006. Speaking Out on ADAP: A Conversation with MLA Marie Renaud & Advocate Zachary Weeks

Episode Summary:

In this episode of We Advocate, Gordon and Annie sit down with two powerful voices in Alberta’s disability community: MLA Marie Renaud (St. Albert, Opposition Shadow Minister for Community & Social Services) and disability advocate Zachary Weeks.

Together, they unpack what’s happening behind the scenes with the proposed Alberta Disability Assistance Program (ADAP), from the lack of meaningful consultation to fears about reduced benefits, reassessments, and the real-world impact on people who rely on AISH.

Marie offers an insider’s view of how legislation actually moves through the Alberta Legislature (and how that process is being shortened and constrained), while Zachary shares what he’s hearing directly from disabled Albertans: fear, anxiety, and a growing sense that they are being pushed further into poverty and blamed for needing support.

This is a grounded, honest conversation about policy, power, and people - and what all of us can do next.

Why this matters:

• This isn’t abstract policy — it’s rent, food, and medication.
• It sets the tone for how Alberta treats disabled people.
• The process signals how other systems may be changed.
• Families and caregivers are being pushed to the breaking point.
• Silence will be read as consent. 

Key Takeaways:

• ADAP is coming — but the rules aren’t clear. The government has announced the Alberta Disability Assistance Program (ADAP) to “replace” or sit alongside AISH, but so far we have only a discussion paper and vague timelines, not full legislation or detailed regulations.
• Democratic process is being squeezed. Marie explains that debates in the Legislature are often shortened or pushed through multiple stages in a single day, meaning fewer MLAs get to speak and big changes can pass with minimal scrutiny.
• People with disabilities are being left out of the design.
• There has been no meaningful consultation with the disability community, front-line advocates, or opposition MLAs on how ADAP should work — despite it fundamentally changing financial supports for ~80,000 people on AISH.
• Fear and anxiety are sky-high.

Disabled Albertans are worried about:

• Mass reassessments of AISH recipients
• Being judged on a simplistic idea of “ability to work”
• Losing benefits or being pushed onto a lower-benefit tier with no clear appeal path
• The employment promise doesn’t match reality.

Government messaging suggests ADAP will “empower” people to work, but:

• There is no robust infrastructure to support disabled workers
• Employers aren’t being meaningfully prepared or educated
• Even non-disabled Albertans are struggling to find stable, livable-wage work

Memorable Lines:

“I’ve never seen this magnitude of change with so little information.” – Marie

“They’re drafting programs and policies at a table where the very people affected aren’t even sitting.” – Zachary

“We used to be proud that Alberta led the way on disability supports. Now we’re watching that pedestal crumble.” – Gordon

Resources & Links:

Government of Alberta – ADAP Discussion Guide 

We Advocate – ADAP Summary Whitepaper (VanderLeek Law & Disability Advocates)
Gordon’s 4-page plain-language summary of the ADAP changes, intended to help families, advocates, and even MLAs understand what’s coming. 

