New 2025 report charts provincial and territorial trends in social assistance and adds disability-definition analysis
Maytree today published the 2025 edition of Social Assistance Summaries, a jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction overview of social assistance numbers for the 2024-25 fiscal year. This annual report supplies journalists, policymakers, and researchers with up-to-date caseload figures and trend analysis. This year, a new section examines how differing definitions of “disability” affect who receives support, and what this means for federal programs such as the Canada Disability Benefit.
The report provides comprehensive data on how many people received social assistance in each province and territory, tracking cases and beneficiaries across all 13 jurisdictions.
Key findings include:
- Sharp caseload increases: Quebec’s Aim for Employment program saw a 34 per cent increase, while Alberta’s Income Support, B.C.’s Income Assistance, and Ontario Works all grew by approximately 15 per cent.
- Single adults most vulnerable: Unattached single adults comprise most social assistance cases across nearly every jurisdiction – representing 73 per cent of Income Assistance cases in B.C., 81 per cent of Ontario Disability Support Program cases, and 86 per cent of Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped cases in Alberta.
- New disability supports: Nova Scotia introduced a Disability Supplement in May 2024, and the Northwest Territories launched a new Income Assistance for Seniors and Persons with Disabilities program in July 2024.
National spotlight: Federal disability definition excludes hundreds of thousands
This year’s report includes an analysis of how definitions of “disability” vary across Canada – and how these differences directly affect how people access income support.
The analysis reveals that 750,411 cases qualified for disability benefits through social assistance in 2024-25 – more than the 610,000 people the federal government projects will receive the Canada Disability Benefit by 2028-29.
“Most provincial and territorial definitions of disability are broader than the federal Disability Tax Credit (DTC) standard,” the report notes. “Since eligibility for the Canada Disability Benefit is tied to the DTC, hundreds of thousands of people already assessed as having disabilities by their provinces or territories will be excluded by the more restrictive federal definition.”
Maytree proposes that the federal government adopt a more inclusive definition that encompasses all provincial and territorial disability definitions, ensuring people don’t face conflicting federal criteria.