives, and to participate in and contribute to the development of their communities.

Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you, Robin. You said you were speaking for all of you, and then you'll help us with the questions.

Mr. Robin McLay: I brought my crew with me.

The Chair: That's the crew.

Adrian.

Mr. Adrian Norfolk (Acting Director, Multilateral Affairs, Human Rights, Humanitarian Affairs and International Women's Equality Division, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade): I'm still waiting for my crew to turn up.

The Chair: There's a crew at the back there.

Mr. Adrian Norfolk: Oh, great.

I'm the deputy director, but I'm acting director while the director of the division is in Geneva. One of the things she's doing right now is negotiating the resolution on human rights of persons with disabilities, which is being negotiated this week in Geneva and will probably be voted on at the end of this week, or perhaps at the end of next week. Action will take place on that resolution.

DFAIT's role in promoting and protecting the human rights of persons with disabilities has mainly been in the coordination of negotiations at the General Assembly and the UN Commission on Human Rights when resolutions on disability issues are debated. Until recently those debates have happened biennially, but I suspect, as is happening this year with the resolution at the CHR, they will go back to annual considerations at the General Assembly in the fall, and the commission in the spring.

Prior to the Commission on Human Rights, DFAIT holds consultations with NGOs each year in February, and NGOs that represent persons with disabilities are invited to these consultations and do attend. We benefit from their input before we go to these negotiations in Geneva. Similarly, NGOs are part of the consultative process prior to special sessions to review UN world conferences and world conferences themselves. In collaboration with the relevant departments, DFAIT has ensured that disability issues are integrated into our participation in these conferences. Indeed, the outcome documents of these conferences reflect the awareness that persons with disabilities have special concerns and needs requiring serious consideration.

These conferences have also made recommendations to rectify past discriminatory practices, as well as to protect and promote the rights of disabled persons to participate fully in all aspects of society as citizens of their countries. Most recently, at the World Conference Against Racism in Durban there were a number of paragraphs included in the outcome documents. One I particularly draw your attention to is paragraph 180 of the program of action, which invites the United Nations General Assembly to consider elaborating an integral and comprehensive international convention to protect and promote the rights and dignity of disabled people, including especially provisions that address the discriminatory practices and treatment affecting them.

If we go back to the Commission on Human Rights, the last resolution, which was in the year 2000, called for measures to strengthen the protection and monitoring of the human rights of persons with disabilities, and it called for the Office of the High Commissioner to carry out a study, which was commissioned from the Research Centre on Human Rights and Disability of the University of Galway, Ireland. The purpose of this study was to evaluate existing standards and mechanisms in the field of human rights and disability and to suggest options for the future. An executive summary of the study was circulated in Geneva earlier this year, but it hasn't yet been released in its entirety and officially presented to the Commission on Human Rights. It may have happened yesterday evening. It should happen this week. The complete study is to be appended to a report from the High Commissioner for Human Rights on this issue.

From the executive summary we know the study establishes that side by side with the UN 1993 Standard Rules on Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities are the six long-established UN human rights treaties, which have considerable potential, but have been generally underused so far in advancing the rights of persons with disabilities. I won't bother to list the six. I'm sure you're familiar with the six conventions. The main thesis of the study is that the process of disability reform could be greatly strengthened and accelerated if greater and more targeted use was made of these existing six instruments. However, the authors do also recommend the development of a new instrument to tailor general human rights norms to meet the circumstances of persons with disabilities. I believe they use the expression that a convention is used to underpin, not undercut the existing instruments. Practical advantages would include that states parties would be clearer on their exact obligations in the disability field, and civil society would also be able to focus on one coherent set of norms, rather than six.

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Of course, we've seen with the convention on the rights of the child and convention on elimination of all forms of discrimination against women that these sorts of conventions aimed at specific groups definitely do overlap and reinforce the civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights conventions.

On a separate, but related track, Mexico, much to many people's surprise, introduced a resolution at the General Assembly in October-November that was adopted in December. It proposes that an ad hoc committee be established, open to the member states of the UN and observers to the UN, to consider proposals for the international convention to protect and promote the rights and dignity of persons with disabilities. The first meeting of that ad hoc committee is scheduled for August, and it should submit a report to the General Assembly in the fall.

DFAIT believes it is important to ensure, of course, that the rights of disabled people are protected and promoted. Generally speaking, as a matter of principle, when it comes to new international instruments, we've taken the position that it's preferable to focus on the implementation of existing obligations--and there are six existing covenants and conventions--rather than the creation of new, potentially overlapping instruments. As consideration is given to the new convention, we will want the opportunity to thoroughly review the report that's coming out from the High Commissioner in its entirety this week as part of our deliberations with regard to the most appropriate way to move forward. In this respect, of course, there'll need to be interdepartmental consultations with key involved departments, including HRDC, which has the domestic lead on disability issues, federal-provincial-territorial consultations, and consultations with NGOs.

Very briefly, the UN Secretary General did appoint the special rapporteur on disability, who reports to the UN Commission for Social Development. His duties are to assist in monitoring the implementation of the standard rules. As you know, the Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities were adopted in 1993. Although not legally binding, they represent a strong moral and political commitment of the governments to take action to attain equalization of opportunities for persons with disabilities. At the last meeting of the commission the mandate of the special rapporteur was extended to 2005. Earlier this afternoon I received the latest copy of the draft resolution that's being negotiated in Geneva. It calls for the special rapporteur to address the Commission on Human Rights at its 59th session, which is next year, on the human rights dimension of his work. So clearly, we're beginning to see a more established and systematic link between the work of the special rapporteur and the Commission on Human Rights.

I think I'll finish there, but of course, I'd be happy to respond to any questions on my department, with my crew.

Thank you.

The Chair: What is the wish of the committee? Would you prefer to hear from the community first or to ask some questions of the officials?

º (1600)

Mr. Tony Tirabassi (Niagara Centre, Lib.): I think we can go with the members from the community myself.

The Chair: Maybe we'll start with Diane and Laurie, who co-chaired the last international convention that was here. Then we'll go around. How far have we come in 11 years or whatever it is?

Ms. Diane Richler (Executive Vice-President, Canadian Association for Community Living): Thank you.

I was trying to wear a slightly different hat now, since I am focusing a lot of my efforts as president-elect of the international organization of which the Canadian Association for Community Living is a member. The last time I appeared before this committee, it would have been representing that association, which is now very ably represented here today.

I came with a package of materials, which I will leave. I apologize that I don't have copies for everyone, but I will leave them here. After hearing the presentations, I'd like to focus my comments on a few points. It's quite interesting that particularly the representation from CIDA focused so much on what the community has done and the grants CIDA has given that have enabled certain activities to be carried out. What I'd like to do is talk a little about what the government has done, where I think there have been some really positive examples we can build on, and where some opportunities exist.

I think it's really important that this meeting is happening the week that we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the charter, because the adoption of the charter in Canada and the inclusion of the equality rights provisions for people with a disability have had a huge impact, not only in Canada, but throughout the world. While we're certainly not the only country to be thinking about disability as a matter of human rights, I think the way the equality rights provisions were framed as a matter of non-discrimination has really been very important. It's very different from the way many other countries think about human rights. .

I was at a meeting in the U.S. two weeks ago with representatives of major national organizations of the United States. Their model, of course, is the Americans with Disabilities Act, and they looked at a convention as being a very specific document that will entitle people who have a disability to certain benefits because of their disability, which I think is exactly the inverse of the way we've tended to think in Canada, namely, that you can't discriminate against people because they have a disability.

I think many people have looked to the Canadian model because it offers an approach that's much more holistic and it is much more deeply rooted, as both of the presentations indicated, in a broader concept of democracy and democratization and the role of the citizen. A major report written during the time of this government about disability was called A Matter of Citizenship. Again, I think the Canadian perspective of disability as being a condition that doesn't alter someone's status as a citizen, but calls on both civil society and government to undertake efforts to make sure citizenship rights of persons with disabilities are not diminished is really important. When we look at the role Canadian civil society organizations and government have played in other contexts, that's really important.