Disability Advocate for Alberta – Contact Page
Where individ

Transcript

Welcome to this episode of We Advocate. My name is Gordon Vanderleek,
founder and managing lawyer of Vanderleek Law, and I joined, as always, by my lovely co -host. Annie, welcome to the podcast. Yeah, and welcome everyone for joining us.
So this is an exciting episode. It took a while to line it up, but we're thankful
that busy schedules permitted an opportunity for us to have Marie Renaud and Zachary Weeks on the episode. Welcome to both of you.
Thank you for having us.
With that being said, let me just do a little bit of an introduction. As we know,
we've been focusing episodes on the changes to the age program. And I think I
first, I've known of Marie and her advocacy for some time because I've, you've been at this for a while, Marie, and you've been advocating on behalf of the disability community for some time. I know even going back to when there was the discussions of the Henson Trust and, you know, on behalf, Marie is the critic that is very vocal right now as a member, MLA in the province and a critic for this program and things relating to the disability community. But Marie, well, while we know that other people may have attended your town halls and know a little bit about you,  that it would be helpful to start with a little bit of an introduction, and then Zachary We'll turn it over to you, and then we'll kind of jump into this. Okay,
sure. And he's Marie Renaud, and I am the MLA for St. Albert. I was first elected
in 2015, and I've spent, you know, the majority of my adult life working in the
disability sector in some capacity. Yeah, I am currently the opposition shadow
minister they're calling it. We used to call it critic, and now they're calling it
shadow of community and social services. They recently changed that name, too. It's assisted.
background and I know you've been a vocal advocate on a number of issues and done some work in this space and certainly have been involved in some of the discussions to date and working in tandem with Marie in some of the recent town halls, but introduce yourself to our listeners. Yeah, well, thanks so much, Gordon and Annie for allowing us to be here tonight. And as you mentioned, my name is Zachary Weeks.
I am a person with a disability in that I live with cerebral palsy and use a
power wheelchair full time. I cut my teeth in the nonprofit world where I was
essentially introduced to the people I now have the distinguished honor to often
advocate on behalf of. And so it's been a real adventure, I would say, with everything going on with the government and working alongside not
just Marie, but many MLAs that recognize the changes that are on the horizon are
not going to impact Albertans very, very well. Well, thank you for that. And again, welcome to both of you. Marie, maybe a question to start.
what do we understand right now with regard to the implementation? For listeners of the podcast, we know that really all we have from the government so far is the
discussion paper, plus they did put on a town hall. And there was certain, you
know, I know I attended that. And we, you know, gained a little bit of
understanding of kind of their position with regard to it. But before we get into
some of the details and I guess the concerns that both of you have with regard to
this program, what do we know about when the legislation is coming?
And I guess more importantly, what's the process? Because you have a unique
perspective of, you know, for 10 years have seen how legislation is made in in
Alberta, I don't want to presume anything with our audience, and it'd be helpful
just to lay the grounds for saying, okay, what's coming up? What could happen with this? Give us that high -level analysis.
Well, I mean, I know what should happen. I think what we've seen over the last of
the while is really an erosion of the process. I mean, we saw it happen, you know,
really last week where when bills are introduced, whether they're private member bills or government bills, there are three stages of debate that we go through, and it's supposed to allow for all 87 of us. There's 87 seats in this province, and we're
all sent here by voters, and we represent them, and we should all have an
opportunity to speak at least at one stage of debate. So what we've seen, though,
is an erosion of that is that the government, instead of debating a bill, will pass
a motion that they can sort of move through all stages very, very quickly or like
in one day or they can limit the debate to like one hour at so let's say they'll
say okay the second stage we're just going to have one hour so typically that'll
give you maybe four mLA speaking so it's really an erosion of even understanding or having the opportunity to debate the bill the problem with this particular what's
going on right now with age and the creation of this new program is there's this
huge vacuum and lack of information. And I think, you know, I'm not sure if that's
incompetence or if it was designed that way to leave it so wide open so that there
is a lot of confusion and things can be changed as we go. I'm not sure at this
point. I've never seen anything like this. I've never seen this, the magnitude of
the change that is coming with so little apparent preparation and sharing of
information, especially process, right, for people that are quite vulnerable that
really just simply want to understand, okay, if there's a change coming, tell me
what I need to do. And, you know, we just can't get simple answers. I can't get
responses. As an MLA, as an elected person, I cannot get a clear answer from the
ministry about, okay, so what's next? When's that cutoff date? When will people know when that reassessment will happen and what will that mean for them. And can you clarify this on appeal? And I don't know that they know. So, you know, they
announced it. They were excited to announce it in February of this year. And since
