Reinstatement

To try to make this story make sense, let me take you back a few years.

I have been a person with quadriplegia all my life. I have a rare muscle weakening condition and essentially have no more strength than an infant. I am sixty years old.

I could have lived on a pension since I was sixteen when a small allowance was granted to teenagers like me to assist with extra costs of living. Essentially my Mother took that cheque, probably spending it on the gas needed to drive me to and from school every day.

I chose employment, getting my first paying job in the summer between 1st and 2nd year university. The only time I was on a disability related pension was for a few months while recovering from major surgery in my mid-twenties.

When I decided to leave paid employment in 2007 and live on the pension from the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) it was something of an adventure for me. I had met many, many people over the years who live from this income and spend their time quite productively volunteering in some way. I wanted to, and do, build projects and research around the idea that Inclusion makes people more peaceful and therefore is a road to World Peace. (www.peaceforinclusion.blogspot.com) It seemed that an ODSP pension could make focusing on this work more feasible for me.

You see it seemed like choosing between two paths that both involve managing one’s income carefully and creatively. Employment brought the potential for more income, the accumulation of more assets and more credit backing. It also meant that costs like a $22,000 wheelchair would fall 25% to me and fixing that chair as it aged and making a car accessible ($19,000) were 100% my problem. ODSP allows for not more than $1,700/month – and that’s with deliberate and delicate management of every entitlement – and no more assets than $4000 and of course no credit, but it does cover medical, prescription, dental and access equipment.

Employment ties one to the employer’s agenda. After years of working at the top level of the bottom rung, not being encouraged or allowed to take on other positions or projects I was qualified for, being assigned forever to the token “disability” position, and watching as others in similar positions lost their health and self respect, I began to consider that maybe I could make the ODSP option work, i.e. find freedom in poverty.

Making a go on such a small income is tricky, but that’s another story! This one is about getting suspended three times in one year.

There are three things about my life that have led the powers of ODSP to find me indigestible in the recent past. The most recent is that I filed my claim for a Federal income tax refund after April 30.

Now as you most likely know there is nothing technically wrong with filing your taxes after April 30 if you know you don’t owe Revenue Canada anything. Many people go for years without filing – no problem! It’s like giving Canada an interest free loan and the government isn’t going to complain about that.

On the strength that I wasn’t going to owe anything the guy who does my taxes didn’t do them until after the 30th. He prioritized his clients who DO owe Revenue Canada something.

Now, how on May 5th, does ODSP know that Revenue Canada doesn’t have my tax form yet? And why is it of such interest to them that they sent me a letter that day threatening suspension from my benefits by the end of this month? I don’t really know – it’s not in any manual or on their website.

Anyway I filed, I made an appointment, I went in, I am reinstated for a month.

Next time I will tell why it’s only for a month, because that’s another story.

Judith