See text below.
EXCERPTS
The Harper government's child care advisory committee has found businesses aren't interested in opening child care spaces, yet still heavily favours incentives for businesses as the solution to this country's child care shortage.
It's a plan that's doomed not just because it lacks business support, but because there's no one to work in these hypothetical new child care spaces. The committee itself acknowledges there is a "crisis" in child care human resources.
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The study showed that income in the child care sector was about half the national average for all occupations, and less than half as much as elementary school and kindergarten teachers.
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Finding a way out of this mess isn't rocket science. Improvements in pay and working conditions will keep trained child care workers from taking their skills elsewhere, lowering staff turnover and increasing the quality of care.
Quality child care depends on well-paid, qualified staff. Without a policy framework and considerable investment that can address this human resources dilemma, early learning and child care professionals are leaving the field and fewer are entering the profession.
Let's invest in strategies that boost this sector, not subsidies we know will fail.
Paul Moist
National President,
Canadian Union of Public Employees,
Ottawa
- reprinted from the Whitehorse Daily Star