Liberals continue to fail Canadian Autism Partnership
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
177.15324
Summary
In this episode, Conservative MP Mike Lake talks about the Canadian Autism Partnership and how it aims to improve the lives of people with autism across the country. Mike Lake is a father of a child with autism and has been involved in advocacy for autism since the early days of his son, Jaden, who was diagnosed with ASD at the age of three years old. He has been a long-time advocate for the autism community and has dedicated his life to advocating for the needs of people on the autism spectrum.
Transcript
00:00:00.480
You're listening to The Blueprint, Canada's Conservative Podcast.
00:00:08.200
Well, they thought they were going to have an easy day over there today, but not so fast, Mr. Speaker.
00:00:15.600
What is it going to take for the Prime Minister to have any respect for any laws in this country that may curb his out-of-control behaviour?
00:00:30.500
And welcome to The Blueprint, Canada's official Conservative Podcast.
00:00:36.200
It's great to be your host, Tony Clement, Member of Parliament for Paris-Saint-Muskoka,
00:00:40.380
where we talk about the current issues that are before Parliament, some of the debates that we're having,
00:00:45.980
some of the contentious issues that Canadians care about.
00:01:03.860
Well, Blaine was the Member of Parliament for Wetaskiwin before, but this is a new riding Edmonton-Wetaskiwin.
00:01:08.280
Well, Edmonton-Wetaskiwin voters, I apologise in advance, but we've got a great MP in Mike Lake,
00:01:14.080
and he's doing a lot of work on a lot of issues, of course.
00:01:16.540
But one that we want to talk about today is the Canadian Autism Partnership.
00:01:21.020
Tell us a little bit about that and a little bit about how you came to be involved in this important issue.
00:01:33.480
He's been fortunate to grow up in Alberta where services have been pretty strong for people with autism,
00:01:40.340
But not everybody in the country has the same opportunity.
00:01:43.900
And so not that long after I was elected, I realised that there was a sort of a platform that I had.
00:01:50.180
That wasn't what got me into politics in the first place,
00:01:52.320
but that there was a platform that I had as a parent of a child with autism
00:01:55.400
and that there were a lot of Canadians in the same boat who didn't have access to the same services that Jaden had.
00:02:02.320
And so we worked for many years to try and bring the autism community together to come up with ideas.
00:02:09.240
Some of those years, you were the health minister.
00:02:11.260
You remember some of the conversations that we had at the time and took some steps forward.
00:02:20.440
So after doing some pretty cool things, stepping stones along the way in 2015,
00:02:26.440
we started a Canadian Autism Partnership working group,
00:02:30.660
12 experts from across the country to put forward a plan for a Canadian Autism Partnership.
00:02:36.400
So these are experts in the autism research community and, I guess, representatives of parents and so on and that kind of thing?
00:02:44.720
Parents, stakeholders who would run organisations.
00:02:47.900
We've got some fantastic organisations plus four top researchers, world-class researchers who work in Canada
00:02:54.200
who are part of this partnership working group.
00:02:56.880
And so they came up with a plan of action, basically.
00:02:59.820
They did and submitted a business plan in the fall of 2016
00:03:05.100
and a budget ask for $19 million of the government of the day.
00:03:09.840
And interestingly, the Liberal members of Parliament,
00:03:13.340
over half of their caucus signed support letters for the Canadian Autism Partnership.
00:03:21.320
Even the minister herself, I think, eventually asked for it in the budget.
00:03:25.700
Now, tell us a little bit about what that $19 million would go to.
00:03:29.700
Like, what's the end goal that you want to see reached with that $19 million?
00:03:36.200
We want to see, you know, really, because most of the challenges are provincial in nature,
00:03:40.980
So what this does is really, it's a partnership of the organisations across the country.
00:03:45.780
So it's not a new organisation or another competing organisation.
00:03:49.200
Really, it's meant to be a partnership of all of the organisations working together,
00:03:52.860
speaking with one voice, advising governments in their jurisdiction
00:03:55.900
on things like early intervention or education or housing or vocation.
00:04:01.260
Or, you know, what happens when mum and dad die?
00:04:06.740
Because this is a big concern for families living with someone with autism.
00:04:10.940
And this sort of expert partnership working to provide the best evidence base possible,
00:04:20.560
scouring the planet for the best practices in all of these areas and advising governments
00:04:24.480
so Canadian government's policymakers can make the best decisions they possibly can.
00:04:27.800
So that's it. There's a lot of different things going on in different jurisdictions.
00:04:32.300
Some of it very, very progressive and innovative when it comes to autism
00:04:37.700
in terms of incorporating autism people into our society
00:04:43.740
and making sure that they have the right resources available to them.
00:04:49.320
Absolutely. And, you know, autism is a challenge that faces people across a lifespan.
00:04:55.020
So people at different places in the spectrum have different challenges.
00:04:58.540
And we have to be careful that we make sure that we address those challenges.
00:05:01.400
But, you know, commonality that you would have is difficulty in social interactions
00:05:06.720
and understanding, you know, what understanding the abstract, I guess, in a sense.
00:05:12.720
So something like a job interview for someone with autism,
00:05:14.980
even at the higher IQ end, is very, very difficult.
00:05:17.900
You might have someone that can get a degree in engineering
00:05:21.640
But that social interaction that helps them to get a job
00:05:24.460
is something that's very, very difficult for them.