To summarize, I hope I'm not stealing any thunder from CACL in this, but one of the analyses they have done looking at the whole issue of foreign affairs concludes that disability has to be considered, whether we're thinking about aid, trade, or diplomacy, and that there's a role in all. I think, if there's a challenge for us now as a country, it's that our efforts are a bit spotty.

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In respect of aid, there are certainly projects, and I was encouraged to hear how many projects are being funded that support persons with a disability or their organizations, but I think there is not yet a consciousness within CIDA that all development efforts need to be treating disability as a horizontal issue and that, when one is looking at matters of education, for example, the inclusion of children with disability needs to be thought of all the time.

I'll mention that there's a very specific initiative right now where there's incredible potential, but at the moment it's just potential, and that's the African initiative, where one of the major themes is education. Certainly, the leaders of Africa have identified the need to promote education for all as a priority for the continent, but to date, from the information I've been able to gather, the question of how to ensure that children and youth who have a disability are included in the evolution of education within Africa is not really a primary concern. The paper that was written for the G-8 leaders on education was written in the U.S., and although I haven't seen it--it's an internal document--what I've been told so far is that there is no reference at all to disability.

Our sister organizations in Africa tell us that if young people with a disability are not included in the efforts to develop education for all, the countries will never be able to meet their targets, because there are so many young people who have a disability in the continent. I think our approach to inclusion is one that offers the potential to really reform education in a way that responds much more to the individual needs of all children, so all children who are disadvantaged can benefit. It's not something we would be promoting, just a parallel program for students with disability, but rather, in the overall development of education systems, there should be a recognition that children with a disability are to be included.

So while there may be some very specific initiatives related to disability, and even related to disability and education, and as was underlined, one of the major initiatives that was spoken to is an excellent initiative on education, it's not yet a cross-cutting issue within CIDA policy to make sure all education efforts think about what the impact is on children with a disability.

In the area of trade, which may seem a little more of a stretch, in fact, there have again been some very good examples. The Prime Minister has included representatives of disability organizations on Team Canada missions, and that's been important, not only for the ability to export some Canadian expertise, but also for giving status to disability organizations in the countries visited, because of the presence of people with disabilities on the tour. All the international financial institutions, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, are places Canadian exporters look to generate new business, and there are opportunities for Canadians to be able to export a lot in those venues, but I think there really hasn't been a sufficient development of that area of expertise as one we can look at.

The last area is diplomacy, and again, it's one that is often very general. One has to take advantage of the opportunities as they present themselves, but sometimes they can be extremely meaningful. One of them I can refer to was the Quebec City summit two years ago. In the declaration of Quebec there's an excellent reference to the commitment of the heads of state to the rights and inclusion of persons with a disability and a statement that is very strong in saying that people with a disability will be included in all activities in the Americas. Sometimes words don't seem to mean very much, but in this case the hemispheric institutions, like the Organization of American States and the Inter-American Development Bank, are being held accountable for how they implement the Quebec City summit. So for the first time we're starting to see the OAS develop an interest in persons with a disability, and their education department is now, for the first time, putting a strong push on promoting the inclusion of students with a disability.

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It was largely officials at DFAIT who knew where the opportunities were and figured out language that looks quite harmless on the surface--it's not as aggressive as a convention--but had a major impact. The people within the Americas branch were very sensitized to the issue of disability, because some people within the department who had previously been posted in countries where there were major disability activities came back home and were able to help community organizations look for opportunities to promote them themselves. In the Africa branch there hasn't been that same history of involvement. So as the African initiative has developed, there haven't been the people within the department who necessarily had the contacts or would have been on the lookout for those kinds of opportunities.

Our experience is that it's really easy to find allies within the departments once we meet the people. The problem is that as Canadian NGOs, we don't necessarily know where the next major diplomatic summits are going to be taking place or what the opportunities are. So we really need to see, both within DFAIT and CIDA, I think, a more aggressive way to look for those opportunities and to monitor all the activities both departments are involved in, to make sure the charter is respected, not just within Canada, but in our foreign policy.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thanks very much, Diane.

Laurie.

Mr. Laurie Beachell (National Coordinator, Council of Canadians with Disabilities): I'm here today more as support to our international committee volunteers, Steve Estey and Dave Shannon, who are on our international development committee, and I'll turn it over to them in one second.

The only comment I would make, Madam Chair, is with regard to where we have come. Our activities are sporadic. There is no clear centre of responsibility or coordination in government on this. When CCD began in international development, we were one of the earliest organizations to be involved, back in the early 1980s. At present we have no funding, we've no projects, we are looking more at the policy end.

Canada's leadership in this whole area of international development and disability is recognized, and was recognized as recently as 1998, when the Prime Minister travelled to New York and received the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Award for Canada's leadership in disability issues. But I would have to say Canada is not the leader now that it was on this front, and there is a need for reinvestment and new coordination in working at partnerships with NGOs.

I'll turn it over to Steve Estey and Dave Shannon to make further comments.

Mr. David Shannon (Member, Council of Canadians with Disabilities): Thank you, Laurie.

Chair Bennett, I want to thank you and Bill Young for having, on such short notice, invited us and our organization today. It's a great pleasure to be in front of you. And I want to say, on a personal note, it's a great pleasure to be in front of the member from the very city I grew up in, Wendy Lill. There's some Maritime representation here in both me and Steve Estey.

It's a great pleasure to speak on the topic of the international protection of human rights and the advancement of the disability agenda. I think, around this table, we all can agree that this is our common goal. We may disagree today on outcome and perspective at this time, but we do agree, in a very Canadian way, that we can contribute at an international level on this very front.

Steve.

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Mr. Steve Estey (Member, Council of Canadians with Disabilities): I'd also like to say it's a real privilege to be here. Many of the folks around the table have been here, as you said, very often. This is my first visit, and I'm kind of excited by it, to tell you the truth.

When Dave and I were talking about preparing the presentation and talking about human rights, the convention on disabilities, and all these kinds of things, we talked about how United Nations instruments and things that happen at that level tend to be somewhat esoteric and very difficult for us as people with disabilities, living our day-to-day lives, to understand as to their nature and value. I was sharing with Dave and Laurie this morning a story that comes to my mind often when I think about human rights and people with disabilities.

Two years ago I was travelling in Cambodia on a project with land mine survivors. We travelled one day a couple of hours outside Phnom Penh to a little village that was about an hour through rice paddies and rainforest and things. It was pretty remote. When we arrived at that village--we were there with a couple of people from a local non-governmental organization called Action on Disability and Development from the U.K.--we met with a number of people in this village. There is one person who I met there whose face comes to my mind whenever we talk about this. At that time she was a 24-year-old woman with severe cerebral palsy, not verbal, not mobile, but when I met her, she was very much a part of her community. They were out on the street talking, people were around. I talked with this young woman and her family. Up until the time she was 22, she lived in the backyard of her family's house, chained with the pigs and the chickens, because her family was totally afraid of her. They had no idea what was wrong with her, why she couldn't talk, why she couldn't walk, and they didn't know what to do. It was only when somebody with a bit of understanding about disability came to their community and explained to them some of the things about what was happening that she was welcome.

So when we talk about human rights and disability, it's not a question only of dollars and cents for discrete development projects, which are unquestionably important, but there are some very fundamental issues about the kinds of lives disabled people are living. These are the things human rights conventions have the possibility and the power to affect.

While we continue to work with bilateral programming in the area of project development, our organization, CCD, is very much committed to working at the policy level too. So Dave and I want to talk a little about some of our experience with CIDA, the UN convention, and similar mechanisms. We're going to adopt a tag team approach to our presentation, so bear with us as we go back and forth.

Mr. David Shannon: We hope it's not more a Laurel and Hardy approach.

