Independent report slams Nova Scotia’s lack of urgency in disability housing reform

HALIFAX — An independent review is slamming the Nova Scotia government’s progress on complying with a human rights ruling ordering it to move people with disabilities out of institutions and into their own homes by 2028.

The report from Michael Prince, who was appointed to independently track progress as an expert in disability issues and social discrimination, said Nova Scotia’s efforts this year lack urgency and transparency.

“I’m quite concerned about the shortfalls and the distance to go” in order to attain the spring 2028 target, Prince said in an interview Friday.

In last year’s report, Prince wrote about the “absolute necessity” for Nova Scotia to ramp up progress toward completing the requirements of the ruling.

“Now, in assessing the results for the third year, I conclude that alongside some points of progress, there is a troubling lack of traction and the absence of acceleration for several requirements foundational to the remedy,” Prince said in the report released Thursday.

In 2021, the Disability Rights Coalition won an Appeal Court decision that identified systemic government discrimination in Nova Scotia against people with disabilities seeking housing and services in their communities.

The three people behind the original complaints were medically discharged, but still spent years living in a locked ward at a psychiatric hospital. A human rights board of inquiry subsequently created a list of reforms required to address the province’s shortcomings, known as the remedy.

In a provincial report released in June, the Nova Scotia government said it had completed 16 of 34 requirements from the human rights reform and had made progress on several others.

In Prince’s assessment, just seven requirements have been completed entirely.

“At this stage of the remedy’s time frame, too many items are incomplete, too many are not meeting the targets for compliance. While the province reported that most Year 3 requirements were in compliance, I conclude that more than half made only slight progress,” reads the report.

Prince said he was struck by the lack of adequate disclosure about government’s efforts on the file, and the fact that information was presented in a “very optimistic way.”

In the report, Prince said the province’s self-assessments without substantiating evidence “are simple wishful thinking.” He said it was challenging to assess all of the province’s efforts because of a lack of information.

“In the report, a couple of times I say, ‘I really can’t comment on this,’ or, ‘I don’t feel I’ve got enough information to make a fair assessment as the monitor,'” Prince said. “It’s like an auditor saying you haven’t given me enough financials to look at your budget.”

Victoria Levack, a Halifax disability advocate who lives with cerebral palsy, described the lack of government urgency highlighted in Prince’s report as a “slap in the face” to the many Nova Scotians with disabilities.

“This just shows, once again, that people with disabilities are an afterthought to this government,” Levack said in an interview Friday.

Levack said she’s also troubled by the lack of transparency surrounding the province’s efforts to enact the remedy, adding that Nova Scotians with disabilities have a right to know what progress is being made.

Susan Corkum-Greek, the minister of opportunities and social development, said Thursday that Prince’s report represents “one perspective” on the matter.

“I take very seriously the feedback from Dr. Prince as the monitor. I also would say that what he offers is one perspective — an important one — but the other perspectives that are very important include the perspective offered to me through a very passionate and committed team in opportunities and social development,” Corkum-Greek said following a cabinet meeting.

The minister said she remains confident the government will ensure Nova Scotians with disabilities are out of institutions and into their own homes by the 2028 deadline.

“I believe it’s achievable, but I want to say that this is a generational shift. It’s bigger than government, it’s bigger than programs, it’s bigger than changing a system. It’s going to require a societal change that is going to go way past March 2028,” Corkum-Greek said.

The report says in the year ending March 31, there were 102 people under Nova Scotia’s disability support program who moved out of institutional settings and into community homes.

Almost 260 people have moved out of institutional settings over three years.

The province did not immediately respond when asked how many Nova Scotians with disabilities are still living in institutional settings.

Levack, who spent a decade living in a Halifax nursing home before the province supported her move into an accessible apartment with 24-hour support, said every day spent in an institutional setting unnecessarily is a day too long.

“To have such slow progress while these people are suffering is a problem, and trust me, they are suffering. I still have trauma from living in institutions,” she said.

Kim Long, a vice-chair of the Disability Rights Coalition and a mother to a son with Down syndrome, said in an interview Thursday the group hopes to see a greater sense of urgency on the part of the Nova Scotia government.

“The five-year timeline was an ambitious one, and it was inevitable that there would be bumps and hurdles during implementation. We believe that full transparency about those hurdles is important… as well as how the implementation may be adjusted to make up for those setbacks,” Long said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 7, 2026.

— With files from Devin Stevens

Lyndsay Armstrong, The Canadian Press