Timmins father launches lawsuit over lack of help for his daughter, 'the funding is cut off'

A Timmins father is taking on the Ontario government in a lawsuit.  

His daughter has several disabilities and when she turned 18, the type of government assistance she received had to change. 

However, it's been over a year and no money is coming in.  

The Leroux family tried to make the best of a rainy holiday Monday.

But looming over them is the fact they say they are not receiving adequate financial assistance from the government for Briana, who has the mental capacity of a four-year-old.

When Briana turned 18 in February 2016, her government assistance shifted from one government agency to another as she is now an adult.

She’s been on a waiting list ever since. 

"The funding is cut off and the programs are not available anymore," said Marc Leroux, Brianna's father.

"So, they go from helping you to nothing and then now what you have to do is wait.  So last summer the issues I had, I pretty much had to take the summer off in order to be with Briana because we had no worker for her for the summer."

The Leroux’s are not alone.

There are 11,000 other families in Ontario just like them; waiting for funding from Developmental Services Ontario to provide adequate care for their children.

This is why he's going public, because even if they were to win a class action lawsuit, it would only amount to around $10,000 per family.

Not enough says marc, and he feels the government needs to change its ways. 

"I'm hoping this just opens the government's eyes and gets the media out there looking at it and gets people to investigate what's going on with DSO and the government and why they're not fulfilling their duties to these kids and adults with disabilities," he said.

Timmins-James bay MPP Gilles Bisson has met with the Leroux family and he told CTV he's working on getting help for them, and a number of families. 

"I've been talking to my colleagues at Queen's Park about what supports are available so that we can have a good list of that," said Bisson.

"We'll meet the parents again for a second time in June, but the idea is to pull them together into group and to connect them with people like the child advocate and others who can help them advocate for their children so they can get the type of supports they need for the families and for themselves."

In the meantime, Marc told CTV he'll continue to fight for the rights of his daughter and others like her.

He said her disabilities will not stop just because she became an adult.