What we do have is a disability community comprised of 600 million people worldwide. Approximately 80% of that 600 million live in developing countries, where people with disabilities are sizable constituents. More than the numbers, though, is the appalling human rights conditions of people with disabilities, as Steve has just outlined. Furthermore, the first UN special rapporteur on disability noted in 1991 that people with disabilities:

frequently live in deplorable conditions owing to the presence of physical and social barriers which prevent their integration and full participation in the community. As a result, millions of children and adults throughout the world are segregated and deprived of virtually all rights and lead a wretched marginal life.

Adequate health care, housing, education, and meaningful employment are of fundamental importance to all human beings, including disabled people. Yet millions of disabled people around the world do not have access to the resources necessary to fulfil their basic needs, nor do they have influence over the policy decisions that affect their daily struggle for survival. Happily, we're here having influence in policy discussion.

Throughout the world, Madam Chair, people with disabilities are subject to discrimination. They're denied jobs, excluded from schools, are considered unworthy of marriage or partnership, and are even barred from certain religious practices. The underlying attitude that disabled persons have intrinsically less value because of their disabilities has devastating implications for disabled persons around the world. There's nothing more clear than the testimony of persons from the disability community who support this notion in compelling personal accounts of disability oppression.

We submit, Madam Chair, that empowerment rests in tackling the negative assumptions society and disabled people themselves have made about what they can and cannot do, and then changing those assumptions and attitudes and creating a framework for this more positive approach to thrive.

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Mr. Steve Estey: To talk for just a moment about the economic realities associated with disability, not just for people with disabilities themselves, a couple of years ago a U.K. overseas development assistance agency did a study that estimated that there were 32 million disabled people in India. That study further estimated that four times that number, or 130 million people, were directly affected by disability. They talked to family members, they talked to people in the community. When we think about disability and disabled people, there are impacts for me as a person with a disability, but there are impacts too for my family, particularly in a situation where there are no supports in the community available. My mother might not be able to work, for example, so that there would be economic impacts in that way. It's important to bear in mind that the reality of disability ripples out.

Another study done by that same organization in Tanzania found that households with a disabled member averaged a consumption rate 40% less than the national average, and those households had a 20% higher head count. So there were 20% more people in households with disabilities, and yet their consumption was 40% less. So the effect on families, on a household, the net impact of disability is quite significant. The study in Tanzania concluded that “disability is the hidden face of poverty in Africa”.

So following up on what Diane was talking about in regard to inclusion and the economic impact, I think it's important for the committee, Madam Chair, to understand that these effects, particularly in developing countries, are felt much more broadly than just on the individuals with disabilities themselves.

Mr. David Shannon: This profound need with respect to disabled persons worldwide was recognized by Canada 20 to 25 years ago. Canadians and the Canadian government understood that we were beginning an evolution from a medical or a rehabilitation model, which saw the disability as problematized, saw the individual as defined by their disability, as being an injury or a disease, to a human rights model, a model of human rights and citizenship. They seized the moment 20 years ago, they took leadership. Examples are the founding of CCD, being instrumental in the founding of Disabled Persons International, the drafting of the Obstacles report, the inclusion of disabled persons in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms--we do celebrate the 20th anniversary this week--the world program of action on disability, and then the United Nations decade of disabled persons. These are all things Canada not only participated in, but led. Canada's leadership in this period contributed to the genesis of several NGOs and advanced the disability agenda throughout the world community. As a result, NGOs developed. Several other nation states grabbed onto the disability rights movement and moved forward.

Domestically, we have made tremendous advancements pursuant to sections 7 and 15 of the charter, in particular with respect to the duty to accommodate. Our judge-made law at a domestic level is utterly brilliant and remains a standard for the world to watch. However, the world moves forward and Canada's leadership is eroding. We want to talk today about ways Canada can re-assume its role as a global leader on the disability and human rights stage.

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Mr. Steve Estey: I'd like to talk for a moment about CIDA policy. I won't repeat all the things that have been said. You've been given a very clear overview of CIDA policy, basic human needs policy, governance policies, and so on, and how those things can perhaps affect people with disabilities. We've also heard about a number of projects that have been financed by CIDA over the past several years. What we at CCD have been doing as we look at the whole area of policy with regard to disability and development is looking at other models in other countries. We're trying to see what other donor countries are doing in the area of disability. You compare that to what the Canadian government is doing and see if there is a consistency there or if there are different approaches.

What we've seen in a number of countries, countries that are typically grouped as Nordic countries, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, for example, is that they have developed a real relationship with the disability community. They make use in those countries of a reference group model, so that organizations of people with disabilities work in conjunction with a bilateral aid agency to set broad policy parameters or frameworks for the types of interventions that would be appropriate in the disability milieu. In the United States they have recently promulgated a specific policy on disability and development. They've established a department in USAID that monitors the implementation of that policy. It files annual reports. In the United Kingdom they have recently put forth a policy statement on disability and development that talks about these kinds of things and about the issues of poverty, poverty alleviation, and so on.

So we've seen that a number of other countries have perhaps taken their work on disability and development and brought it together in a more focused fashion. Granted, CIDA is doing an awful lot of work in this area, but I think what we have seen in other places is that the disability community is suggesting that if the work can be brought together more coherently, perhaps the impact can be greater than with a number of disparate activities in different departments. So that's something we would certainly be interested in following up with CIDA and would support in whatever way we could.

The other small point I wanted to make with reference to disability and development is that while we have talked about human rights violations, about people with disabilities being the poorest of the poor, the flip side of that coin is that there are 600 million people out there who want to live their lives and contribute to their families and their societies. There's a tremendous untapped source of resources and energy there, so that policy on development really ought to bear that in mind and approach people with disabilities as an untapped source of energy to contribute to the development of their communities and society.

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Mr. David Shannon: In addition to this policy recommendation, we are heartened and rather excited to hear of Canada's support, with a couple of caveats, of the UN convention on persons with a disability. We wholeheartedly support the UN convention. We submit that Canada needs to participate in an integrated and leadership role in the development of the UN convention, and particularly at this time, participate fully in the ad hoc committee Mr. Norfolk mentioned.

One of the arguments against the convention is that it creates more machinery, and with more machinery comes more cost. I hope we've made the case with respect to the apparently insurmountable cost we are faced with socially and economically by doing nothing. We submit that the benefits of the UN convention far outweigh any costs.

Furthermore, in support of the United Nations convention on disabled persons, we submit that it will provide an immediate statement of international legal accountability regarding disability rights, it will clarify the content of human rights principles and their application to people with disabilities, it will provide an authoritative and global reference point for domestic law and policy initiatives, and it will provide mechanisms for more effective monitoring, including reporting on the enforcement of the convention by governments and NGOs, a supervision by a body of experts mandated by the convention, and possibly the consideration of individual or group complaints under a mechanism to be created by the convention. It's very exciting to see a quasi-judicial evolution out of this.

Further, it will establish a useful framework for international cooperation. It will provide a fair and common standard of assessment and achievement across cultures and levels of economic development. Also, it will provide transformative education benefits for all participants engaged in preparatory and formal negotiation phases and for the public in countries that consider ratification of the convention. Finally, it will contribute to the critical mass of jurisprudence respecting disability rights and the international protection of human rights. By adding to that critical mass, you begin the process of making disability rights more and more normative, and therefore more integrated in the world community.

I'll make a final statement about recommendations, Madam Chair. There are upcoming forums and directions for Canadian engagement and participation in order to reassert its leadership on a global stage with respect to the disability agenda, the UN convention and ad hoc committee, where DEFAIT has shown very positive assurances that there will be NGO participation, and participation in the African decade of disabled persons that begins this year. We see this as an absolutely brilliant opportunity to dovetail with the Prime Minister's recent tour of Africa. In October of this year Disabled Persons International will be holding its world congress in Sapporo, Japan. We invite members of Parliament to attend and participate at this world congress.

