A person receiving Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) income support has a duty to report their income, assets, financial situation, and living arrangements to their caseworker. For single recipients living with a disability who require caregivers, ODSP caseworkers often request detailed information to determine whether the recipient and their caregiver are “spouses”. You do not have to be legally married for ODSP to find that a companion, friend, or caregiver is your “spouse” under the applicable legislation. Instead, the “spouse” test considers whether you resided in the same dwelling place for a period of at least three months, are financially interdependent, and share social and familial aspects consistent with cohabitation.
When ODSP requires further information to determine whether there is a spousal relationship, it must provide recipients with a fair process. A finding that two people are “spouses” has significant negative financial impact on a recipient. For example, an ODSP recipient can lose their income support entirely if the financial assets of their supposed “spouse” rises above the asset threshold of $40,000 allowed under ODSP.
The Income Security Advocacy Centre and the Grey Bruce Community Legal Clinic represented an ODSP recipient who required two caregivers to assist her with her day-to-day activities and literacy-based support. ODSP believed that one of these caregivers was her “spouse” and asked her to provide extensive information about this caregiver. However, on the same date that ODSP requested this information it also issued a decision suspending the recipient from receiving income support. ODSP did this despite stating in the request for information that the recipient would have one month to gather the relevant information from her caregiver.
We challenged ODSP’s failure to allow our client to explain her situation. ODSP’s process was unfair because our client was suspended from income support before she could provide information and explain that her caregiver was not her “spouse”.
The Social Benefits Tribunal agreed that ODSP has a duty to make sure that the process is fair when making decisions that affect social assistance recipients’ ability to pay for food, rent, medical benefits, and basic necessities. ODSP failed to follow its own procedures and denied our client a fair process. Accordingly, the Tribunal rescinded ODSP’s decision to suspend our client’s benefits.
Read the Social Benefits Tribunal’s decision on CanLII here, and a PDF of the decision here.