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[OPIRG-EVENTS] SUE'S PRESS RELEASE EMAIL VERSION
Dear Citizens Concerned about NAFTA and FTA and there effects on Education,
Health Care and Social Programs.
Please distribute this as widely as possible on the internet if you have
the time and inclination. If you need any more information you can email
me or call me tonight or tomorrow morning at (613) 658-5384 or after that
time on Sue Clark's cellular number listed below.
Jane Scharf
P R E S S R E L E A S E FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Sue Clark Disabled Activist cellular - 613-290-9259
Mike Clancy CAP Candidate for Brantford 519-758-9134
Jane Scharf CAP Candidate for Leeds and Grenville 613 658-5135
Paul Hellyer CAP Party Leader 1-877-629-0841
Connie Fogal CAP President (604) 687 0588 work or (604) 872
2128 home
CAP website www.canadianactionparty.ca
Whistleblower and Disabled Activist Expose Jane Stewart
Sue Clark is a 45 year old women from Ottawa who is in recipet of a
provincial disability cheque each month because she sufferes with Post
Traumatic Stress. She has asked the Canadian Action Party to help her with
a sit-in protest at , Minister of Human Resource Development, Jane
Steward's constituency office in Brantford, Ontario.
In her letter to the party she tells how she needs help financially to get
there on the train, someone to go with her on the train and support should
she be arrested once she begins her sit-in.
The reason she wants to protest at Steward's office she explains to CAP is
because since the Federal Government withdrew the national standards and
funding for vocational rehabilitation of disabled persons in 1996 Sue has
not been able to receive access and accommodations in post secondary
education. The Minister is failing to provide funding and direction to the
provinces to help the disabled.
The dismantling of the national standards and withdrawal of funding allowed
the province to bring in Bill 142 last year, which eliminated any hope of
getting any help with basic and post secondary education for the disabled.
She has pursued two appeals with Vocational Rehabilitation one in which
decided that she should receive rehabilitation but the province will not
allow it since they cut the whole program after Bill 142 was brought down.
She appealed the denial to appeals court through the West End Legal Clinic
in Ottawa. Last winter Sue had pneumonia several times, which prohibited
her from securing a lawyer soon enough for them to file the necessary
paperwork by September 23, 2000. Her lawyer made a request to the courts
for an extension of the deadlines with a medical certificate provided. The
reason the court gave on October 23 2000 for disallowing the request was
that the respondent the Ministry of Community and Social Services disagreed
with an extension.
CAP has picked up Sue's transportation and food costs and arranged for her
accommodations overnight in Brantford Tuesday night. Jane Scharf, Canadian
Action Party candidate for Leeds and Greville is accompanying Sue on the
train to Brantford where they will be met by Mike Clancy CAP candidate for
Brantford on Tuesday October 31, at 6:15 PM. Together the three will head
to Ms. Steward's constituency office at Market Square #1 Market St., in
Brantford for 9:00 am the following morning.
Sue Clark, says, " I will sit in at Stewart's off ice and I am not leaving
without a written commitment from Ms. Stewart that I will receive the
vocational rehabilitation that I am entitled to under section 15 of the
Charter of Rights and Freedoms which guarantees me equal access and
accommodations in school. I am prepared to risk arrest by refusing to leave
if a written commitment is not forthcoming because I have no more options
for redress of this issue."
Mike Clancy says, "I have a particular interest in this case because I was
forced to resign from HRDC because I refused to disallow training
placements for disabled persons. I was told that providing training for
disabled was a waste of money because they had to many barriers. Yet the
disabled were expected to find work without the training. So I know there
is an agenda to leave the disabled high and dry in terms of
rehabilitation."
Jane Scharf, says, "I have known Sue for many years now and it breaks my
heart to see how hard she struggles just to survive. She could have been
gainfully employed years ago if she had received access and accommodations
in education. Constitutional rights be damned seems to be the sentiment of
both the provincial and the federal government. CAP is going to provide Sue
with support through her protest including her arrest as well as providing
transportation, meals and a place to sleep."
Kenneth Fernandez LLB, BCL, Constitutional and International Affairs
Consultant for the Canadian Action Party says, "what is happening to Sue is
not only immoral it is also unconstitutional. Section 36 and 15 still
obligate the governments to support equalization of the disabled. The
Canadian Action Party, can make the link between this shameful
discrimination against Sue Clark, and the government’s implementation of
the IMF’s privatization i.e. Americanization agenda. The IMF briefing notes
that we have in our possession, obtained through the Access to Information
Act clearly indicate that the IMF requested that the government divest
itself of active participation in maintaining viable social programmes of
national dimensions."
Connie Fogal, CAP's Constitutional Lawyer spearheading the lawsuit against
the Federal Government over so called "free trade "agreements, says, "it is
the unconstitutional provisions of FTA and NAFTA that is driving the
governments to abandon the commitment to rehabilitate the disabled. NAFTA
requires money to be spent in the interest of business not in the interest
of the Canadian citizens. Unfortunately big business has decided they do
not want the disabled. It is imperative that FTA and NAFTA be scrapped and
further so called "Free Trade" negotiations currently taking place be
abandoned or all remaining social, education and health programs will be
gutted in favour of corporate greed. "
Party leader Paul Hellyer says, "All of this regressive social change is
being promoted in the name of laissez-faire economics which insists that
governments are bad and markets are good. In the name of globalization
Government-owned services must be privatized and cease being accountable to
sovereign citizens. Even basic services like health and education are on
the block as Sue Clark found out when trying to get help with her
education. Globalization in my opinion is the highway to poverty,
homelessness and disease for tens of millions of people of this earth. The
hope for Canadian's is not in "free trade" agreements it is in "fair trade"
agreements."
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