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Mr. Steve Estey: We would also invite the committee to call for full articulation of a policy on disability and development within CIDA similar to the policy initiatives I referred to in the Nordic countries, the United States, and the U.K.

We also would like to echo recent recommendations from the UN special rapporteur to the social committee in Geneva. He called on the UN to initiate or continue working human rights machinery to make it more effective and more inclusive of disability. He called for the elaboration of a convention on persons with disabilities. He also called, I was interested to note today, for a continuation of the appointment of the special rapporteur. I was pleased to hear that has happened. Finally, he called for the re-establishment of an interagency mechanism that was created during the international decade of disabled persons to coordinate exchanges of experiences and ideas between United Nations bodies and organizations with programs in the disability field.

Thank you very much.

The Chair: Joan.

Ms. Joan Westland (Individual Presentation): When I was listening to David talking about the convention and all the things it was going to do, I wanted to know if it did windows as well.

I am less than enthusiastic about the focus on conventions and United Nations instruments, partly based on my own experience, having been involved in the drafting of the UN standard rules, in the Vienna declaration and program of action, and in the world program for action, and having made many presentations at the United Nations third committee, as well as having been a delegate to the UN General Assembly. It's an incredible amount of energy. You will deliberate for days at a time about whether or not you should eradicate poverty or eliminate poverty. While I appreciate the role all of that has to play in the bigger picture--and I think Diane gave us a very good overview of that--I get very concerned at the possibility of our efforts being limited to these activities, because they are so time-consuming and because they require so many resources.

To come to what we've heard so far from the presentations, I'd really like to have some open discussion and not just bang my fist on the desk. There is an issue in the sporadic and what seems to be disjointed approach to project funding. I challenge whether there is as much needs assessment analysis being done in countries prior to decisions being made about what projects should or shouldn't be supported or implemented. I would really like to see more communication and collaboration between member states of the United Nations concerning areas they're going to get involved in. In some of the countries I have visited as part of some of these projects I find it astounding that anything can happen at all, because it seems the people in the country spend all their time shuttling delegations of foreign aid representatives back and forth between hotels and airports, and very little time is left over, it seems, to implement what the project was intended to do.

Why is it that we don't seem to have a very comprehensive overview among member states of regions you're going to be participating in or particular areas of concern you're going to be addressing? It's not just a coordinated effort within our Canadian environment, there seems to be a need for some strategic planning at a much more global level as well.

Somebody mentioned the sustainability issue. When I look at the CIDA documents, the language certainly reflects a lot of what we've been discussing. The documentation that comes out of our Department of Foreign Affairs reflects a lot of the inclusion arguments we've been putting forward. I'd really like to see that discussion raised a little higher. I think we need to have some serious exploration of what we mean by inclusion. I would like to see disability issues addressed in all your policies and programming and in discussions within your department, but not at the risk of inclusion disappearing altogether. When I talk about inclusion policy in programs, it's because we want to be part of the mainstream, recognizing that there will be issues that require specific and particular attention, not in parallel with what is going on, but as part of our global process and thinking.

º (1640)

I'll address another practical piece, and then let Michael jump in, because we are running out of time.

When we talk about capacity building and projects that look at developing capacity for NGOs at the local and community level, we need to make sure we are including the community in a larger sense. One piece of the puzzle, if we've learned that in our Canadian experience, has been capacity building and recognition of citizenship of people with disabilities. But we're not living in isolation, so we need to make sure we have the tools and the instruments to influence our local government in the way it functions and operates, to ensure that community infrastructures are in fact inclusive and accessible.

There are mechanisms in countries around the world, whether it's associations of mayors or municipal government networks, where that discussion can be tabled and can be supported. We also need to pay attention to other members within the community who affect whether or not barriers will be removed, the educators, the health care givers. So in our analysis of needs and our analysis of solutions we need to ensure that these partners are part of that process in a meaningful way.

I would see as well a role here in assisting your colleagues in other governments to develop a knowledge base, so that they can not only draft, but develop and implement some strategic social, and economic policy that's inclusive and supports all the other layers or levels you're targeting. That kind of comprehensive approach, to me, is what's going to ensure the sustainability you're talking about. Otherwise, you're going to continue throwing darts at a dart board and doing projects here and there--all very worthwhile, I'm sure--but it's going to be extremely difficult to see something sustained if the other partners in our community are not also being influenced and part of the program.

We had last June--Madam Chair participated, as did Wendy Lill--a round table discussion in Montreal concerning inclusion by design. It was a round table prior to an international conference, where we try to bring multi-sectoral representation of everyone from urban planners to policy-makers to people who design the products we use for daily living to begin to have some discussion about how we can target all those sectors within our community. Addressing issues for people with disabilities cannot be done in isolation.

If you remember nothing else, please, when you talk about participation for people with disabilities in any of your project development and delivery, make sure there are resources built into those projects so that the people can participate in a meaningful way, and that means addressing accommodation needs. It's been consistent in programs I've been involved in that the accommodation issues are not taken into consideration, so there's no interpretation for people who are deaf to participate in the programs, there are no resources to provide any of the material in alternatives to print. Transportation in many countries is an issue for anybody, but for people with disabilities it can be completely prohibitive. I really feel it isn't enough merely to say people with disabilities must participate or must be part of your client group or your decision-making group. You must also demonstrate how that participation is going to be meaningful and have resources in place to ensure that it's happening.That's my one other little practical point.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

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The Chair: Thank you.

Michael.

Mr. Michael Bach (Vice-President, Canadian Association for Community Living): Thank you, Madam Chair. I echo a number of the points that have been made. I have left a presentation with the clerk that can be distributed later. I won't go through the full presentation. I want to make a couple of key points.

First, I think we all share a recognition, among the community and government, members of the committee, that Canada has made some significant advances on a human rights framework for disability and has played a significant role internationally in supporting the development of a human rights framework. As someone who's worked in this area, disability and international development, through my earlier work at the Roeher Institute and very recently now at CACL, I'm certainly aware, from working in various regions of the Caribbean, Central and South America, south Asia, of the real power of a human rights framework. It gives people a sense of hope, a sense of possibility, and for many, as they begin to learn about the realities of human rights conventions and commitments at an international level, there is a real sense of energy and possibility.

As we think about moving forward on a new disability convention, we should be careful to recognize the moment we're at and ask ourselves very critically, do we, in fact, need an additional rights framework? What will it provide us with, or what should it provide us with? Do we need a shot in the arm of euphoria and hope? We need a sense that if we get another human rights commitment, maybe we will make a difference.

There is, I think, a sense of frustration in many of the countries I've worked in, where five or ten years after learning about their international human rights commitments and not seeing much change, people are asking for a real change. I think Diane, in her comments, and others have echoed that the challenge is to develop a coherent policy framework to deliver on those commitments. It was the submission of CCD that a new convention will advance the monitoring framework, will advance a framework for international cooperation, will advance public awareness. I'm not sure it will. It should. If it did, it would be terrific, but I think we need to learn from history and really question whether it will.

So if our challenge is to figure out how to develop a coherent policy framework to move forward on the international commitments we have, I think it is important to keep the really big picture in mind. I appreciate CIDA's policy goals for poverty reduction; they're the right policy goals. The reality is that between 1961 and 1997, a period of massive economic globalization, the gap between high-income and middle- and low-income countries grew from just over $10 trillion U.S. to over $25 trillion. The reality is that economic globalization is bringing poverty, and it's bringing polarization. We just need to accept that. I don't think there's any doubt about it, I don't think it needs to be debated. While we have goals for poverty reduction and commit significant resources to that, we're not having a big impact. The biggest issue with disability is poverty. Unless we get hold of this issue with economic globalization, we're not going to address the disability issue.

