a film review.

[growler]

Hope Is Not A Plan about empowering disabled voters to manage their own lives
By Paul Caune  

I was absent from the pages of the Beacon News for over a year because I was making a documentary film about how most Canadians with disabilities do not have a practical way to enforce their civil rights. The film is called Hope Is Not A Plan.

About a year and a half ago, I was approached by Colin Andrew Ford of Urban Sherpa Films, a Vancouver-based film company. He had seen a video clip of me on Facebook and emailed asking if he could do a film about me. I agreed to meet him, and when we met, the first thing I said to him was, “I have no interest in participating in a film about a brave little guy in a wheelchair.”

I said there is a much bigger, more important story which has been missed by the mainstream and much of the alternative media.

Which is, in a nation supposedly filled with nice people, citizens with disabilities do not have a practical way to enforce the civil rights guaranteed to them by Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Much harm is caused by this fact, which is hidden in plain sight.

To the everlasting credit of Mr. Ford, he recognized that this was a more important story than the shenanigans of one—I freely admit—very charismatic guy in a wheelchair.

And thus began the epic quest to make Hope Is Not A Plan. Mr. Ford and I decided that we would not seek any government, corporate or union money for this project. I am pleased to say that we were able to raise the money simply by appealing to our network. We raised $17,000.

We made this decision because we wanted not even the perception the film is a front group for any special interest, or that the film would have any strings attached to money which would dictate the content.

The Hope Is Not A Plan crew filmed in Montreal, Ottawa, Edmonton and in the lower mainland of BC. In the film you will be introduced to some of the toughest people you will ever have the privilege to meet. Each story in the documentary is an illustrative example of the abuses of power citizens with disabilities and their families are subjected to across Canada.

You will see the black hole that can open up underneath even the most accomplished person with a disability due to how much discretion civil servants who administer services have. And you will learn how easy it is, in the blink of an eye, in your home to become a person with a disability.

Overshadowing all the true stories is the fact that since 1990 the US has had a law to protect the civil rights of Americans with disabilities—and Canada does not.

Hope Is Not A Plan argues in favour of two solutions to the problem it shines a light on. The federal government and provinces of Canada all need their own versions of the Americans With Disabilities Act.

And, as I have said on more than one occasion, people with disabilities need to remember the golden rule: the people who have the gold make the rules. Canadians with disabilities and seniors need a law which gives them the option of individualized funding: any money outside of acute care allocated for them should be given directly to them so they can decide how and where they will purchase their needed goods and services.

[observer]

Sounds like it should be an interesting view, growler!