then, they released that paper soon after that. They had a town hall a few months
later, but I don't know that there's been much else. And so I think the lack of
information has contributed to the fear. The lack of real democratic process has
contributed to my alarm. And yeah, I know people are really frightened.
And to be quite frank, I am too. Yeah. So with that, can you share a little bit
about like what happens in terms of consultations? I know you may not be able to
get into details, but is this a situation where, like, are they talking to the NDP
or other critics, you know, other people in terms of maybe trying to figure it out
or put it together. One would hope they're listening, but are they from, you know,
looking at it from a party perspective, is there dialogue about this at all in
terms of the changes to the H program between the UCP and the NDP? No, zero.
There's zero consultation. Now, did we know it was coming? Yes. So I suspect what
our theory was, in 2019, when the UCP was elected, we saw that one of the first
bills, it was like an omnibus bill, and it made some really significant changes to
the age legislation at that time, changing the way eligibility was determined. There
was a number of other things. And then we had heard, again, lots of rumors and
speculation under the dome, but what we heard were that there were some significant changes coming to age. What we suspected at the time, they were going to sort of merge income and age and create like, sort of like a two -tiered age system, very
much like they're doing now. But then COVID happened. And then I think that sort of stalled things. So, but since then, in that interim, there has been nothing. No
signals. You know, I suspect that their consultation, if they did any, was to,
you know, to friendlies, people that they know in their circle. Now, when they
announced the program, They had, they were sort of bookended by the chair of the Premier's Council and the status people of disabilities in addition to the disability advocate of Alberta. And just based on their comments, the glowing reviews of their comments, I suspect they read, you know, press release and didn't really, weren't really consulted. Because these are very bright people and I suspect if they knew what was happening, they would have had other things to say. And I think they've had to walk that back a little. You saw that in a town hall. In all the time I've been doing this, I've never seen the Premier's Council on the status people with disabilities do a town hall ever. So that tells me something. So I suspect, you know, I don't know if they're going to, I don't know when they're going to try to introduce legislative changes. I suspect they're going to try to do a lot of it just with changing regulation. But I, you know, I haven't seen it yet. It hasn't
appeared on the order paper, and that's like the list of the bills that have been
introduced in the legislature and that are at certain stages of debate. So as of
today, it's not there. There's nothing there yet, but that doesn't mean we won't see
it this term. If we don't see it this session, we will likely see it when we go
back after Christmas. Okay. And this session is currently running and it goes till
what date? Do we know? Well, given the number of bills, you know, I think it was
set to go to early December, mid -December, like, we're looking like, I think we
were hearing like 15 to 17 bills, but who knows? But again, the pattern that we've
seen every session in the last, I don't know, a year and a half has been cut
short. And so, you know, not only is bill debate sort of stifled, but we've seen
the sitting days just shorten and shorten and shorten. And it's just an erosion of,
you know, our democratic right to debate these things. And but also, not just
debate, but for us, when we see the bill,
turn it over to you, just a little bit of maybe some high level, a bit of
background or some context to this and your participation in it. But please,
when you're doing that, I'd love you to touch on the rally that was held not too
long ago from the time that we're doing this recording. I know there was you
participated at the legislature. Not everybody would have seen it or the full
coverage. I appreciated hearing some of your words on social media. So we'll put
links in the show notes to some of that so people can go back and look at it.
But it'd be great if you can kind of summarize that in terms of the context of,
okay, sort of general concerns and and then we can dive into some of the specifics
of the issues with regard to the new A Depp program.
Yeah, no, absolutely. I think Mary has laid the foundation quite well in terms of a
person with a disability that has relied on age myself as someone that I was able
to participate in that program when it truly was a certain income for the severely
handicapped. I don't like that title, but that's for a different day.
But I think it needs to be modernized a little bit. But,
you know, to see where it was then versus where it is now are two very stark
realities of difference. And so, you know, in terms of sort of just going off of
what Marie highlighted, there's a lot of fear, anxiety,
uncertainty, because, you know, people are not sure what's coming,
there's no answers being given when they are asked. They're provided the same
rhetoric time and time again, canned answers saying,
oh, well, Alberta is the highest in terms of our benefit that we offered to
disabled folks, when in reality,
That's not true, but nonetheless, that is the canned message that we keep hearing
from, you know, Mr. Nixon and Danielle Smith.
And so, you know,
we're not looking for, if we're the best, we're looking about what is going to
happen in the future. And that's where, you know,
there's been pushback and rightfully so that,
you know, we're hearing drips and draps of information coming out,
