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Introduction: Where We Are Now

Five Committees Established

Responsibility for the AODA was transferred from the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to the Minister of Community and Social Services in late June 2005, shortly after the legislation was passed.

Since then, the minister has created standards development committees to develop standards in five areas:

• The customer service committee, established in January 2006, was the first to complete its work. The Accessibility Standards for Customer Service were established in regulation on January 1, 2008 and came into force for the provincial government and the broader public sector on January 1, 2010. The regulation will apply to the private and not-for-profit sectors on January 1, 2012.
• The transportation committee also began meeting in early 2006. Its initial proposed standard was released for public review in June 2007. The committee revised the initial draft to reflect public input and then sent the final proposed standard to the minister in November 2008.
• The information and communications committee started its work in spring 2007. It developed an initial proposed standard that went through public review from November 2008 to February 2009. The committee made revisions and submitted its final proposed standard to the minister in June 2009.
• The employment committee began meeting in fall 2007. It prepared an initial proposed standard that was posted for public review from February to May 2009. After considering the feedback, the committee submitted its final proposed standard to the minister in September 2009.
• The built environment committee also started work in fall 2007. It developed an initial proposed standard that underwent public review from July to October 2009. The committee will reconvene to consider the feedback in spring 2010.

The terms of reference for the standards development committees established to date provide for each committee to disband following the minister’s decision on whether to recommend adoption of a proposed standard as a regulation. As a result, new committees must be created to conduct the five-year reviews of standards under the legislation.

Changes to the Standards Development Process

Changes were made to the standards development process as the result of a letter from the Premier to the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance in September 2007. Following the letter, with the exception of the customer service committee, whose work was complete, all committees were directed to suspend operation until spring 2008.

The most significant change was the commitment to ensure that 50 per cent of standards development committee membership is comprised of persons with disabilities or disability community representatives. Committee members are appointed by the minister. To achieve the 50 per cent level, additional members from the disability community were recruited to each of the four committees still at work, in late February or early March 2008. At the same time, it was made clear that committees could vote on individual clauses rather than having to vote on a proposed standard in its entirety.

A further commitment was made to waive ministries’ official roles as committee members. This was done: ministry representatives were no longer eligible to vote on committee decisions but continued to attend meetings.

As well, in January 2008, in line with another commitment, the ADO assigned a full-time staff person to co-ordinate support for committee members from the disability community. After consultations, the staff person put in place an online collaborative tool so disability representatives could share information and documents, organized teleconferences and face-to-face meetings to help the disability community find common ground, and arranged for specialized expertise to support the work of the disability members.