00:05:26.480
At that part of the spectrum, you deal with significant mental health issues as well.
00:05:30.360
So because people are just a little bit different, they might get bullied mercilessly.
00:05:35.020
But also because that social interaction is tough for them,
00:05:38.040
they'd have a very difficult time dealing with that
00:05:41.380
So you're getting bullied, but you don't know what to do about it, right?
00:05:43.580
We see in the employment market, 85% of people with autism are not employed.
00:05:49.300
And that's a challenge because there's incredible skills and abilities
00:05:51.720
that if we can tap into those skills and abilities in terms of structure and order
00:05:55.180
and those types of things, a lot of things that other people don't even want to do,
00:06:01.440
And so Jaden, in his case, he loves to work in the library.
00:06:03.840
He loves to sort things and sort books or, you know, he loves doing laundry
00:06:07.420
and sorting things and taking it to where it belongs or emptying the dishwasher,
00:06:12.200
Those are things that, you know, he'll cry when his shift in the library is done
00:06:19.160
So tell us then where we're at, this autism partnership idea, you know, sort of,
00:06:25.360
I know it came to the floor of the House of Commons.
00:06:27.600
So tell, set up that story about why it was important that it do so and what happened then.
00:06:33.040
Well, it didn't get funded in the budget, first of all.
00:06:37.340
And it was interesting because I think that we took for granted
00:06:40.180
that this was such a no-brainer that it would have all parties support
00:06:43.460
and would be something that the government would find room for.
00:06:46.300
It was only $3.8 million in a budget that's something like $25 or $26 billion in deficit.
00:06:54.160
So there's some surprise in the autism community and I think, you know,
00:06:57.640
in the opposition parties that it didn't wind up in the budget.
00:07:03.040
Now, oftentimes those opposition day motions are really centered around the political issues of the day.
00:07:07.900
So this is a motion that you moved on behalf of the Conservative caucus.
00:07:13.220
So we get to choose a certain number of days, a small number of days,
00:07:16.180
that we get to choose the subject that gets discussed and then voted on in the House of Commons.
00:07:20.360
And so we were very intentional about making this motion non-political.
00:07:26.960
All we did was say, here's what autism is and lay out some facts about autism.
00:07:31.180
And here's what the Canadian Autism Partnership is.
00:07:34.940
Of course, motions are non-binding, but once a parliament decides that it's a good idea,
00:07:47.940
And I had done a lot of work talking to Liberal members of parliament to get them on side.
00:07:53.040
And many, many, many of them had expressed that they were on side with it in favor of it.
00:07:58.640
In the end, I think that for whatever reason, the Liberals whipped their vote.
00:08:03.500
And only one Liberal member of parliament voted in favor of it.
00:08:08.900
Every Conservative, New Democrat, Elizabeth May from the Green Party,
00:08:12.420
all of the national parties unanimously supported it.
00:08:14.800
It was a pretty shocking moment in the House of Commons, I've got to say.
00:08:18.520
When all of a sudden, these people who had gone to the photo ops,
00:08:22.720
who had put their signature on to support this autism partnership,
00:08:29.720
Well, the month earlier is April's World Autism Awareness Month.
00:08:33.440
And World Autism Awareness Day is at the beginning of April.
00:08:35.700
And there's always an Autism on the Hill event.
00:08:38.220
And we had over a dozen Liberal MPs show up for the photo op.
00:08:43.960
And then every single one of them voted against the Canadian Autism Partnership,
00:08:47.280
which is supported by the vast, vast, vast majority of Canada's autism community.
00:08:54.900
I know there's been an incredible reaction to that from across the country.
00:08:58.980
So tell us a little bit about the reaction to that vote.
00:09:01.760
And then tell our listeners how they can become involved themselves in the wake of that vote.
00:09:07.840
Yeah, well, you know, we've been consistently posting on social media.
00:09:12.200
My handle on Facebook and Twitter is MikeLakeMP Instagram as well.
00:09:17.980
But, you know, posted the photo, for example, of the MPs all standing there with the banner on World Autism Awareness Day.
00:09:25.260
And I think we're up to 1,600 shares right now on Twitter, almost 600 retweets of that.
00:09:31.800
And if you read the comments, so many Canadians who are frustrated by the position,
00:09:36.580
but also really encouraging in terms of continuing the battle here.
00:09:40.320
So what we're encouraging people to do is to take to social media, particularly social media.
00:09:45.240
Twitter is a great place because, you know, most MPs check their Twitter accounts.
00:09:48.960
And so tweet at your member of parliament, your closest liberal members of parliament in your region,
00:09:56.020
Make sure that you email them and call them as well.
00:10:00.980
And if people speak up, I think that governments can change their minds.
00:10:06.560
So, Mike Lake, thank you for doing all that you're doing on this very important file.
00:10:10.700
It shows the compassion that you have as an individual and something that we as Conservative MPs share with you.
00:10:16.820
And let's hope that we can make some progress on this issue in the very near future.
00:10:22.480
Thank you for listening to The Blueprint, Canada's Conservative Podcast.
00:10:35.500
To find more episodes, interviews, and in-depth discussions of politics in Canada,
00:10:39.760
search for The Blueprint on iTunes or visit podcast.conservative.ca.