Section two focuses on The Accessibility for Manitobans Act, its standards and related legislation.

1. The Five Topics in this Section

2. The Need for Legislation

3. The Accessibility for Manitobans Act (AMA)

4. Focus on Barriers, Not Disabilities

5. The Human Rights Code and The AMA

6. The Business Case for Accessibility

The Need for Legislation

Nearly one in four Manitobans face barriers to accessibility in daily living. With an aging population, this number continues to grow.

Legislature building

All Manitobans, regardless of their abilities, have the right to participate fully in society, and to be treated with dignity and respect.

By introducing a law, government organizations (like schools and universities), businesses, and non-profit organizations must all collaborate to make Manitoba accessible.

Section two focuses on The Accessibility for Manitobans Act, its standards and related legislation.

The Accessibility for Manitobans Act

The Accessibility for Manitobans Act (AMA) was enacted in 2013. The AMA has two main goals.

• Goal 1: Identify, prevent and remove barriers to participation.

• Goal 2: Make significant progress towards achieving accessibility in Manitoba by 2023.

Manitoba’s efforts will focus on collaboration, awareness-raising and the training of organizations to fulfill the requirements set out in the law. Like other laws, the AMA also sets out enforcement measures, including orders to comply and monetary penalties.

The Five Accessibility Standards

Accessibility Standards, or regulations, are the building blocks of the AMA. They outline who has to do what and by when to enhance accessibility.

To fulfill the AMA, the Manitoba government appointed an Accessibility Advisory Council to assist in developing five standards affecting accessibility in customer service, employment, information and communications, the design of public spaces and transportation.

The Standards

Standard 1: Customer Service (enacted November 2015)

Standard 2: Employment (enacted May 2019)

Standard 3: Information and Communications

Standard 4: Design of Public Spaces

Standard 5: Transportation

Learn More

To learn more about each of these standards, select their titles below.

Source: http://accessibilitymb.ca/law.html 

Focus on Barriers

The AMA focuses on barriers, not disabilities.

What is a barrier?

For people with disabilities, a barrier is anything that interacts with their disability in a way that may impact, or prevent their full and effective participation in society.

For example, Mike has low vision. He is given a book with a font size that he cannot read. Mike’s low vision is not the barrier. The small print size is the barrier. If Mike had larger print, he would be able to read the material.

While most barriers have not been set up on purpose, awareness is critical to ensure everyone has equal access to goods and services.

Types of Barriers

What do you imagine when you think of an accessibility barrier?

Physical Barriers

If you are like most people, you may be thinking of physical or structural barriers, such as steps, curbs, or narrow passageways. Heavy doors or doorknobs, versus levers, are also structural barriers that affect many seniors and others with arthritis.

Information and Communications Barriers

Barriers to information and communications are easy to miss, if they do not affect you, but are present in almost every aspect of daily life.

Barriers to information and communications occur when not everyone can understand or access the message being delivered.

For example, in-person communication may be difficult when a location is noisy and if a person is hard-of-hearing, or anxious.

Technology Barriers

Technology can enhance access. For example, a computer can improve accessibility for someone who is deaf or hard-of-hearing. However, technology can also create new barriers. For instance, a barrier is created when an individual must have good vision or use of their fingers to use a device to pay a bill.

Systemic Barriers

Barriers are systemic when they are a result of an organization’s policies or usual practices. For example, a store policy that requires that customers bag their own groceries is a systemic barrier, as not all customers are physically able to do so.

Attitudinal Barriers

Attitudinal barriers result when people think and act based on false assumptions. For example, a bank teller would be wrong to think a client who is unable to express herself verbally cannot make a financial decision. Breaking myths and stereotypes is the first step to creating the foundation of a fully inclusive society.

Manitoba Voices: Catherine Smorang

Catherine Smorang is a proud mother of a university student. She loves helping others and, in the absence of a pandemic, she is frequently at “Shop CNIB” explaining or demonstrating accessibility aids to others.

The Manitoba Human Rights Code and The AMA

The Accessibility for Manitobans Act (AMA) complements the Manitoba Human Rights Code and offers proactive ways to ensure accessibility for everyone, regardless of their abilities.

Reasonable Accommodation

Providing reasonable accommodation is a legal requirement and failure to reasonably accommodate an individual can result in “discrimination,” as defined in the Manitoba Human Rights Code.

Simply put, reasonable accommodation means adjusting a rule, policy, practice or a physical space to allow changes to the ways things are usually done.

Duty to Accommodate

In most cases, providing reasonable accommodation in customer service is simple and affordable. Reasonable accommodation requires a business or organization to take responsibility for an accommodation – including bearing the costs – up to the point of undue hardship. Undue hardship arises from substantial costs or health and safety risks to an accommodation. Inconvenience, preferences, or having to bear some costs do not usually qualify as undue hardship. Although undue hardship is not defined in the AMA or the Manitoba Human Rights Code, case law tells us that it is more than minimal hardship and it must be based on actual evidence of hardship.

If an accommodation request creates undue hardship for you and/or your organization, you and/or your organization still need to explore other ways to provide accessible customer service. Collaborate with the person making the request to find another way to provide customer service. With flexibility, openness, and good communication, accommodation solutions are usually possible, easy and inexpensive.

The Business Case for Accessibility

Creating Accessibility is the Law in Manitoba.

For Manitoba businesses, removing barriers is also the smart thing to do.

Currently, millions of Canadians have a physical disability that affects their mobility, vision, or hearing. This number is expected to increase substantially by 2030, when persons with physical disabilities are anticipated to make up over one fifth of the consumer market, with a spending power of $316 billion. Removing barriers to access often costs little or nothing.