but it's all smoke and mirrors. So a lot of the information being circulated is
actually from Marie and from her team that's been able to dig into what this
actually means based off of their experience of what it should look like and what
might be coming down the the the pipe.
Now we have, you know, some information that has been brought to light since,
or since the announcement of ADAP,
and that is that, you know, this is going to be a great opportunity for people
with disabilities, and It's going to be a game changer. They're going to be able to
earn much, much more. But what they don't tell you is that they're going to reduce
the benefit to 1740 from the proposed increase of age to 1940.
If you are transferred to this ADAP program from H now that in itself is a bit of
a wild goose hunt because we don't know who is going to be transferred to the
program unless you're severely disabled or essentially on your deathbed that is what
has been you know portrayed to us us. So the community is starting to realize
that's, you know, where there's smoke, there's fire and, you know,
they're looking at what this government is doing to other minority groups,
even majority groups with our teachers, our students, or health care,
you know, and they're rightfully so alarmed that they are going to be steamrolled by
these changes and don't have, you know,
any real mechanism to push back because we don't know what we're even pushing back
against. So that leads to the rally that happened just the week in which,
you know, hundreds of Albertans with disabilities came out and joined arms with our
students that are being affected by these attacks on them by the UCP.
And, you know, we're all, we're all, when one is attacked,
we're all attacked. And I think, you know,
that was a really sad
but inspirational day in that it showed that we could come together and we could
push back and share
our fears, our concerns, and more importantly, our voice to push back against these
changes that are coming from all fronts. That's a great perspective because when it
all was happening with the teacher strike, I wondered whether it would take away. I
knew this, October 30th rally was going to happen, and I wondered whether it would
take away. But that's a great perspective on showing that we as a group of people,
not like that we are all a community together and that what affects one and harms
one is going to harm more and just them. And so that's a great perspective,
actually,
gives me goosebumps to think of that, because that's, I think everybody sort of
needs to see what's happening, whether you're disabled or not, to see that what's
happening, you know, affects them as well as far as, yeah, even democracy,
right? So, yeah. And on that point, and, Marie, I don't know if you have a
perspective on this or either one of you that my senses, I guess I'll ask the
question, did the government reach out or was there any communication as a result of
the rally in terms of saying, hey, we heard you or, you know, any of that?
I'm assuming the answer is no because Marie said there's been no communication.
But, you know, just sort of post -rally, was there any reaction from the government
to the message that was being portrayed? Well, yeah, actually, at the rally, at
question period that day of the rally, I had a question, well, we asked questions
and sets of three, so a question and two follow -ups. All three questions were
specifically about the changes from age to adapt and the rally.
So all of the questions were about there are, you know, citizens with disabilities
right outside, they're asking this question, what do you have to say? And it was
just, well, I posted them all online, anyone that wants to see them, they're
available on my social media. But it was really like mocking answers.
It was about, it was things like, I don't know if the minister maybe doesn't
understand his file, but he would say things like, you know, I said, well, you
know, you've said that July, 2026, everybody's moving to a DAP, and then, you know,
they get sorted back for whatever reason. And he said that wasn't true. And he
said, you know, this is about people being able to work and already, you know,
people on Aish had that ability. So I don't know if he's just playing word games
or he genuinely doesn't know. But that was the day of the rally. And I know that
everybody heard it in there because we could hear it from, you know, cafeteria, from
bathrooms or in the hallways. So I know that the offices, they heard it in the
offices. I'm quite sure they had to walk by it at some point. But there was no
acknowledgement that, you know, maybe there's just a lot of frightened people out
there that need more information. Nothing. It was more mocking and misinformation,
which, you know, it's unfortunate. I think when people demonstrate like that, it's
maybe the time to rethink your position and go out and listen. And that was not
what I experienced that day from the government. Okay, thanks for that. Maybe
Zachary, back to you. I know you've kind of laid that groundwork, but, and there's
a number of aspects of the ADAP program, and we could probably have a three -hour
podcast if we had to get into all the details. So maybe for, I guess my question
is, of the changes that you see, I know there could be a long litany of things
you would like to see changed or that you're concerned about. But maybe, you know,
let's pick one to start with and then Marie can do the same with you. And let's
have a discussion for the next number of minutes about sort of the top concerns.
We've talked a little bit about process and communication and it's maybe not what it
should be. But getting into the specifics of what you can see is coming up with
ADAP or what you at least might fear is coming up with ADAP. What would be,
you know, start, maybe let's start that discussion, Zachary, with a discussion of
sort of a, you know, one of your top concerns with where this program is going
