Who We Are

ARCH Disability Law Centre is a specialty community legal clinic that is mandated to address systemic change through the removal of ableist barriers and to advance the full inclusion for persons with disabilities. ARCH provides a range of free confidential legal services to low-income persons with disabilities living in Ontario in select areas of law. 

ARCH is dedicated to defending and advancing the equality rights, entitlements, fundamental freedoms, and inclusion of persons with disabilities.  

ARCH is designated as a “test case” clinic.  This means that we represent eligible individuals and groups in important systemic legal cases where a court or tribunal is deciding an issue for the first time, where a court is deciding an issue that will affect a large number of people, or where there is a disability analysis that should be brought to a court to decide the outcome. 

ARCH also provides free, confidential legal advice and information on specific disability-related areas of law through our Summary Advice and Referral service to all persons with disabilities living in Ontario.  

In addition to legal representation, ARCH works to change laws that affect persons with disabilities through our law reform and policy work, provide public legal education to community groups, and support and lead community projects and capacity building efforts to support these efforts.  ARCH is grateful to our primary funder, Legal Aid Ontario, for all its ongoing support. ARCH is also grateful to our other funders and funding sources, including donations from the public. 

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Our Funders

Our Vision

A society in which laws, policies and legal systems ensure full participation, inclusion, dignity, and equal rights without discrimination for persons with disabilities

Our Mission Statement

ARCH Disability Law Centre, as a specialty legal clinic with a provincial mandate, undertakes to achieve this Vision by: Advocating for the rights of persons with disabilities, including the removal of systemic barriers;

Promoting awareness and providing education on the rights of persons with disabilities;

Addressing issues that have a particular impact on low income persons with disabilities;

Ensuring that ARCH’s work has Ontario-wide impact;

Engaging in national disability rights work and influencing the realization of international disability rights norms in Canada and Ontario; 

Continuously developing and utilizing ARCH’s expertise in local, provincial, national and international law as it affects persons with disabilities; and

Addressing the heightened disadvantage and discrimination faced by persons with disabilities, including as a result of other intersecting grounds of discrimination, including gender, race, age, language, place of origin, economic status, sexual orientation, and others. 

Our Values and Principles

ARCH is guided by the following set of core values:

The dignity and worth of all persons with disabilities must be respected;

Persons with disabilities have the right to dignity, equality, self-determination, disability-related supports and full participation in a barrier-free inclusive society;

Persons with disabilities themselves are in the best position to determine their own priorities; and

All persons have a common responsibility to create inclusive communities accessible to all persons with disabilities. 

Additionally, ARCH is guided by the following set of core organizational principles: ARCH operates in accordance with the above core values;

ARCH is a community-based organization, governed by a Board of Directors composed of a majority of persons with disabilities; and

 ARCH is accountable to persons with disabilities in Ontario, its members and its funders.

Our History

ARCH opened its doors in January of 1980 as the first specialist legal clinic in North America run by and for persons with disabilities. Operating until 2005 under the name Advocacy Resource Centre for the Handicapped, the Clinic was created to meet a need for legal support identified by consumer groups and an increasingly active disability rights movement in Ontario and across Canada. (“ARCH celebrating 25 years”).

ARCH continues to value a collaborative, inclusive approach to what we do , building partnerships with disability communities and self-advocates, legal networks, agencies,  policymakers, and other stakeholders. Among its first major law reform efforts, ARCH was instrumental in forming the Human Rights Coalition which successfully advocated for adding “handicap” (disability)  as a prohibited ground of discrimination to Ontario’s Human Rights Code. Over the following forty plus years, ARCH’s efforts have been focused on effectively advancing the rights enshrined in the Human Rights Code, Canadian Human Rights Act, Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and the Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities to make real change in the quality of life and opportunities for persons with disabilities.

ARCH has contributed to significant advances on key concerns to the disability community, including:  mental health law and the right of psychiatric patients to refuse involuntary treatment; removal of voting restrictions at the municipal, provincial and federal levels; implementation of comprehensive disability rights legislation  and accessibility standards; inclusive, accessible adequately funded education; tax reforms to address the additional costs of disability; a transformed understanding of legal capacity and the limits of guardianship;  deinstitutionalization and adequate supports for independent living; availability of legal services to low-income clients with disabilities in inner downtown and rural regions of the province; and the collection of adequate disability-related statistical data on which to base policy.

More about the history of ARCH’s work can be found in the pages of the Clinic’s periodicals ARCH Type (1981-2000) and ARCH Alert (1984- ), which chart the time, joint commitment and persistence required to make real change in the quality of life and opportunities for persons with disabilities.

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ARCH Disability Law Centre is deeply grateful for the recognition it has received for its dedicated work in advocating for the legal rights of people with disabilities. The numerous awards we have received reflect our commitment to promoting equality, accessibility, and inclusion. We are thankful for the ongoing support that enables us to create meaningful change and empower communities across Ontario and Canada.