The Issue

Every day in Ontario, more than 500,000 people on ODSP are forced to choose between paying rent and buying food.

In 2026, a single person on ODSP receives just $1,436 a month, while the average one-bedroom apartment in Ontario rents for $1,589. A single parent with two children receives $2,299 for a household of three. A disabled couple receives less in total than two disabled singles living apart.

That is not a safety net. It is a trap.

ODSP was created under the Ontario Disability Support Program Act, 1997 to help disabled people live as independently as possible and lead "more productive, dignified lives." Instead, every household type on the program is left below Ontario's poverty line, a single person by roughly $865 a month, more than $10,000 a year.

And the gap is growing.

Between 2019 and 2024, the income needed to stay out of poverty rose 19%, while ODSP support for shelter and basic needs grew just 17%, and Ontario Works support did not grow at all. Food bank visits across Ontario are up 134% since 2019-20, and one in three food bank users is a person with a disability.

Current ODSP policies do not just fail disabled Ontarians. They actively punish them, whether they work, marry, raise children, or grow older.

Punishing work

ODSP exempts the first $1,000 of monthly earnings, then claws back 75% of everything above it. Ontario raised this clawback from 50 to 75% in February 2023, making it harder, not easier, to escape poverty through employment. A disabled person who works is rewarded with paperwork, verification, and a shrinking cheque.

This is not a ladder; it is a trap.

 

Punishing marriage

Two single ODSP recipients each receive $1,436 a month — $2,872 combined.

The moment they move in together or marry, those same two people are capped at $2,416 a month if both are disabled, or $2,148 if one is not. The double-disabled cap is so low it even cuts below the couple's own basic-needs and shelter components ($2,603).

That is $456 to $724 a month, over $5,000 to $8,700 a year, taken away for choosing to build a life together.

Ontario justifies this by claiming couples "can share expenses." But two people with disabilities each carry disability-related costs that run roughly 30% higher than the cost of living without a disability, and the penalty far outweighs any real savings from sharing a household.

ODSP makes it literally cheaper to live apart than to be married.

If a non-disabled spouse works, they get only a $200 monthly exemption, one-fifth of what a disabled person receives — and their earnings are clawed back at 50%.

 

Punishing every kind of household

A single adult on ODSP receives $1,436 a month, roughly $865 below the poverty line of $2,300.
A single parent with one child receives $2,074, below the poverty line for a family of two.
A single parent with two children receives $2,299, below the poverty line for a family of three.
A couple where one partner is disabled receives $2,148 — while two singles would receive $2,872.
A couple where both partners are disabled is capped at $2,416 — while two singles would receive $2,872.
A couple with one child receives $2,374, below the poverty line for a family of three.
A couple with two children receives $2,608, below the poverty line for a family of four.

Every one of these is below what a modest, basic standard of living requires.

Single parents.
Single-parent families have among the highest poverty rates in Canada. A parent with two children gets $2,299 to house, feed, clothe, and care for three people, while disability costs for the parent make every dollar stretch less. The sole-support parent supplement ($143 a month) helps, but it has been eroded by rising rent and food costs.

Disabled adult children.
An adult child with a disability living at home with parents on ODSP can be treated as a "dependent adult," and pushed into Ontario Works participation requirements, forced to comply with job-search rules, with their family's income support reduced if they cannot. Instead of receiving disability supports in their own right, they are treated as an employment case.

Seniors.
When a disabled person turns 65, their file is reassessed and pushed toward senior income programs, yet the double-disabled couple rate explicitly does not apply to couples over 65 who are not eligible for OAS. Disability-related costs do not retire at 65; medical needs rise with age.

 

Housing instability

The shelter allowance is removed entirely if someone becomes unhoused. The exact moment a person loses their home, their income drops, cementing homelessness instead of preventing it.

Since 2019, homelessness among ODSP and Ontario Works recipients has surged 72%, to more than 30,000 people.

 

Administrative hardship

Strict reporting rules, monthly income verification, and overpayment recovery that claws back up to 10% of a person's budget for honest mistakes create long-term financial burdens.

These procedures do not stop fraud; they punish people already living on the edge.

Disabled Ontarians and their families deserve more than survival. They deserve dignity, stability, and the opportunity to live full lives.

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We call on the Government of Ontario to take immediate action:

1. Raise ODSP rates to the poverty line for every household type. Increase the single rate to at least $2,300 a month, and scale every family rate — single parents, couples, and families with children — to the appropriate Market Basket Measure threshold, with inflation indexing that keeps pace with real costs.
2. End the clawback on work. Reduce the earnings deduction from 75% to 50% after $1,000, so working genuinely pays.
3. End the marriage penalty. Set the couple rate at two times the single rate, give each disabled spouse their own $1,000 earnings exemption, and raise the non-disabled spouse's exemption from $200 to $1,000 — because disability does not disappear when two people fall in love.
4. Protect housing support. Combine the shelter allowance and basic needs into one stable, flat benefit, so losing housing never means losing income.
5. End administrative punishment. Allow flexible reporting timelines, forgive honest mistakes, and prevent long-term repayment burdens for minor errors.
6. Protect every kind of household. Preserve and expand the sole-support parent supplement, allow disabled adult children to receive ODSP in their own right without Ontario Works participation requirements, and ensure seniors keep adequate support for disability costs as they age.
7. Modernize the disability program. Index the Special Diet Allowance, frozen at $250 a month for over a decade, and raise asset limits from $40,000 to $100,000 for a single person — matching British Columbia — so modest savings are not a disqualifier.

 

Why this matters now

Living with a disability costs at least 30% more than the cost of living without one. Yet ODSP pays less than the cost of rent alone, punishes recipients who work, taxes the act of falling in love, and leaves single parents and families below the poverty line.

The program that was meant to support dignity is instead legislating poverty, and the province is already paying for it in homeless encampments, record food bank lines, and strain on our health-care system.

Every signature sends the Government of Ontario a simple demand: raise the rates, end the clawbacks, and make ODSP work for every household it was built to serve.

Ontario promised disabled people dignity and independence. Instead, it delivers poverty, punishment, and precarity.

Sign this petition to demand real ODSP reform.