EXCERPTS:
Children and families in Canada have a right to access quality, affordable child care services. Yet, only 20% of young children today have access to a regulated space and, in many regions, child care fees are the second highest expense for young families.
In much of the world, children are not seen as the strict responsibility of individual parents. Instead, children are recognized as the next generation and highly valued and protected. In many cultures, children are very visible in public life. They may be seen strapped to their mother’s backs in African marketplaces or attending meetings with their fathers in rural Indian villages. They are recognized as necessary parts of life rather than impediments and interruptions. In most European countries, children are seen to be a public responsibility and this is reflected through tax benefits directed at children as well as universal child care programs available to all parents.
In Canada, early childhood educators who care for young children are paid even less than parking lot attendants and zookeepers. According to our economic system, taking care of a child is about as valuable as taking care of a car or an animal. Few child care workers can afford to use the care they provide to other people’s children.
The idea of a national childcare program has been around since the Royal Commission on the Status of Women put it on the political agenda in 1970. Arguing that reliable child care is fundamental to women’s equality in employment, the Commission recommended that “the federal government immediately take steps to enter into agreements with provinces leading to adoption of a national Daycare Act.”
The Liberal government of Paul Martin promised a new national program in 2004. This was subsequently cancelled by the 2005 election of Stephen Harper’s Conservatives. The Conservative government then introduced the “Universal Child Care Benefit”, a monthly cheque to families for every child under age 6 (taxable). The $2.5 billion annual UCCB was intended to give the greatest benefit to two-parent families with one parent in the labour force. Federal ECEC funds to provinces/territories have since been cut while any discussion between the federal and provincial/territorial governments about pertinent social policy has been abandoned.
Although the province has set out a plan for modest improvements to early learning and child care, Manitoba continues to suffer from a chronic and serious shortage of trained early childhood educators, which is a problem directly caused by low pay and remuneration.
In order to use a child care space, a parent must pay. Fees are very high – as much as $7,300 per child per year. Child care costs can easily eat up half or more of the after-tax incomes of women working typical jobs such as clerical and service work. In many families, child care is more expensive than the mortgage. While the province provides about 9,600 child care subsidies for very low-income parents (2007 figures), the eligibility rate for a child care subsidy is set very low – well below the poverty line, and there are not enough spaces or subsidies for parents who need them. In 2007 the maximum a single parent with one child could earn to be eligible for a full subsidy was $15,593. Even those parents who are fortunate enough to qualify for a scarce subsidy must still pay a portion of their child care fee.
Most children with employed/studying parents are in unregulated situations – cared for by relatives, older brothers or sisters, baby-sitters or by themselves. Women on reserves, in small towns, and in rural areas experience the greatest lack as most licensed child care spaces are found in urban centres.
Whether or not one or both of their parents have paid work outside the home, most children need some kind of paid care, be it a babysitter, a neighbour, or a child care centre. The need is there.
Good child care so parents can work, study and participate in their communities while children thrive is in the best interests of all Canadians — as are public education, publicly-funded universities and publicly-funded health care. A thoughtful national child-care program can become a real social program like those at which Canada used to excel.
As children, child care is a right. As families, child care is a right. As women, child care is a right. As workers, child care is a right.
Yet, Canada remains without a national child care plan and without political leadership on this issue. While significant strides have been made by Quebec, provinces and territories have by and large yet to develop an adequate, well-designed, well-resourced approach.
I hope this blog will stimulate discussion and debate, and will encourage readers to present their own perspectives on this issue.
- reprinted from my Steinbach