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Gladys Whincup is losing the $1.15-an-hour job she’s had for 35 years, and she’s devastated.

“I loved working there,” she says. “It was a nice job and we got paid for it. I liked everything about the job. All the people I work with I like very much — they are all my friends.”

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Whincup’s workplace is — or was — a wastepaper sorting and disposal plant at Tunney’s Pasture where she and dozens of other developmentally disabled people have been gainfully employed disposing of copious quantities of secret and confidential federal government paper — as much as 40 per cent of it — since 1980.

As of month’s end, their workplace and sense of community and friendship will be just another empty federal government building. The group of 50 workers has been told to vacate the premises.

The Ottawa-Carleton Association for Persons with Developmental Disabilities (OCAPDD) administered the work program in a joint agreement with Library and Archives Canada (LAC) and the provincial government. The province funded the salaries of two OCAPDD staff to supervise the workers; LAC, the federal government’s clearing house for the paper, paid the honorariums.