There are a number of corollaries to a recognition of that context. Economic globalization is important, it brings benefits. The real dilemma is that we've developed the economic institutions to make globalization of that scale possible in the last 40 years, we haven't developed the social institutions. Pierre Pettigrew, the current minister, and George Soros, the American financier with his Foundation for the Open Society, in a recent book, On Globalization, have made the same point. We've got the economic institutions for globalization, and they're very sophisticated, but we don't have the social institutions, and unless we have global public goods for health, education, social support, unless we have the social institutions to put that agenda on the table, we're going to continue to see that gap grow between high-income and low- and middle-income countries, and we're going to see the exclusion of people with disabilities expand in that growing polarization. So as we think about moving our disability rights into making real policy change possible, we've got to keep that big picture in mind.

º (1650)

We'd like to suggest outlines for some core policy objectives and roles for Canada. When we say roles for Canada here, we mean both for CIDA and DFAIT, and we're really suggesting the need for a coordinated policy agenda between the two agencies of the federal government.

Parenthetically, Michael Ignatieff, one of the pre-eminent philosophers in Canada, in his recent books on the rights revolution, has made the point that Canada has been a leader, institutionalized nationally and internationally. And he's made the argument that with the advance of those rights should come recognition of people's needs, of the value of people, of respect for people, but in fact, what we've seen is a dilemma of the rights revolution. We have seen the advance of those rights, but with exclusion persisting. So again, I think Canada should take credit for its role and its leadership, but we've got to move into what is really a policy vacuum.

There are some key objectives to pursue in a coordinated agenda between DFAIT and our official development assistance. The first is to take leadership on a legal human rights framework and advance that. Second, as has been mentioned a number of times, there's a need for an agenda for inclusive policy development. We need a policy agenda for inclusion, and we've got to horizontalize it. Third, we need clear policy objectives for democratization, of states and institutions of governance, but also of the market. People with disabilities need to be able to have access to markets, not only for consumption, but for labour participation. And we need to democratize civil society. So our democratization agenda needs to cover state markets and civil society. A fourth policy goal should be to strengthen the capacity of civil society organizations. These aren't new goals, but I think we need to state them clearly and in a coordinated way across the federal government.

There are key roles, I think, in foreign affairs and official developmental assistance. We must demonstrate leadership on human rights and democracy commitments. We've made them and we've demonstrated leadership in promoting them, but not really in delivering upon them. Canada's role in effective monitoring and developing the resources for national monitoring and support of monitoring bilaterally and in multilateral institutions has not been strong, I would argue. We can talk more about that.

There are some areas, given the issue of disability globally, that we need to address, as with the human genome and human rights, UNESCO's declaration. As Margaret Somerville, one of our leading ethicists, has said, genetics now equals eugenics in Canada and globally. So Canada's got to take a lead, I think, on beginning to monitor that.

We need to look at bilateral or multilateral institutional development. Project development, outside a policy framework to create capacity for social institutions, regionally and globally, is not going to help us deliver on our agenda. George Soros has some very innovative ideas for doing that with some of the mechanisms at the World Bank.

We need to bring not only a national and bilateral focus to inclusive policy development, but we need to focus on subregional and regional initiatives as well. CIDA's initiative with the Canadian Association in Central America is a great example of that. We're building capacity at a regional level in Central America for inclusive education, for engagement with the OAS, for engagement with the OECD on moving an agenda for inclusive education forward.

We need a policy engagement strategy for disability civil society organizations. We need to mobilize investment in NGO and civil society partnerships. And I think we need to look at our current practices for funding Canadian NGOs in some of our partnerships in development and aid. Given the funding of disability organizations now, the requirement for one-third of Canadian NGOs to participate, we're going to see less and less capacity, fewer and fewer NGOs being able to come to the table, because they don't have that cash. Because of our accountability frameworks now under HRDC, we can't generate surpluses on any projects, which used to give us some capacity to generate some overhead, so we could do some other things. That's gone, and yet we've developed enormous expertise in Canada that's respected at the NGO level, and we're not going to be able to deploy it in a few years, given the current funding guidelines.

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Furthermore, I think the guidelines under the NGO project facility at CIDA, need to recognize that NGOs in our partner countries want a partnership. They don't just want a flow of cash, they actually want a partnership. We learn as much from those engagements as our NGOs in other countries do.

Finally, as I've said, we need to establish a comprehensive monitoring strategy, where Canada not only monitors our international commitments in our own country, but also provides resources and models to do it internationally.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thanks very much.

Tony, do you want to go first?

Mr. Tony Tirabassi: Thank you.

I'd like to thank everyone who appeared before the committee this afternoon. Much has been said here, and I'm trying to digest it all and who does what, the various areas of interest you have.

I'm looking for clarification, some additional information. Much has been mentioned here about Canada's contribution to the development of international programs. How would you assess Canada's past contributions to the development of international programs and policies as they relate to disabilities, and how have things changed?

I had the opportunity to visit the United Nations last fall as an observer in the general sense. And in meeting with the various departments and agencies, we did hear about Canada's changing role, but that's also because the demands have changed out there in the international world. So while in some areas it may seem that our contributions have diminished, it's really an increased responsibility out there as a result of awareness, certainly more in the area of peacekeeping.

So I'm wondering if I could get an answer to those questions. I'm very interested in your comments, Michael, about poverty as the root of the disabilities question.

Mr. Laurie Beachell: We were involved in the early days in development education activities, educating other Canadian NGOs, like Oxfam, CUSO, and Inter Pares, to be inclusive of disability and try to work through a model of educating those who were in the business of development to be more inclusive. There were some dollars in those days for those kinds of activities. That pot of money at CIDA dried up and was gone. The development education side of it, the old public participation programs of the mid-1980s, is gone.

We then followed CIDA's lead and tried to undertake direct development projects. We found ourselves, frankly, unable to sustain these in any way and creating expectations in our partners in developing countries that we could not match, because the funding cycle was eight months, the money had to be spent within eight months, and there was no assurance that there would be anything beyond. Then CIDA did a review of our development projects and said, you do good work, there are a few areas you could strengthen, and we think you should have program funding that would allow you longer-term commitments, but we have no money to give you.

So not only was the potential of development projects gone, but we basically had to say, we can no longer do the work we are doing. We had projects in Zimbabwe, we had projects in Trinidad, we had projects in El Salvador and Nicaragua, in Guyana, in Jamaica for a number of years, and we do none of those any more. There is no way our activities can be sustained, no way we can meet the needs of our partners in those countries. We were actually creating expectations there was no potential in the funding structures for us to fulfil.

So CIDA's initiative on this was very sporadic, and our ability as an NGO to be involved simply diminished. That's why we come back and say there has to be some coordination of these sporadic activities. There has to be a policy framework within which we can actually go forward with initiatives Joan mentioned that are sustainable and have impact on those issues of building civil society and addressing the great inequities that exist between those that have and those that do not in many of the countries where we have member organizations.

I'm not sure if I'm being direct enough, but I think that on the whole issue of coordination, the tools, like the convention, like the Obstacles report, like the Parliamentary committee, help us kick-start things and bring attention to certain issues. However, if we don't get to the policy coordination piece, we are going to end up with very unequal and unpredictable results.

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The Chair: Joan.

Ms. Joan Westland: I want to also give an answer to your question about Canada's leadership role and where it's situated today. I think we have to remember where it was situated when we were a leader. There was an international decade going on, and the member states of the United Nations were dealing with disability issues as a priority activity. So there was an international context that encouraged the Canadian government to take on a leadership role. There was a minister who hosted a number of meetings bringing ministers from other countries to discuss what their agenda was, what their strategy was in dealing with disability issues. As the decade finished, the focus started to slide and slide. We were unable during the decade to bring the inclusion argument to the table as strongly as we are trying to do today, so that disability was separate and apart, and it became very difficult to sustain it as a priority activity for a government.