and, you know, articulate your position with regard to that and why you,
why that you're concerned about it.
You know, I think my first concern is that There's been no consultation.
You're drafting, you know, programs and policies at a table in which the very people
that are going to be affected are not sitting at. That's the first one.
The second one is the fact that, you know,
the program will not work. It will not work.
I'm saying that now because the infrastructure is not there to support people with
disabilities to find employment. And what I mean by that is you need to work with
employers to educate them on what that looks like when you hire people with
disabilities. And it needs to be a partnership in that regard.
You know,
the physical infrastructure is not even there, let alone, you know,
sensitivity training to, you know, different disabilities or what have you and then
thirdly you know my concern and it's it's shared by many is if not all close to
80 ,000 people in age is that the
we're going backwards in terms of the amount of support being offered to people with
disabilities in terms of the amount they're getting. No one can barely live on $1
,01 as it is. Now you're not only clawing back the cat a disability benefit,
but you're going.
further into poverty and you don't want to know the types of messages that I get
on a regular basis in terms of what this policy is going to do and this program
is going to do.
You know, I really appreciate what you've just said because I think
sort of you can look at aspects of government efficiency and budgets and how much
money we have and we got to save money or we can't afford things. But at the end
of the day, this is about a fairly meager amount that is below the poverty line,
right? I mean, it does become a poverty issue that is there. Maybe just in response
to that I feel, Maria, I'm doing the, you know, you get a question and a follow
-up question. I'm doing the follow -up question like you do in the legislature.
Just the stories and what you've seen, I think that that is an important part of
the debate of how this is really affecting people, the proposed changes, right, that
are going to come in next year in terms of how hard it is right now and how hard
it's going to become in terms of people making ends meet. Yeah. Well,
I think, you know, Heidi Jans, I don't know if you follow her at all.
She's a really great writer. I think she's an associate professor at the University
of Alberta. I don't recall. But she actually, she wrote a post about it.
And, you know, I couldn't speak to concerns the way she did. And she's a woman
with a severe disability, also a PhD. she's just
do a mass reassessment based on criteria like Zach said that really nobody's been
consulted on, which is scary. I mean, that's really frightening. It's just a
completely different process. But one of the things that really bothers me,
which is why I know this is going to fail, is that we've not, and I don't just
mean the ECP government, I mean successive governments for many terms have not
focused a lot of effort and resources and opening really successful pathways to
employment for people with disabilities. And there's a lot to that, right, to create
those, it's possible, but you have to really work at it and be very deliberate. So
I'm on this committee called Public Accounts, and we work with the Auditor General,
and every Tuesday morning, when we're in session, we go through an annual report and
audit recommendations for a ministry. And so almost every ministry that applies, I
want.
or the need for it. No, well, no, we don't really do that. And so I've asked this
in health, in jobs, in economy and trade, everywhere, and it's just not on the
radar. Sure, they dump federal money into these labor employment training programs
where, you know, you learn to write a resume and interview and how to do job
seeking or job search skills. But these are not specific to people with disabilities.
These are lots of different marginalized groups, and we know that there's a certain
degree of skill required to remove barriers for people with disabilities. And so even
the government's own documents in their annual report, their target for success from
those programs, so I can't recall the time after they graduate or finish, but their
success rate for employment is, their target is only 65%. And so, you know,
that scares me when we know that the unemployment rate for people with disabilities
is horrible. There's like over a million people with disabilities in Alberta, and
only 80 ,000 on Aish, and, you know, the other group is struggling. So imagine the
group that is on Aish, that struggle is going to be real. And there could
potentially be, as of July, there could potentially be, like, let's say even half of
those ACH recipients are told they need to work and find work to make up that
$200, that's going to be a disaster. Yeah. Well, and going back to what Zachary
said about sort of going backwards,
that's one of the concerns that I have too is not only monetarily, but I think
it's in the mindset. Like the government now is sort of making it appear again very
much that there are so many people on Aish that are receiving it,
there is the same sort of rhetoric that's going to people and that if people don't
really understand and are just listening and think that are going to start believing
that, which again, when you sort of look at the mindset then of someone with a
disability, they're told, well, you're only good if you can work and you're, and now
you're, now you're seen as someone lazy and someone trying to take advantage because
really you could do so much better. It's just it, that scares me a lot. As much
as it is the going back and making less money, that part probably scares me as
much that we are putting people with a disability into a place where they somehow
have to prove their worth when they are as worthy as anybody else. And so,
