Torchlight

Gender Support Group

Help eyed for sex changes Premier vows to back rights ruling Would reinstate OHIP funding
Kerry Gillespie, Queen's Park Bureau

The Ontario government has moved closer to once again paying for sex-change operations.

Premier Dalton McGuinty said his government would reinstate funding immediately if the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal rules that that it should.

A case - launched by several people undergoing sex changes when the then Conservative government delisted such surgery from OHIP in 1998 - ended Tuesday. The tribunal has up to six months to decide.

"If the tribunal rules in favour of reinstating funding, will you ensure that your government respects the ruling and reinstate(s) the funding immediately?" New Democrat MPP Marilyn Churley (Toronto-Danforth) asked the premier in the Legislature.

"I want to be very, very direct to the member’s question: Yes," McGuinty said.

After question period, the Liberal government leader spoke to some of the complainants.

Given more than six years of fighting the system, those few minutes meant a lot to Martine Stonehouse.

"I was very happy. ... It shows strength if the government is looking out for the smaller people, the people without a voice," said Stonehouse, 48, a school caretaker.

"It’s a shame, though, that we had to go through all we have," she said. "This should have been addressed a lot sooner rather than having us go all the way through a tribunal hearing."

Stonehouse was born "Martin" but never felt comfortable as a man. "For 25 years to please my parents and society I fought to be a man. It wasn't me."

In 1994, Stonehouse began the transition to becoming "Martine." She was ready for surgery in 1998 when the government suddenly stopped paying for it. Her life has been on hold ever since because she - and her fiancé John Gelmon - cannot afford the $25,000 procedure.

With the tribunal over and McGuinty’s encouraging words, Stonehouse hopes she soon will get surgery and then walk down the aisle at her wedding.

If the tribunal rules against them, she vows to appeal. "It will be very devastating for us because it will mean we can’t get on with our lives and I have a lot more to my life than just this."

- Published in The Toronto Star on Thu, April 21, 2005