So I think there was an international environment that enabled the Canadian government to be very progressive, but there was also a level of discussion that we hadn't yet achieved in talking about horizontal policy planning and ensuring that disability issues were seen not as issues of a person with a disability, but as issues of the community in which that person lives. I think those are two things you need to keep in mind in looking at Canada's enthusiasm to sustain a leadership role in this area.

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The Chair: Adrian, and then Diane.

Mr. Adrian Norfolk: I'd like to thank Joan, because she's raised a very important aspect here, the international focus, the international profile of this issue. I would say we're entering another period now on the whole profile of this issue, because of this Mexican-led initiative in the General Assembly. That's not to diminish in any way what would have happened anyway perhaps in the course of the next year, with the results of this Irish study and the resolution of the the Irish-led commission coming out.

I think we are seeing a period where this whole issue of the human rights of persons with disabilities is going to gain a much higher profile again, and therefore there is room for Canada. Perhaps, on the international stage, it's not always an advantage to take a leadership role. We took a leadership role the first time around, as you were saying . The first resolution of the commission was a Canadian-led resolution. I'm not sure how many years we ran it, but at some point we handed it over to the Irish.

One might say that the Mexican-led issue is very encouraging here, because when it comes to progress on the international stage, something that is western-led, or perceived to be western-led, sometimes is not going to make as much progress as something that has cross-regional support. Although it may not be as appropriate under the convention for us to take a leadership role, there's always very active participation behind the scenes, making things work.

I think David talked about and Michael commented on the net benefits far outweighing the costs. I must echo Michael's comments, in that the potential net benefits definitely do far outweigh the net costs, but we are talking potential here. There was a lot of hope for the World Conference Against Racism, what it would do, and certainly from the perspective of the Canadian government, it fell far short of expectations. It's a very different context, a very different issue, I realize that, but when it comes to international negotiations, realizing that potential, especially given the potential resources that will be available to a committee, for example, that would be overseeing such a convention, is an unknown quantity and far beyond our individual capacity to lead on.

Thank you.

Ms. Diane Richler: I'd like to make a very personal reflection, rather than an organizational one, on how and where Canada's shown leadership. I think Canada has shown real leadership when it's taken on an issue that might not be central to the UN process, but where it could make a real difference, and there are two that I would mention.

The first was the investment in DPI. I am not part of and wasn't part of the organizations that created DPI, but as I travelled around the world, I saw the impact the creation of the first organizations of people with disabilities in various countries had. It had made an enormous contribution to the members of Inclusion International, because families of sons and daughters with intellectual disabilities saw people who had a physical disability speaking out for themselves and started to think about disability in a different way. So I think Canada's investment in DPI, in its formation, was extremely critical as a means to sensitize people to the rights and abilities of people with a disability.

The other example is the Ottawa process on the land mines issue, where I think it's not just the outcome that was so important, but the willingness of the Government of Canada to work with NGOs and burst open the whole tradition of how international diplomacy was carried out. To be willing to share information with mere mortals was a revolutionary process that I think has had a huge impact.

So my sense is that the leadership on disability has not been necessarily through the major multilateral institutions and existing structures, but has been much more when Canada's identified an opportunity and just gone for it with a lot of resolve and investment and follow-up.

The Chair: Maybe we should go to other members' questions, because we've got so many.

Before Nancy gets to ask her question, I want to explain. Nancy is our conscience on this file, Nancy being the member from Nunavut. It's pretty hard for her to sell foreign aid in her riding--she sometimes isn't able to say that herself.

I would want, before you leave, to know how a convention on persons with disabilities and an internal monitoring system might actually help us in our struggle with accountability frameworks with disability. I was at one of the reporting meetings on CEDAW, and in some countries that has helped, in other countries it doesn't seem to have helped. How does the existence of an international framework actually help the country monitor what's going on and use it in its courts?

Robert.

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[Translation]

Mr. Robert Lanctôt (Châteauguay, BQ): I will not ask any questions because I do not have enough time for them. I hope that you will come back. I will, however, make some comments because there were too many questions. I came here with a headache, which is now getting worse because I have heard so many outrageous remarks.

I can understand that we want to have good reviews, and be able to say once again that Canada is a marvellous country. I heard some mention of human rights conventions. Concerning humanitarian assistance, Canada is still only at 0.25% of GDP, even though it is signatory to a convention under which it made a commitment to spend 0.7% for assistance. Canada is not the only country that does not abide by that convention, but how is it that both Norway and Sweden manage to abide by that convention?

I hope that there will be a UN convention on persons with disabilities, and that you will invest effort and money needed to achieve that result. Should that be done by delegation? It would serve as a fine example, showing that Canada is doing well and is at last coming back to what it used to be. I believe that we should start here, within Canada.

I used to be a member of this Subcommittee. Unfortunately, I have other issues to deal with and I cannot do everything, but I like this Subcommittee. I like being in attendance here. When I am asked to replace members of the committee, I always accept.

This Subcommittee has to be recreated from scratch at every session. It is not even a standing committee. Perhaps we should start by doing some work here internally, if we want to show others that we are doing well.

We talk about integration of resources and even about horizontal efforts. I believe that it will be very difficult to get anywhere on the horizontal level, even though the ideal scheme would be to talk to each and every one of these departments. It seems to me that this is wishful and somewhat absurd thinking. I told you that I do not have enough time because I would have so much to say. Perhaps we should try to stick to the subject at hand. There is talk of a UN convention. At least, a convention it would be more specific.

We should not try to achieve everything at once when disabled persons still do not have anything, even here in Canada, and even in Quebec. You told me that there is someone here from your riding. Not only there is no one from my riding here, but is there even no one from my province.

It is all very well to develop frameworks, and it is fine and dandy to want to go through CIDA, but we simply cannot do everything without resources and without money. I go over what you told me. Yes, we can do things, but without money, resources or political will, we will not get anywhere. This round-table discussion is interesting, and we could spend two or three hours talking about the issues that were raised by everyone. That is why I cannot ask you any questions. I could ask every member of the panel, questions so as not to put you in the hot seat but to discuss the outrageous situations that we find in this society.

Those are my comments. I want to allow other members to speak as well, but I do hope that the members of this Subcommittee will take the issue seriously. The idea is not to consider programs, be it at CIDA or here. These programs are never sustainable, even here. They are always designed to please. However, how many persons with disabilities, even here, lack a permanent jobs, and how many persons with disabilities do not feel there is a will to integrate them? We say that we do want to integrate them, but are they really integrated in this country?

Let's take it one small step at a time. Let's do a round table. Excuse me, but I am a very pragmatic person. I always do the same thing. What is the priority, what are the first steps that will help us come up with concrete action, instead of mere talk?

» (1715)

I will leave it at that.

[English]

The Chair: You're not allowed to answer that question yet. It's a perfect question for your collective wrap-up.

Wendy and Nancy both have questions. We'll let them ask them, and then we'll give you all a chance to wrap up. Then we have this fantastic motion on our accessible website that we have to pass before anybody slips away.

Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP): Thank you very much.

It's fascinating to hear each of you, because you do speak from both personal and organizational perspectives. You know what you're talking about, which is always a pleasure.

I'm still thinking about a meeting we had about a month ago with presentations by native health workers, who came to the disability committee to talk about the situation facing native children on reserves and in the city and the whole idea that there are so many disabling conditions facing people living in poverty. It really was a horrendous presentation we heard. I have to follow that through to what Michael Bach said about the fact that we are seeing a growing gap between the rich and the poor. Poverty is absolutely the number one problem. It is a very disabling condition. I'd like to ask a couple of questions about that.

Very specifically, we have a role here. Our federal government has had an international profile, and we're proud of it, in respect of land mines, and that's a good example. I'm glad you raised it, because it seems to me we have an opportunity to play a lead role in several issues. I'd like to hear where we are in some very specific things. What kind of leadership are we showing in child labour around the world? What kind of leadership are we showing in standing up to pharmaceutical companies on HIV-AIDS drugs in Africa?

