Key issues template
Key issues template
Addressing The Unmet Needs Of Children And Youth With Disabilities.
In British Columbia, up to 83,000 young people with disabilities are not receiving services that adequately meet their needs. This means families may be going without critically needed respite care or not receiving medical equipment or timely access to therapies. For more than a decade disability advocates and RCY, have been calling on government to address under-resourcing and significant gaps in systems of care to ensure young people with disabilities reach their full potential. There has been too little action in response.
A staggering number of families are at their breaking point, living within a system that remains underfunded, fragmented and almost impossible to navigate. Families have been waiting too long for change and they can’t wait any longer.
– Dr. Jennifer Charlesworth
Representative for Children and Youth
WHAT RCY IS DOING
Since it’s inception in 2007, RCY has published 12 reports focusing on the barriers young people with disabilities and their families face when trying to access provincial services.
RCY has made numerous recommendations to successive governments to improve funding and service provision including to enhancing services and supports for young people living with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, the need to address the significant mental health needs that young people with disabilities experience, facilitating cross-ministerial collaboration, and establishing a data gathering system that depicts an accurate picture of exactly how many young people in the province are living with disabilities and are, or are not, being served.
You get to a really dark place where you go, I can’t do this anymore so I’m going to harm myself and my child because that is the only option and the only light I can see moving forward.
– Parent
What We're Hearing
Consistent with our commitment to amplify voices, RCY engages with young people, families and the wider disability community to convene a diverse range of perspectives and to catalyze change. This work has taken the form of surveys, intimate conversations and larger collective convenings and has captured the voices of people in all corners of the province. While circumstances may be different, the message is clear – young people living with disabilities and their families are at their breaking point.
By the Numbers
Up to
young people living with a disability did not receive adequate services and supports in the community and in school.
Less than
of children in government care are there because it’s the only way for families to secure necessary support for their child.
of families agree that the services they receive meet their children’s needs.
young people living with a disability did not receive adequate services and supports in the community and in school.
Featured Reports
Too Many Left Behind, 2025
The Representative for children and youth has released an issues Spotlight report renewing calls for immediate and urgent action including immediate funding …
Still Left Out, 2023
The Representative for Children and Youth has released a follow-up report to Left Out, calling on the provincial government to immediately provide much-needed supports for the children and youth with disabilities and their families across British Columbia who are currently under-served.
Left Out, 2020
The provincial government should immediately begin working with families and community organizations to address the urgent needs of children and youth with special needs who have been neglected during the pandemic and begin a system overhaul aimed at providing inclusive, equitable and needs-based services.
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