I don't know, are you feeling that too, Zachary? like are you hearing a lot from
people that you're that they're sort of feeling that people are judging them that
way more so than they were in the past yeah absolutely i i think to your point
and just to throw out some stats i think and marie correct me if i'm wrong but
the amount of people abusing the system is less than one percent I think it's 0 .05
% of 88 ,000 people. So if that's the case,
you deal with those people, you don't throw out the bathwater with the baby,
so to speak. I love babies, don't get me wrong.
But, you know, it's just so far from the truth that anyone who believes it,
I strongly encourage you to do your own research, especially in today's day and age
with all the misinformation and disinformation but in terms of the feedback that I'm
getting, you know, and to your point, We have a society and a government that coins
your value based off of how much coin you can bring in.
And by doing so, you are going to be literally making people more disabled and
burning them out by trying to live up to this,
this, I don't even know what to even call it,
this, this,
well, just an unrealistic standard, right? Like, it, we, you know, we can't all,
we can't all do the same thing, And we all have different gifts, and we all have
something to bring to the world. And if someone with a disability can't do the same
thing, that does not mean they're lazy or don't have something to offer, right?
And I absolutely. I think anyone who thinks people wake up go,
gee whiz, I really look forward to, you know, living on provincial assistance.
And I don't want to work. And, you know, it would only make me more confident and,
you know,
increase my quality of life. If anyone thinks that they want to live on age and
not work, you've got to be from a different galaxy.
Yeah, and I see that across the board, too, in my work. Like, that's not, it's
just so not true, right? Like, everybody if they, if they could, wants the ability
to do that, but just that, that's just not possible for many,
many people. And even if it was, the system isn't set up yet to accommodate that
the jobs are not out there. Abel body people are having a hard time finding jobs
to make it in this day and age,
right? And I think what Marie said about the fact that it takes a lot to equip
somebody who is actually taking someone on who has a disability. My fear is,
You know, if there is things like, you know, subsidies and things like that, I fear
that people will be treated badly because they're going to be made to feel like
they're just not meeting the standard. And there will be a lack of understanding of
someone's complexity and why they can't do certain things or that they need prompting
or all of those different things in order for them to do the job and that they
are going to need support. And it's not for like just today and tomorrow you should
know it all. They should, they're going to need support every single day in order
to help them to sort of accomplish what they need. And so, yeah,
I think how in the world are they going to train all these employers in order to
be able to do that? Well, that should be fairly easy according to Minister Nix.
I know that is what he said. It's true. He did say that, and I thought, yeah,
right.
So as we're looking at maybe kind of wrapping up the conversation or looking at,
I want to spend a little bit of time in our, you know, in wrap up to say, what
about calls to action? What do we see? We see lots of concerns. And ideally,
the government may say, let's withdraw the legislation, but we have to assume they're
going to, they've said it, they're going to do it, and they're going to push
forward. What can we do by way of advocacy? Mary, maybe I'll start with you,
just looking at it from an MLA perspective or even highlight some of the things
you're hoping to do in terms of gaining support for any advocacy and,
you know, in terms of calls to action out of this with regard to the new program?
Well, I think there's lots of things that we can all do. And I know that when I'm
sort of moving forward and pushing and trying different things, I feel a lot less
hopeful. So, you know, I'm hoping that people will, you know, start to get more
active. I think every day, I don't want to speak for you, Zach, but I know that
you struggle with it too. But, you know, every day we get messages of people, you
know, saying they want to apply for made or...
until July so we do have a little bit of time and we've not really seen the
legislative changes yet so we have some time i encourage everybody to do a number
of things and everybody's able and in different ways and has different skills but do
everything you can and that means everything from i encourage everybody to contact
your mLA respectfully you know whether it's by calling them or sending them an email
asking for a meeting laying out your concerns um That's really important. You know,
if your MLA doesn't call you back or write back, that doesn't mean they haven't
recorded it, the call or the letter. We do all record these things. That's how we
measure intensity. I know the government does the same. I encourage everybody to
write to the disability advocate. I know they've been prevented from releasing a lot
of reporting, but they still count and internally share that information. We've been
able to for it some stuff, but I encourage people to contact the disability
advocate, record their concerns, contact the Premier's Council, people with
disabilities, or they will also likely not respond, but it's really important for
people to understand this is important. Rally show, if there's rallies, show up if
you're able. If not, that's okay too. One of the most important things I always
tell people to do is that talk to your friends and your family and the people that
you socialize with or maybe at your job site or you know anybody most albertans i
think there's a lot of us that are very tuned into politics in alberta or you know