I'm very concerned about our immigration policy. We have a discriminatory immigration policy, so we are not showing any kind of leadership in opening our doors to persons with disabilities. We are seeing families that can never be reunified, because we will not allow members of families in who have a disability. So there are some just very obvious places where we can be leaders. I want to know if you feel we are doing anything right in moving ahead our immigration policy to make it less discriminatory.

The Chair: Nancy.

Ms. Nancy Karetak-Lindell (Nunavut, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

I was very struck by a comment made by Mr. Steve Estey in talking about how we field in our day-to-day lives the impact of what's happening at the United Nations. How do we bridge that gap with all the great things that are being done internationally through the UN and other national groups that are advocating on behalf of persons with disabilities? How do we get that information to the people who are affected? How do we engage them? I represent a riding where isolation makes it very difficult for persons with disabilities to even communicate with other people with disabilities, never mind know what their rights are. I find it very frustrating that we almost have to deal with these people case by case, person by person.

You talk about monitoring whether those conventions are being carried out, whether those statutes are being acted upon. When you're, say, grading the provinces and territories, how do we do that? How do we find out how each territory or province is doing in carrying out those programs that they should be carrying out? Especially in my case, where a majority of the money comes from the federal government for the territory, is there a mechanism? Is there a watchdog, maybe one of the NGOs, monitoring those types of situations?

As you say, it's very difficult for Canada to say it's one of the best countries in the world when people in aboriginal communities are still very much below the poverty line. I would imagine it is even worse for aboriginals with disabilities, as difficult as it is for any person with disabilities. In trying to relate things to people in my communities, I'm sometimes at a loss as to how to make a bridge. How will it affect someone in their day-to-day life if they can't even secure simple services in their communities?

» (1720)

The Chair: While you're thinking about the answers you're going to be able to give in five minutes, we have this little motion that authorizes subcommittee staff to begin development on the enhanced subcommittee informational website as part of the subcommittee's upcoming study on issues concerning CPP disability.

(Motion agreed to—See Minutes of Proceedings)

The Chair: David.

Mr. David Shannon: I'm thinking of the question raised with respect to connecting resources or poverty and disability, and also the issue of aboriginal persons with a disability and finding connections. I teach international human rights at Negahneewin College in Thunder Bay, and with my students I often find that very question: As aboriginal persons, how do we make connections to disability issues and human rights, and then somehow bring that into an international perspective?

With respect to human rights, we have a long continuum. At one end are economic rights and poverty. I would submit it's not just a question of poverty, it's about disability, it's about human rights. There also are social rights, individual rights, rights to have families and vote in a democratic fashion. That's part of the continuum. As this committee is probably aware, 17% of the Canadian public have a disability, 40% of aboriginal persons have a disability. Those numbers arise out of poverty and other issues.

One of the exciting things I found with my students is understanding isolation and other matters that affect aboriginal communities. There are some very interesting and exciting models, of course, in New Zealand, Africa, and elsewhere that my students become very interested in as they refer to what's happening in Canada and how Canada might advance its models.

Therefore, there is a very exciting potential for reciprocating relationships with respect to international human rights, disability, and development, and as this is the first year of the decade of disabled persons in Africa, I think there is some very interesting potential for partnerships, and perhaps exchanges, for first nations and for all Canadians.

» (1725)

The Chair: Laurie.

Mr. Laurie Beachell: The question was asked about priorities, and there are many priorities. We identify, as a community, many issues, because there are many issues. I think we are not asking for significant new resources for this area, our resources being spent by CIDA and energies being spent by Foreign Affairs in this area. What we require is some greater coordination and participation of the community in those discussions.

Diane commented about the impact of support for Disabled Peoples International and what that has meant on a very broad scale in giving voice to people with disabilities, and I would respond to the member from Nunavut that the essential of giving voice to people with disabilities to identify their concerns and issues is what has worked so well in many countries. It has been that self-help model of people with disabilities coming together to identify their needs and priorities. It is not that we need a project in this particular skill development, it is support for building of civil society, to give voice to those who have been under-represented and impoverished.

To address Wendy Lill's question on immigration, we're fighting for change to the Immigration Act. There have been some modifications for family reunification whereby the excessive demand clause does not apply now in cases of refugees and in cases of immediate family, but that is fairly restrictive. It would not allow you to bring your grandfather or a cousin. It would be immediate family members, and where the government is at is the other side of the table in the courts fighting us when we say the Immigration Act discriminates on the basis of disability. We intervene in various cases, but on the other side of the table is the Government of Canada defending the position that people with disabilities will create excessive demand, that we should deny immigration based on the fact that they have disability and may cause significant cost to our health education system, etc.

Ms. Diane Richler: I'd like to respond mostly to the question from the member from Nunavut, because the whole question of engaging the Canadian public is also linked, I think, to what we have to offer to the world today, and that's related to the link between the fight for human rights for people with a disability, meaning inclusion and the value within Canadian society of inclusion.

I've only made one trip to Nunavut, but what struck me there was the diversity of the people who have chosen to live there, which I think is really representative of the diversity of Canada. When other people look at Canada, what they see is that we have tried to develop our communities in ways that can be inclusive of a broad spectrum of people, that we haven't defined a Canadian norm and asked everybody to fit in with it. We've tried to design our communities so that there's room for everybody, and if your unique characteristic is your religious heritage or your ethnic heritage or your mother tongue or your dress, that's okay.

So our schools tend to be places where there's a valuing of multiculturalism. There's a difference in schools now, there's a respect for a whole series of traditions. The youngest member of our family, who is one and a half, is learning to sign in day care, because everyone is learning to sign in day care. That's just part of what education is about now. Even though there is not a deaf child present now, the day care workers know those children are going to interact with deaf children and colleagues in the future.

So I think Canada is an inclusive place, and I think those kinds of values also contribute to a new understanding of human security. That's where I think some of the linkages are between what the disability community has to offer through promoting inclusion to a much broader global agenda of building peace. I think members of our communities understand that they want our communities to be inclusive, and they can see themselves reflected in the countries many of their members come from and the diversity that's there. That is probably the most characteristic vision Canada has to offer to the world, that human rights mean inclusion, inclusion respects diversity, and diversity builds peace. I think that's a starting point for the future.

» (1730)

Mr. Steve Estey: I just wanted to make a quick point. It seems everybody is interested in talking about Nunavut now, and as we were talking, I was thinking about an organization CCD has worked with that deals with people with disabilities in Africa and Asia who perhaps face many of the same issues of isolation as people with disabilities in Nunavut and in the north. I was in Yellowknife last year and was talking with people there about the situation of disabled people, and the same kinds of questions were raised. I just wanted to make mention of this organization. It's called Action on Disability and Development, and I'd be quite delighted to share information with you after the meeting about them. They developed specific tools, programs, training, and outreach for self-help programs for people with disabilities that revolve mainly around getting disabled people to go out and find other disabled people, rather than relying on setting up an office or building and hoping people come to them.

Thanks.

Mr. Michael Bach: I have a couple of comments to respond to questions about how to be pragmatic, leadership on immigration, and how this touches us in our daily lives in Canada.

A number of political analysts and thinkers are asking why we haven't seen states move forward on progressive public policy consistent with our human rights commitments, in the case of Italy, in the case of Japan, in India in the face of horrific communal violence going on, and with other countries. They come to one very simple conclusion: you have to strengthen and deepen civil society organizations and capacity. It's there that voices come together, it's there that knowledge is generated, it's there that societies can hold governments accountable. As for being pragmatic, I don't think we've looked closely enough at the leadership and the outcomes that have come from our investments in civil society and NGO organizations in the international arena in Canada. I don't think we've put it together to understand the kind of model of capacity building that's actually been generated. I think we should do that now, before we lose the capacity of civil society organizations, and it'll just be archival work.

Mr. Laurie Beachell: I have large archives already.

Mr. Michael Bach: We don't want you to be in the archives, though, Laurie.

