Several protesters were barred from entering Doug Ford’s Etobicoke North constituency office Friday, amid steadily increasing anger over his government’s changes to the autism support program in Ontario.
The group of demonstrators had asked to enter Ford’s office on Albion Road on Friday afternoon. A man greeted them at the door, letting twopeople in before blocking the rest.
“We don’t want you in our office, thank you very much,” the man at the door said. “I will deal with constituents and then…”
He was interrupted by another protester asking to enter, which he blocked.
“I don’t want you coming into our office. We’ve had problems here before. I can’t have you come in the office.”
Premier Doug Ford’s office later confirmed that staff alerted Toronto police to the protest. The officers who responded stayed on the opposite side of the street to Ford’s office.
“Premier Doug Ford’s staff invited some Etobicoke North constituents who were participating in the protest into the office to hear their concerns, while asking the other protesters to stay outside,” a spokesperson for the Premier’s Office told CP24.”The only conversations the constituency office staff had with the police was to keep them updated on any developments.”
“Staff had a productive conversation with the constituents in the office.”
Parents of children with autism in Ontario are upset after the government altered the autism support formula to means-test it.
The new program offers $140,000 per child from age two to eighteen, but begins clawing back money once a family’s income exceeds $55,000 per year.
Families can receive a maximum of $20,000 per year up to age six, with $5,000 per year made available for each year after that.
Families at the protest said the changes will meanthat most middle-class families seevery little help.
“They’re going to give out enough funding to see that parents get pretty much no services at all,” one man told CTV News Toronto.
Children and Social Services Minister Lisa MacLeod has defended the changes, saying the Liberals’ program had 23,000 children languishing on a wait list, and the program needed several emergency infusions of cash to keep it afloat.
When the new program was announced last month, a PC staffer and parent of a child with autism quit in protest.
“They’re going to make services almost impossible to get for the vast majority of families. It distributes funding based on age, which we fought the Liberals on twice,” another parent, who identified herself as Laura, told CTV News Toronto.