disability sector for sure but most people don't know what's happening and so it's
really important to inform people and one thing i've learned about albertans is
they're pretty fierce when it comes to standing up for people with disabilities i've
just seen it over and over over the decades and that always makes me feel really
hopeful. But I think it's incumbent on all of us to share in our circles about
what is happening, why it's dangerous, and how they too can help you push back. And
so these are some of the things. Now, I certainly have different levers that I can
pull as a legislator, as an elected person, and I will continue to do that. I
think Zachary and I and the people that we know, we've sort of committed to doing
everything we can to share this information, whether it's town halls or rallies or
podcasts or, you know, writing letters to the editor. But I think everybody pushing
back all the time is what it's going to take. It's not just going to take a few
people, but it's going to take everybody. Now, sadly, ultimately, the only way, the
absolutely only way that we change all of this and start on a different track is
to elect a new government. Most people don't like to hear that, it's like, oh, it's
partisan, you know, but that's a reality. So none of this will truly change until
we can change an elected government that reflects our values and what we would like
to see. So that's what I usually say. All right, Zach, we want to give you a
chance to, yeah, calls to action, takeaways, what you would advocate to our listeners
in terms of what they, on next steps they could do. Well, I think it's critical
for people listening to this podcast if they're going to be affected by these
changes to know that they are not alone. And that,
you know, the majority of Albertans, to Marie's point,
some time ago by my mentors, is don't listen to what they say,
watch and how they act, right? So the real opportunity,
again, to Marie's point, would be if the government's pause implementation and use
this as a chance to co -design reforms with the disability community,
not for us, but with us. That would be my first call to action.
Secondly, all of the things that Marie said, I just feel like I'm repeating what
Marie is recommending, but, you know, lean into the stuff that you can do.
So if you can't attend a rally, that's fine. But what can you do?
You can help spread the word online about that rally. You can tell your family,
your friends about what's going on. We live in a world where the digital world
influences the real world. And the more people that share the injustice and what's
going on to our most vulnerable
is incredibly powerful right now so get on social media share your thoughts make
connections and unite as one and most importantly I think give yourself grace don't
try and beat yourself up or stress out about something that you know we have no
information are very little on. Now it's easy for me to say that because,
you know, saying one thing and doing another is two different realities,
but more than anything, love yourself, love your neighbor,
and push back together.
Well, that, Let me just say that's very powerful and very eloquent. And thank you,
both of you. I think that's a great place to wrap up and really highlighting the
need as a community. We have to support each other, right? When there's attacks from
different sources, let's get information, let's get it out there, let's advocate,
let's try to make change but support each other through that process and uplift each
other through that process. I really love your ending there saying, hey, we still
have to love each other, right? We're going to do this all in a respectful way,
but we've got to also care for each other. And yeah, that's a great way to end
off the podcast. I couldn't have said it any better. I'll add in and We'll put it
in the show notes, but it's available on our website as well. We'll put those links
in the show notes that I've, you know, as a firm, we've written a four -page
summary. It's available for download on the, on the website to say, here's all the
changes that are coming up. So we encourage, if you're talking to your MLA, give
them a copy of that and say, well, here's the summary. You know, Mary, you're
signaling that you have it as well, and hopefully we can do it for general
circulation. So we try to say, you know, that let's try to provide,
well, what is this all about? What is our observation? So that's point number one.
Point number two is, for sure, and I don't think I'm going to accept no for an
answer from the two of you, we're going to have to have you back to be able to
talk about, well, when we see the rules and when we see the legislation, we don't
know when that is. And thank you for finding that procedure, Marie. But I think we
can do also another deep dive and get your unique perspectives on this. So this
isn't the, maybe the end of my ask for you to participate and help our listening
audience to understand more what's going on. The difficulty is we don't have the
rules. There's, you know, sort of fears and conjecture. But hopefully with your help,
we can be that voice to try to provide some solid information, and also those calls
to action. So with that, thank you so much for your participation. I know your time
is valuable, your clarity of thought, and the eloquence of your words.
You know, keep advocating. We always keep saying that, hence the name of the
podcast, we advocate. And to our listeners, thanks for listening in.
And so the two of you, Enjoy the rest of your day and much strength as you
continue your advocacy in the battle for this program.
And hopefully the government will listen and work with the disability community.
I really appreciate it, Zachary, your point about don't do stuff for us, do stuff
with us. And with that, thank you so much for your participation. Thank you so
much. Thank you.