Devaluing Ontarians with Intellectual Disabilities
- November 28, 2018
- Laura Lepine
- Comments Off on Devaluing Ontarians with Intellectual Disabilities
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The Ontario government has announced a change to the Employment Standards Act that will have a significant, negative impact on Ontarians with intellectual disabilities: a delay to the end of sheltered workshops.
“Sheltered workshops” are places where people with disabilities are employed for incredibly low wages (under $2.00 per hour). Under the Employment Standards Act, sheltered workshops are excluded from the wage protections in place for other Ontario workers.
The previous government committed to repealing the sheltered workshop exclusion clause by January 1st, 2019. Now, it is not clear when the exclusion clause will be repealed – or if it will be repealed at all.
David Baker of bakerlaw was instrumental in conducting the original minimum wage, Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, Employment Insurance, and Canada Pension Plan cases that established how sheltered workshops must operate as places of employment while Executive Director of ARCH Disability Law Centre in the 1980s.
You can read more about how this change will devalue Ontarians with intellectual disabilities here (link).