Second, with leadership on immigration, Laurie's comments are right on concerning the excessive demand provisions. The problem is, we can't even bring our policy limitations into question in the area of immigration. It's interesting that we've incorporated in the regulations a gender lens. We might want to look at developing a disability lens for immigration regulations.

As for how this can make sense in the Canadian context, I think it's specifically to do with human rights education and monitoring, and we don't actually have good models and capacity. If we look at the early childhood development agreement, the approach there was to leave it up to federal, provincial, and territorial governments to try to work out a monitoring framework. It's not worked, and what's happening now is that the advisory groups are turning basically to the NGO children, family, and disability communities to come up with an outcomes framework, saying, well, maybe NGOs can hold us accountable when they come up with the framework, because we can't fully figure it out, other than, of course, how much we're spending. If we would actually move forward on progressive disability policy in this country, I think the community, before an agreement was negotiated between the federal, provincial, and territorial governments, could very quickly come up with an outcomes framework that's pretty clear and pretty solid.

There is now capacity growing. In Nunavut we just have had our territorial affiliate formally instituted in the last month, the Pamiqsaiji Association--you've met with them, good. We'll be up to meet with you and others in the next couple of months. So there is now capacity in diverse regions across this country that actually, as Diane said, share a common framework of inclusion, which I think we can really build on.

Thank you.

» (1735)

The Chair: Thank you. We think that's a better system than behind closed doors, without anybody having a say.

Joan, and then we'll see if the officials have any benediction.

Ms. Joan Westland: To echo again what Michael and others have said, there is that need for coordination and for some thoughtful planning, I think, on policy and program design and delivery, which is part of the coordination, but not only so that the things are interconnected, but so that the whole makes some sense, even asking whether these activities are incorporated within the priorities of the government of the country in which they're being implemented, and whether they march to the same tune. With situations where you have a project on land mine survivors and the ministry that's responsible for the inclusion and dealing with employment for land mine survivors is the one player that isn't part of the program, I would sit back and say, this isn't really marching along with what's going on in the host country.

So it's not just coordination for making sure we know who is doing what, and it's not only linking that through information, but it's really asking whether this is being thoughtful and strategic in a larger sense and is meeting some of the principles Canada says it endorses and believes in. Does this match up, or is this again working in some isolated sector? It's that kind of coordination that's thoughtful, as well as being logical and part of a process. It starts with a request for some strategic planning within our own national framework, which would then, by virtue of its existence, translate into international initiatives. We need to start with our own national environment to be effective, otherwise, what you're doing in your international strategy may, in fact, conflict with what we're supporting or promoting within our own organizations or our own communities.

As to the enormous gap in our regions, which are certainly north-south and rural-urban, I think the resolution is to be systematic. It's a long-term investment. That's one of the other frustrations we continually experience, the sporadic, short-term investment that's supposed to be addressing issues that have been in existence for many years. Again, one timeframe doesn't make any sense, having 8 months to deal with a 200-year tradition that you're trying to resolve. So some of that is incompatible.

We do have some tools for some of the issues you were talking about in your region. The standard rules were designed to provide a mechanism for countries and regions, and communities within countries, of use in addressing some of the issues that cannot be addressed by massive delegations coming and sitting down with you for four years to try to help you build an inclusive and barrier-free community. There have been some instruments put into place. We anticipated when we designed them that they would be of use at local, regional, provincial, and national levels. They weren't designed exclusively to be used in what we would call the developing world. We tried to develop something that would have a greater application than that. So I would suggest that may be something for you to take a look at.

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Mr. Michael Bach: I would want to make sure this discussion keeps us working both internationally and nationally. If we just focus nationally, we're not going to make any advance, because Canada is actually trailing massively in disability policy. We are trailing behind behind not only the Nordic countries, but the States, Australia, the U.K. To the extent that we think we're going to find the solutions here, to that extent we're going to continue to fail. So I think we need to pluck up our courage and go out there. While we've been leaders on human rights frameworks, we haven't been on disability policy.

There's a growing recognition, with the recent report to the President of the European Union on why the European Union is not moving forward on policy development in light of the European Union treaties, that it is precisely because the learning isn't taking place. The exchange is not taking place across jurisdictions in social policy models and development. Canada really has to look beyond its borders now, because we're being left in the dust.

Mr. Adrian Norfolk: I thought I would try to address the question you asked, Ms. Bennett, which was about how a convention can help domestically. Although I think we remain to be convinced that this is the most effective way of proceeding at the moment, the fact is, of course, that if there is a convention with a committee, as David has said, there will be a framework for a systematic form of evaluation of Canada's performance against such a convention. Just as with the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Convention, CEDAW, and CERD, there will be the important role of civil society, which will, among others, hold us to account.

This also addresses Ms. Karetak-Lindell's question as to what mechanism is out there to make sure the territories and provinces actually do perform and to consider what progress they are making. As we do with existing conventions, the government and the individual provinces and territories would all contribute their sections to such a report. It's clear that would be the case. Then there would be opportunity for NGOs to have input into or to comment on that. Also, NGOs have direct access to these committees. This would be the case with another convention, I'm sure. Clearly, that's how it would work, and I can see the advantage there. Again, we're talking theory, and how many years ahead that will happen is another question.

Actually Ms. Lill has left, which is good, because her questions were too difficult for me anyway. I understand that with regard to the child labour question, our own department's leadership is somewhat diminished since the adoption of the ILO convention on the worst forms of child labour, which was adopted two years ago. I'll defer to my CIDA colleagues on that, because I think they've been doing some work in this area. Immigration policies I wouldn't pretend to be able to comment on.

» (1745)

Mrs. Kirsten Mlacak (Deputy Director, Human Rights and Social Policy Branch, Canadian International Development Agency): I am always impressed to see the tremendous amount of expertise and knowledge about CIDA that resides outside CIDA, and I've heard that today.

There are many things going on at CIDA: new development discussions; talks about trying to be more knowledge-based and policy-driven, which I think dovetail very nicely; human rights approaches, which is why we referred to that in our opening comments. These I think can coalesce very nicely to provide some real momentum and opportunity to look more coherently at disability and development cooperation.

That said,

[Translation]

I quite agree with what Mr. Lanctôt said: let's take it one small step at a time.

[English]

I think that's only realistic in our own context, although, on the example of gender mainstreaming, while CIDA has a 30-year history of taking very small, slow steps toward an integrated policy on gender, we have seen some tremendous progress in this regard, and indeed, some real development impacts. We're very aware of how these new analytical approaches can really benefit both the thinking and the on-the-ground interventions that can take place in development. As I think many of the people in the room know, we have been involved in discussions in this regard, and we'll rely very heavily on much of the work that has been done already in looking at what lessons can be learned from other development agencies. We know very well that we have much to learn outside our own walls.

On child labour, I'm also not in a position to speak at length, but I was able to give Ms. Lill a copy of our child protection action plan on her way out, which speaks in greater detail of our issues on child labour. All our action plans under the social development priorities are on the CIDA website. I didn't bring enough copies with me for everyone.

The Chair: Adrian.

Mr. Adrian Norfolk: I meant to mention that the report that's just about to come out in its entirety has a whole section on the existing instruments, the six conventions, and how they should be utilized more. I would argue that NGOs should look closely at the resolutions that are being debated right now and what Canada co-sponsors and agrees to in these resolutions. There is no need to wait for another convention before holding the government accountable to what it's saying in international forums.

The Chair: Thank you very much. I think we've all learned a lot this afternoon. When we think back to the first year of this committee, though we called twelve ministers, we didn't call the Minister of Foreign Affairs or the Minister responsible for CIDA. That I promise will never happen again. I think what we've learned more than anything today is that for Canada to have a coherent policy on disability, we need to know how we look out, what we bring home, and that informs everything we do on this tiny planet.

Thank you all for coming, and à bientôt. The meeting is adjourned.