Denying long-term government help to alcoholics and/or drug addicts...???
IN CANADA,,, Denying long-term government support payments to alcoholics and drug addicts violates the province’s
Denying long-term government support payments to alcoholics and drug addicts violates the province’s Human Rights Code because it discriminates on the basis of disability, the Ontario Court of Appeal has affirmed.
In a 3-0 decision Thursday, the court dismissed an appeal from the director of the Ontario Disability Support Program, who argued that provincial legislation preventing addicts from drawing long-term disability benefits was meant to assist them in their recovery.
The ruling means some people who are unable to work or function in the community because of a severe alcohol or drug dependency — including a former Sudbury truck driver at the centre of the case — will be entitled to nearly twice as much in government benefits.
Had the province been permitted to deny Robert Tranchemontagne long-term disability payments, his only social assistance option would have been a welfare cheque of $585 a month through the Ontario Works program, which also requires recipients to look for a job and undergo treatment for addictions.
Under the Ontario Disability Support Program, which does not impose the same obligations on recipients, a single person can receive up to $1,042 per month.
“It is well known that addicts and welfare recipients have been, and continue to be, the subjects of stigma and prejudice,” said Justice Janet Simmons, writing on behalf of a panel that included justices Eleanore Cronk and Paul Rouleau.
The case focused on a provision in the Ontario Disability Support Program Act, which withheld disability benefits from anyone whose sole disability was a dependence on alcohol, drugs or another chemically addictive substance.
That provision places addicts at a disadvantage, the court said, because it deprives them of benefits available to other disabled people and perpetuates stereotypes.
The legislation was introduced by the Conservative government of former premier Mike Harris.
It contains no “obvious explanation” for why they were excluded from disability benefits, the appeal panel said.
Through a succession of court hearings that began a decade ago when Tranchemontagne and another alcoholic, Norman Werbeski, launched a challenge to the legislation, the director of the disability support program argued it was meant to help addicts recover.
The argument was based largely on social science evidence from the province’s expert witness, Dr. William Jacyk, an addiction specialist at the Homewood Health Centre in Guelph.
In Jacyk’s opinion, disqualifying addicts from disability support payments while allowing them to remain eligible for welfare was appropriate from a medical standpoint because it promotes recovery.
Among other things, it means they have less money to spend on alcohol and drugs and ensures the government isn’t promoting a spirit of long-term infirmity, he said.
But in Thursday’s decision, which upholds the conclusions of a Divisional Court panel last year, Simmons was critical of Jacyk’s evidence, noting, for example, that he couldn’t offer any comment about whether his own patients fared better on welfare than on disability payments.
A social benefits tribunal which found the legislation discriminatory back in 2006 was “entirely justified” in rejecting the notion the province was trying to help addicts by denying them disability benefits, she said.
The court was told Tranchemontagne, 58, a former steelworker, began drinking when he was 18 and has been an alcoholic since his late thirties, He hasn’t worked since 1996.
His doctor said he is not employable because of his alcoholism.
Werbeski, who died last year after being hit by a car, began drinking when he was 16.
Paul Doig, a spokesman for the Ministry of Community and Social Services, said the exclusion provision has not been applied since last year’s Divisional Court ruling and that will continue while the ministry considers whether to seek an appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada.on the basis of disability, the Ontario Court of Appeal has affirmed.
In a 3-0 decision Thursday, the court dismissed an appeal from the director of the Ontario Disability Support Program, who argued that provincial legislation preventing addicts from drawing long-term disability benefits was meant to assist them in their recovery.
The ruling means some people who are unable to work or function in the community because of a severe alcohol or drug dependency — including a former Sudbury truck driver at the centre of the case — will be entitled to nearly twice as much in government benefits.
Had the province been permitted to deny Robert Tranchemontagne long-term disability payments, his only social assistance option would have been a welfare cheque of $585 a month through the Ontario Works program, which also requires recipients to look for a job and undergo treatment for addictions.
Under the Ontario Disability Support Program, which does not impose the same obligations on recipients, a single person can receive up to $1,042 per month.
“It is well known that addicts and welfare recipients have been, and continue to be, the subjects of stigma and prejudice,” said Justice Janet Simmons, writing on behalf of a panel that included justices Eleanore Cronk and Paul Rouleau.
The case focused on a provision in the Ontario Disability Support Program Act, which withheld disability benefits from anyone whose sole disability was a dependence on alcohol, drugs or another chemically addictive substance.
