Service Dog Rights in Canada
Different jurisdictions across Canada deal will the rights of Service Dogs in different ways. Not all Provinces in Canada do so in a manner that is in line with Human Rights
In the United States of America their country wide "American's With Disabilities Act" affords broad rights to any person with a Disability. The Act is very powerful and does not discriminate based on who trained your Service Dog or where you live in the country. In fact, in the USA you don't even need a vest on your dog. Even with such excellent protection, every business, or organization, has the right to ask a poorly behaved Service Animal be removed from the premise.
What about Cheats and fake dogs ?
Well the answer to that question is that indeed, there are those that buy a vest online and stick it on Fluffy and then try to get onto airplanes and into stores. This kind of behaviour is a real slap in the face to those of us with real disabilities and real service dogs.
The Damage done by fake dogs ?
Fake Service Animals diminish the injury that some of us live with, but the bigger damage is how others see real Service Dogs and what happens because of that. There is an unseen damage done by 'fake dogs" and that is the restrictions imposed by some provinces in Canada. The regulations those provinces employ may in fact injure those with disabilities, far more than a few fake Service Dogs going into a store do.
Alberta & Nova Scotia.
These 2 provinces have one thing in common. They have Service Dogs Acts that place very heavy burdens on Service Dog Handlers. Those provinces require that your Dog be trained by specific organizations. (Alberta recently made some modifications to that rule, making it much less onerous on the person needing a Service Dog.) There are not nearly enough organizations in Canada to provide the number of dogs needed in Canada. The requirements are onerous and injure those needing dogs even further. Like in the USA, if a dog is misbehaved and disruptive, then the business has the right to remove it. The protection to businesses from unruly fake dogs has always been available to store owners. Onerous laws do more harm than good.
British Columbia (edited October 2022)
Up until recently British Columbia was grouped in with Alberta and Nova Scotia. While BC still has a similar law that allows for registration with the province, it is no longer mandatory. They have apparently realized that Human Rights law prevails and that overreaching government rules do more harm to the disabled than they do good.
*This article is the opinion of the blog writer and may or may not be the opinion shared by Meliora Service Dogs.
