Friday, October 27, 2006

National Autism Strategy Motion Debate To Continue 3rd or 4th Week in November

The debate of Fredericton MP Andy Scott's national autism strategy private member's bill started today in the House of Commons and aired on CPAC. It was encouraging to see a lot of important information about autism, evidence based treatment, particularly ABA aired in the H of C. The Leo Hayes class of teacher Greg Peters was praised for the tremendous effort they have made on behalf of the autism cause nationally. It was also great to hear Andy read Fredericton area resident Brian Rimpilainen's letter about his autistic child and some of the realities of life for a family with an autistic child. It was tough to sit still as the Bloc Quebecois speakers squabbled about protecting Quebec's constitutional turf. It was difficult to say where the Conservatives were going with their comments.

For many of us in New Brunswick who have fought for years for government funded evidence based pre-school treatment, autism trained TA's to work with autistic students, and decent residential care for autistic youths and adults it was nice to be able to sit back and let advocates like Andy Scott, Nova Scotia NDP MP Peter Stoffer and Brampton-Springdale (Ontario) Liberal MP Ruby Dhalla do the heavy hitting and educate Canadians about autism today in the House of Commons.

Debate did not conclude today and I am informed by Andrew Holland, executive assistant to Andy Scott, that the debate and vote will probably be continued and concluded in either the 3rd or 4th week of November.

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