That provision places addicts at a disadvantage, the court said, because it deprives them of benefits available to other disabled people and perpetuates stereotypes.
The legislation was introduced by the Conservative government of former premier Mike Harris.
It contains no “obvious explanation” for why they were excluded from disability benefits, the appeal panel said.
Through a succession of court hearings that began a decade ago when Tranchemontagne and another alcoholic, Norman Werbeski, launched a challenge to the legislation, the director of the disability support program argued it was meant to help addicts recover.
The argument was based largely on social science evidence from the province’s expert witness, Dr. William Jacyk, an addiction specialist at the Homewood Health Centre in Guelph.
In Jacyk’s opinion, disqualifying addicts from disability support payments while allowing them to remain eligible for welfare was appropriate from a medical standpoint because it promotes recovery.
Among other things, it means they have less money to spend on alcohol and drugs and ensures the government isn’t promoting a spirit of long-term infirmity, he said.
But in Thursday’s decision, which upholds the conclusions of a Divisional Court panel last year, Simmons was critical of Jacyk’s evidence, noting, for example, that he couldn’t offer any comment about whether his own patients fared better on welfare than on disability payments.
A social benefits tribunal which found the legislation discriminatory back in 2006 was “entirely justified” in rejecting the notion the province was trying to help addicts by denying them disability benefits, she said.
The court was told Tranchemontagne, 58, a former steelworker, began drinking when he was 18 and has been an alcoholic since his late thirties, He hasn’t worked since 1996.
His doctor said he is not employable because of his alcoholism.
Werbeski, who died last year after being hit by a car, began drinking when he was 16.
Paul Doig, a spokesman for the Ministry of Community and Social Services, said the exclusion provision has not been applied since last year’s Divisional Court ruling and that will continue while the ministry considers whether to seek an appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada.
This is not rt the way i see it it is really bad and also in many ways death sentences.................imhp
Shamey.
But truly, if people are not employable because of an addiction, what are they to do? How are they to live? If we are going to say that addiction is a disease of the brain, and we are going to pay for disability, etc for other people with other brain diseases, why are we going to eliminate that ONE disease?
Someone who has spent the better part of their adult life using or drinking heavily may not become employable regardless of whether they stop using or not. We've all seen people whose brain is so damaged by using that they sound wasted even when they have been sober for years. Giving them a tiny $500 payment is not enough for ANYONE to live on--twice that is BARELY enough to squeak by on if you eat Ramen noodles and live in a rented room. No one WANTS that kind of a life, obviously. Healthy young people are not going to say "You know what I think I'll do? I think I will get addicted and strung out so I can live on the govt dole in a refrigerator carton somewhere in an alley!" But it does not help these poor folks to leave them penniless and starving in the street--that only causes them to turn to crime.
The article refers to Canada. In the US you cannot get Social Security (either SSI or SSDI) if addiction is "material to" your disability. In other words, if you injure your back and can't work, you get disabilty, but if you injured you back because you fell passing out from being under the influence and this is due to being in active addiction, you will NOT qualify. Too bad, so sad (as one unwelcome remark goes about addiction) says Social Security.
This problem has a long history. Back in the 80's, I think, SS had new guidelines about addiction & disability. They were supposed to try a 3 year program to help people with addiction get into treatment and become "able", so they gave benefits for addiction with the requirement that the person had a representative payee (often a company - does anyone remember Matrix, Maximus, something like that, I think??) and had to get some kind of treatment (paid by Medicaid) and benefits would extend 3 years, the end of which should have been that the person then became employable. Best of intentions, might have helped if AARP hadn't stepped in that next year and said, no, we need $7 BILLION in the next 10 years for retirees something or other, and Congress caved and out went the addiction benefits experiment - hadn't even been in place a full 3 years for the first folks who qualified.
What I DON'T understand is why the Americans with Disabilities Act doesn't apply to the Social Security Administration?????? As the example above indicates, it seems to be purely a matter of people with addiction having NO VIABLE ADVOCACY (meaning lobbyists), and others having no understanding of the $$$ benefit everyone ELSE gains if we treat addiciton as a disease and not a crime.
I know the Social Security is rethinking the "addiction benefit" right now...so it may be in the near future that people will be able to get SSI/SSDI for addictive disorders.
But no question this is an ADA Violation, but we know in America nothing changes unless you have money to go to court and challenge these discriminatory policies.
