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EXCERPTS
With his government's crucial first budget just weeks away, Prime Minister Stephen Harper is taking dead aim at his political foes, all but daring them to bring down the minority government.
At a children's playgroup in the urban sprawl that surrounds downtown Vancouver, Harper challenged his opponents to vote against the Tory plan to give parents of pre-schoolers a $1,200 cheque, and warned he would be happy to fight an election over it.
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Harper met with a group of about a dozen parents privately, and later publicly praised Helen Ward, president of Kids First Parent Association, who said in an interview all new spending on child care should be given to parents, not directed at creating any more daycare spaces. She said currently, tax deductions for daycare give "preferential treatment" to certain parents.
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But in the gym, several parents with children disagreed with Harper's focus.
"I think you need to create daycare spaces more importantly," said flight attendant Lydia Pranaitis, mother of two boys, aged 2 1/2 and 6 months. "The money is nothing &emdash; maybe one night of babysitting to be able to go out." She said her toddler has been on a waiting list for daycare since she was three months pregnant with him, and there are still 300 kids on that list.
Harper called the Conservative proposal a "universal child-care plan," although he admitted it will not cover "all" child care expenses, nor will the upcoming federal budget contain any measures &emdash; no new capital funding or tax credit incentives &emdash; to create the 125,000 promised new childcare spaces.
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He said a direct payment to parents would side-step the "academics, researchers or special interest groups. It cuts out the political and bureaucratic middlemen."
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Almost immediately, interim Liberal leader Bill Graham released a statement challenging Harper's claims that no spaces had been created under the Liberal $5 billion investment in child-care agreements with the provinces.
"Ontario alone was projecting the creation of an additional 25,000 child-care spaces by the end of 2007-08. The province has had to cancel 11,000 spaces because of the lack of federal funding. Saskatchewan has had to shelve its plan to create a universal pre-school program," said the statement.
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- reprinted from the Toronto Star