New autism policy fixes affordable
But parents disappointed over no new cash
The Ontario government’s new approach to autism fixes the problems it can afford to fix, but parents of autistic children are, not surprisingly, disappointed because there is no additional funding in this week’s announcement by Social Services Minister Lisa MacLeod.
MacLeod’s policy aims to be equitable and sustainable, and it achieves that. Under the Liberal program the Progressive Conservatives inherited, three out of every four children with autism were stuck on a wait list, either for assessment or service. Those waits could extend for years, and the delay is critical because autism treatment is more effective when delivered at a young age.
MacLeod promised to end those wait lists within 18 months by doubling the money spent on assessment to help 2,400 children waiting in that queue. There will be money for 23,000 other children who have been approved for service but aren’t getting it. Help will extend until the age of 18 and can amount to $140,000 in total for a child entering the program at two years of age. The focus is on children under six, whose families can get up to $20,000 a year.
That sounds good, but autism services can cost four times that annual amount, and parents who were getting a higher level of assistance under the program about to be phased out are upset. That program provided more money to those lucky enough to get help, but the Liberals achieved this miracle of generosity by providing no service at all to three-quarters of Ontario’s autistic children. That’s impossible to justify.
Eliminating the wait lists will be a significant achievement worthy of praise. Of course, the NDP immediately condemned the plan, saying that all children should get every service they require. In a perfect world, that would be a splendid idea, but for a government with a deficit of up to $14.5 billion, it’s just not on. The vast debt accumulated during past government spending sprees leave Ontario with little room to do more for anyone.
In the election, the PCs promised a one-time injection of $100 million for autism services. That money was used to keep services in place for the few getting them under the Liberal plan, which was going to exceed its budget.
Even in the perpetualdeficit world of the Liberals, the level of service the NDP calls for was never attained. Not even close. One need not be an overly cynical observer of politics to understand that the key function of a wait list, from government’s perspective, is to keep the cost of services down.
To that point, a memo to staff from the CEO of Ottawa’s Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario said “The way government had previously structured the Ontario Autism Program resulted in an explosion of a wait list — 2,315 kids with autism are now waiting for behavioural intervention in our region. The program was also so rigidly structured that our talented, committed staff was not permitted to come up with innovative ways to deliver faster access.”
Under the system now being scrapped, government undertook to assess children, manage a wait list and determine exactly what kind of help the kids could get. One of the more attractive features of the new PC plan is that it turns that on its head. The money will go directly to parents to purchase the services they require. Service providers will have to compete. If there is a way to innovate and lower costs, this is it.
No one is pretending that the PC government will cover all the costs, not even close. The government refers to its program as “a support.” That’s accurate. For families lucky enough to receive services now, the new program is certain to mean less money for most. That’s the unfortunate arithmetic of increasing the number of children served by 300 per cent but keeping the budget fixed.
Some are quick to assign bad motives to the PCs for everything they do, but that doesn’t ring true here. Lisa MacLeod has been fighting for better autism services for years. Her parliamentary assistant, MPP Amy Fee, is the mother of two autistic children and she knows what the wait lists are like. If these two could have done better, they would have.
When the PCs talk about program sustainability, it’s not just a throwaway word. The previous government raised public expectations when it undertook the full cost of autism help for some. It did the same thing with its basic income study, its free tuition and its pharmacare for young people. It never had the money to support these things, and that made them unsustainable. It’s not a pleasant reality, but it is the reality of Ontario in 2019.
INCREASING THE NUMBER OF CHILDREN SERVED BY 300 PER CENT.