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Act Now
The Government of Canada is leading consultations to inform planned accessibility legislation.
In-person sessions are coming soon to your community. Now is the chance to have your say. Read more.
Human Rights
CCD's work in the area of Human Rights and Equality Rights apprises judges, law-makers and other decision-makers about how disability must be taken into consideration in all areas of community life, thus ensuring Canadians with disabilities have full enjoyment of their human and equality rights. The Canadian Human Rights Act prohibits discrimination against persons with disabilities and the Equality Rights Section of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees people with disabilities equal benefit and protection before and under the law.
CCD's Human Rights Committee monitors court cases and law reform which could affect persons with disabilities, guides CCD's legal interventions, analyzes human rights/equality rights questions for the CCD National Council and provides recommendations on possible courses of action.
Recent Work
July 12, 2018
TRACY LATIMER MUST NOT BE ERASED; HER MURDER MUST NOT BE PARDONED
Multiple news outlets are reporting that Robert Latimer has submitted a letter to the Minister of Justice seeking a pardon or a new trial following his conviction for the murder of his daughter Tracy in 1993.
Latimer has been free on parole since 2010. Contrary to some media reports, Latimer has been able to travel outside Canada since 2015, according to the Globe and Mail.
Disability rights activists are concerned that the pardon request is a “symptom and effect of the continuing devaluation of disabled people” as shown by the legalization of assisted suicide and euthanasia in 2016, according to Amy Hasbrouck, director of Toujours Vivant-Not Dead Yet. She notes that individual choice is supposed to be key to the suspension of homicide laws in cases of assisted suicide and euthanasia. “Yet Tracy was not given a choice.”
Dr. Heid Janz, Chair of CCD’s Ending-of-Life Ethics Committee, expresses profound dismay at the mainstream media’s continuing practice of disseminating entirely erroneous descriptions of Tracy Latimer’s condition. “Some reports on Latimer’s petition revived the decades’ old false description of Tracy Latimer as a bed-ridden quadriplegic,” Janz said. “But the fact, documented in all of Latimer’s trials, is that Tracy rode the school bus to her school program right up until the weekend that her father murdered her.”
April 24, 2018
S.A. v. Metro Vancouver Housing Corporation
On April 25, 2018, the Council of Canadians with Disabilities (CCD) is intervening in a very important case before the Supreme Court of Canada. This case could have a significant impact on persons with disabilities, affecting their autonomy, independence and inclusion. The case is called S.A. v. Metro Vancouver Housing Corporation. It raises the question: can absolute discretionary trusts, also known as Henson Trusts, be taken into account in eligibility criteria for social programs, like a housing subsidy or social assistance? Read more.
February 27, 2018
MEDIA ADVISORY
The Council of Canadians with Disabilities (CCD), the ODSP Action Coalition and the Income Security Advocacy Centre (ISAC) will be at the Divisional Court - Superior Court of Justice to intervene in an appeal hearing on a case called Abbey v. Ontario on February 28, 2018. ARCH Disability Law Centre (ARCH) and ISAC are representing the interveners. Read more.
More on Human Rights
July 28, 2017
CCD Alarmed by Blatant Disregard of MAID Legislation
January 25, 2017
Media Advisory: CCD Available to Comment on "Mary Kills People"
November 26, 2016
Strategies for Competent and Ethical Disability Law Advocacy
September 22, 2016
Charter challenge of forced psychiatric treatment filed in BC Supreme Court
June 15, 2016
Media Advisory - National Forum for Robust Safeguards in Bill C -14 - Ottawa: Thursday June 16
June 15, 2016
Share Your Voice: Community Forum for Robust Safeguards in Bill C-14 Thursday, June 16th
Some members of the CCD team at the Supreme Court of Canada on April 25, 2018 to intervene in S.A. v. Metro Vancouver Housing Corporation. (L. to R. Bob Brown, CCD Human Rights Committee member, Dianne Wintermute, legal counsel (ARCH), Dahlia James, a second year JD candidate at U. of Ottawa and Prof. Ravi Malhotra’s Research Assistant and Luke Reid, legal counsel (ARCH) , and Prof. Ravi Malhotra, a member of the Human Rights Committee, Prof. Anne Levesque, Chair of the Human Rights Committee, and Erin Carr, a second year JD candidate.
January 26, 2004
Twenty Years of Litigating for Disability Equality Rights: Has it Made a Difference?
This paper traces the evolution of disability equality rights; from demanding recognition and inclusion in human rights law, to becoming experienced litigatiors for a substantive vision of equality in Canada. Read more.
The Latimer Case
The Latimer case directly concerned the rights of persons with disabilities. Mr. Latimer's view was that a parent has the right to kill a child with a disability if that parent decides the child's quality of life no longer warrants its continuation. CCD explained to the court and to the public how that view threatens the lives of people with disabilities and is deeply offensive to fundamental constitutional values. Learn more.