Wait for core Ontario autism services tops 5 years: advocates

PC MPP Michael Parsa attends Question Period at Queen's Park in Toronto on Tuesday, May 13, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Cole Burston

TORONTO — When Ashley Ferreira’s five-year-old son was diagnosed with autism in 2020 she never imagined that a five-year wait lay ahead for him to get access to government-funded core therapies.

“I thought that the diagnosis came with help,” she said. “It wasn’t until I started joining Facebook groups like the Ontario Autism Coalition that I was like, ‘Oh.’ It was a slap in the face.”

Families had been reporting wait times for access to core services under the Ontario Autism Program creeping upward in the past several years, so advocates set about doing a survey of the community.

Families starting to receive funding now to pay for core therapies including applied behaviour analysis, speech language pathology and occupational therapy are people who registered for the program five years ago, the survey found.

Children, Community and Social Services Minister Michael Parsa refused to say whether that is an acceptable length of time.

“We want to make sure that every family is supported, every child and every youth in this province has the opportunity to succeed and thrive,” he said when asked outside the legislature last week.

Figures obtained by the coalition through a freedom-of-information request show that more than 84,000 children are registered in the Ontario Autism Program to seek autism services and 19,600 of them are receiving funding to access core services.

Parsa touted the government’s record of more than doubling the budget for the autism program — to an expected $778 million this year — and expanding the services that qualify for funding as core therapy to include occupational therapy, speech language pathology and mental health supports.

As well, the Progressive Conservative government has introduced “pillars” families can access on a time-limited basis as they wait for funding for core services, including an entry-to-school program, urgent response services and support training for families.

But Ferreira said they were not relevant for her son, and what he really needed was the core services.

“I see the pillars as Band-Aid solutions,” she said. “They’re not continued support. Our children need continued support.”

Ferreira’s family has been paying out of pocket for the past five years for therapy for her son while she waited for government funding, accruing more than $100,000 in debt, she estimates.

“We’ve been paying out of pocket for five years for early intervention,” she said. “So he’s thriving at the moment, no thanks to the government.”

Ontario Autism Coalition president Alina Cameron said the government’s autism program is not providing enough help for the children who need it.

“Based on the 2021 Stats Can census, there are at least one in every 32 children in Ontario who are autistic,” she said at a recent press conference.

“That’s not rare. That’s a population, and right now it’s a population being failed by this government. There’s a human cost. Families are paying the price. Our survey found that a staggering percentage of autistic children and youth, 44 per cent, have at least one parent or caregiver who cannot work because of the demands of care.”

NDP critic Alexa Gilmour said the autism coalition’s survey is eye opening.

“It is a damning picture that it paints of the Conservative government that is utterly failing our most vulnerable children and families,” she said at the press conference.

“It’s asking them to trust in a safety net that isn’t there to catch them, that they have refused to provide. Less than one quarter of children registered for the Ontario Autism Program have been given access to the therapy that they were promised.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 30, 2025.

Allison Jones, The Canadian Press