On June 20, 2023, the Senate passed the House’s recommended changes to Bill C-22. Since both the House and the Senate approved Bill C-22 with the same text, the Bill now moves to Royal Assent. Once the Governor General grants Royal Assent, which we expect to take place quickly, Bill C-22 will become law. Read our press release here for our reaction to this great news!
What happened between our last update in May and now?
We provided our last update at the end of May, when the Senate added six amendments to Bill C-22 and then sent these amendments back to the House for approval.
On June 14, 2023, the House held a limited debate on the Senate’s May amendments to the Bill, and decided to keep four of the amendments as is, strengthen one amendment, and remove one amendment.
The House kept the following four amendments as is:
- The preamble to the Bill includes the following language: “Whereas persons with disabilities may face additional barriers because of their gender, racialized or Indigenous status or other intersecting statuses;”
- When setting the amount of the Canada Disability Benefit, policymakers must take into account the additional costs of living with a disability, barriers to earning an income, intersectionality, and Canada’s international human rights obligations, in addition to the Official Poverty Line.
- Clarified timelines to create the Canada Disability Benefit, including a one-year timeframe to get the regulations that govern the Benefit in order.
- A technical legislative drafting amendment that provides flexibility for the numbering of sections in Bill C-22 if there is a need for any consequential changes.
The House also strengthened the right to appeal amendment by allowing the future regulations to expand on what can be appealed. Previously, the amendment limited appeals to either Benefit ineligibility or the Benefit amount received. The right of appeal, first enshrined in the Bill by the Senate, guarantees that recipients and those denied the Benefit can appeal a decision to an appeal body. The specific appeal body will be named in the future regulations. An example of a federal appeal body is the Social Security Tribunal, which hears Canada Pension Plan – Disability appeals, among others.
The House removed a Senate amendment that would have stopped insurance companies clawing back the Canada Disability Benefit from anyone who receives long-term disability benefits under an insurance policy or an employee plan. While we are disappointed the House removed this Senate amendment from the Bill, we urge the federal government to confirm agreements with provincial and territorial governments that will eliminate any clawbacks to the Benefit, in any form. ISAC believes that no entity should claw back the Canada Disability Benefit from recipients.
For a review of the entire legislative process Bill C-22 underwent, click here. For a simplified, general overview of the process of how a bill becomes law, click here.
What happens now?
Bill C-22 will receive Royal Assent soon, making the Bill law. However, the Canada Disability Benefit will likely not come into force until the hard work of developing the regulations is complete. The regulations will include important details on how to receive, administer, and enforce the Benefit. For example, the regulations will outline eligibility requirements, the application process, the appeal process, the amount of the Benefit, and much more.
The government has said that they will engage in a “co-creation” process with the disability community to develop the regulations, but we do not know what this will look like yet. It could be a survey on their website, it could be public meetings and focus groups, it could be something entirely different – unfortunately, we do not have any detailed information. The Bill says that the government must report on how the collaborative process is going within six months of the Bill’s passage, so more details should emerge within the next six months.
The Bill also says that the government must produce a progress report on how the development of the regulations is going within a year. This is a short timeline, but our hope is that the government will work quickly and collaboratively to decide important details over the next year, ensuring that people living with disabilities in poverty receive life-saving financial relief.
People with Disabilities NEED income support now. When will the Canada Disability Benefit be available?
As we noted in May, there is no straightforward answer to this question. The Benefit does not exist yet. The difference between today and the time of our last update is that the Bill will now become law, and the timelines for getting all of the details in order will commence. Our best estimate is that the Benefit will be available in one to two years from now.
Some advocacy groups and people with disabilities have urged the federal government to provide a Disability Emergency Relief Benefit to provide more immediate support for people with disabilities who live in poverty. There is also room to improve access to the existing Disability Tax Credit, and other federal and provincial benefits meant to support people with disabilities. We will continue with our advocacy to improve current credits and benefits while the creation of the Canada Disability Benefit takes place.
What you can do right now:
- Learn more about what “co-creation” could look like by reading this new report by March of Dimes and Prosper Canada.
- Check out Disability Without Poverty’s Budget the Benefit campaign, which calls on the federal government to make sure that money is added to next year’s federal budget so that the Canada Disability Benefit can be made available as soon as possible. You can send a digital postcard to your MP through Disability Without Poverty’s website here.
- Get involved in local advocacy campaigns that call for increasing Ontario Disability Support Program rates and changing unfair rules. The ODSP Action Coalition and the Disability Justice Network of Ontario are just two of many provincial organizations to check out.