Our Review of the 2026 Changes
The announcement said more children
will be supported.
Here's what they didn't say.
The BC Government redesigned how disability supports reach children and youth. For thousands of Autism and disability families in this province, the details tell a very different story than the headlines.
We are not against inclusion. We are against exclusion disguised as inclusion.
In February 2026, the BC Government announced a new Children and Youth Disability Benefit, replacing the Autism Funding Program and School Age Extended Therapies (SAET). The announcement described a major new investment in children with disabilities.
We believe every child with a disability deserves support. The question we are asking — the question every family deserves an answer to — is whether this redesign actually delivers that, or whether it asks some of the province's most vulnerable children to pay the price for a system that was never properly funded to begin with.
When the Autism Funding Program ends, the replacement isn't ready.
The Government's own documents reveal a rollout schedule that leaves families in a gap — and points them to services that either don't exist yet, or won't exist for years. This is not speculation. These are the Government's own published timelines.
The Autism Funding Program closes on March 31, 2027. The BC Children and Youth Disability Supplement — the tax measure families are being pointed to — does not begin payments until July 1, 2027. That is a three-month window where families who previously had guaranteed direct funding have nothing. No Autism Funding Program. No supplement. No guaranteed replacement.
Expanded speech-language pathology, occupational therapy, and physiotherapy, with stronger integration with behavioural supports. Delivered in home, community, and school settings. This is the only new community service available before the Autism Funding Program closes.
Direct funding for eligible Autism families stops on March 31, 2027. Families transition to the new Disability Benefit — if they qualify — or to the income-tested Supplement. The Supplement payments do not begin for another three months.
The tax supplement — delivered through CRA, not the Ministry of Children & Family Development — begins payments. Families who lost Autism Funding Program funding on March 31 have waited three months. Families earning above the income threshold receive reduced or no supplement.
Assessment-informed intervention, skill-building, caregiver coaching, and coordinated care for children with behavioural or mental health challenges including anxiety, emotional regulation difficulties, and school exclusion. Intended to intervene earlier and reduce crisis-driven responses. Available approximately 4–5 months after the Autism Funding Program closes on March 31, 2027.
Helps families understand what supports are available across health, education, and community systems. Particularly important for families in rural or remote communities and those without a single diagnosis. Available at least 8 months after the Autism Funding Program closes — the exact date within Winter 2027 has not been specified.
Increased access to therapeutic, behavioural, social, and recreational supports for school-aged children and youth. Group-based and community-delivered models. Available approximately one year after the Autism Funding Program closes — the services school-aged children need most are still being phased in a full year later.
Four things the announcement didn't address
These are not political complaints. They are practical questions that remain unanswered for families right now.
A line was drawn. Without clinical evidence. And without warning.
Of the ~28,000 families currently in the Autism Funding Program, only 12,000–15,000 children are expected to qualify for the new Disability Benefit. The Government estimates around 9,000 of those will be children with Autism. The remaining Autism Funding Program families are directed to a tax supplement or community services — with around 5,600 families receiving neither. Source: Children and Youth with Support Needs FAQ p.3, p.15.
Children who do not qualify for the Benefit were previously guaranteed $6,000 per year through the Autism Funding Program. Under the new system they receive an income-tested tax supplement — delivered through the Canada Revenue Agency, not the Ministry of Children & Family Development — and not available until July 2027 at the earliest. Their needs have not changed. The eligibility line did.
A cash benefit only works if there are services to spend it on.
A portion of the new funding goes to community-based programming — the kind of in-person services, therapists, and family supports that children with disabilities actually need. This investment is real and it matters.
But community programming requires communities. It requires infrastructure, trained staff, accessible facilities, and proximity to families. In rural and remote BC, that infrastructure either doesn't exist or is hours away. The Government's own documents acknowledge that navigation services are "particularly important for families in rural or remote communities" — yet those services don't arrive until Winter 2027 at the earliest.
The caseload is growing 36%. The per-child value is shrinking.
The Government projects the number of children in the Children & Youth with Support Needs system will grow from 58,000 to 79,000 over the next three years — a 36% increase. This growth is real. It is driven by rising Autism diagnoses, better identification of complex needs, and children with medical needs who are surviving longer and requiring more support.
The funding does not grow at the same rate. When you divide the available budget by a rapidly growing number of children, each child receives less. More children in the system, with less per child — that is not expansion. That is managed decline.
Direct funding gave families choice. The new system takes that away.
For years, Autism Funding Program funding gave Autism families one thing that is almost impossible to put a price on: control. Families could choose their own speech language pathologist, their own occupational therapist, their own behaviour support worker. They could find someone who understood their child, their community, their language.
A disability benefit administered through a support planning process is a different thing entirely. It adds steps, gatekeepers, and timelines between a child's need and the service that meets it. For children whose development depends on consistency — on the same therapist, in the same place, on the same schedule — that disruption has a cost that never appears in a budget line.
"Not a cut — a redesign. One that happens to exclude thousands of disabled kids."
We are asking the Government to show us the evidence behind every decision that removes a child from guaranteed funding. The burden of proof belongs to those making the change — not to the families living with the consequences.
What a fair system actually looks like
These are not abstract policy positions. They are the minimum conditions for a system that actually works for the families it is meant to serve. And they are achievable — if the Government chooses to act on them.
The Autism Funding Program must not close on March 31, 2027 until the replacement is fully operational. A three-month funding gap for children with disabilities is not a managed transition — it is a transition without a safety net.
Immediately halt the transition of Level 1 and 2 Autistic youth to needs-based review pending: (a) clinical realignment with the Ministry's own 2021 suicide risk guidance; and (b) finalisation of the assessment tools and criteria that, by the Ministry's own FAQ, do not yet exist.
Community programming must reach communities. A benefit without accessible services behind it is not support — it is a promise that cannot be kept outside of major urban centres.
Per-child investment must grow with caseloads and inflation. A fixed envelope divided by a growing number of children is not investment — it is rationing by another name.
Expand Direct Admit eligibility to include Autism at all DSM-5 levels. A confirmed diagnosis should be sufficient for direct funding access — full stop. Eligibility that requires a separate needs assessment introduces assessor discretion that disadvantages families in rural areas, lower-income households, and those without the capacity to advocate through a complex system.
The Government has cited the Lancet Commission's diagnostic framework to justify this redesign. But the Commission's clinical guidance explicitly warns against eligibility models that gate access on developmental delay — the very model now being implemented. Reform the Direct Admit criteria to reflect the Commission's full guidance, not only the parts of its nomenclature that support the Government's preferred outcome.
This affects your family. Your voice matters.
Thousands of families across BC are navigating this change right now — without answers to the most basic questions. We are collecting stories, coordinating responses, and making sure the Government hears what this redesign actually means on the ground.
