Supports adopting a federal law mandating a child care system
No
Yes
Yes
No
Believes increased federal funds are needed to make quality programs available and affordable to families
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Will prevent a corporate take-over of child care programs in Canada
No
No
Yes
No
Good quality accessible child care is - at one and the same time - a foundation of lifelong learning and healthy development for children, essential to support parents’ employment and learning, necessary in any poverty reduction strategy, critical to women’s equality, an important element of reconciliation with Aboriginal peoples, and key to social inclusion for newcomers to Canada. Early childhood education and care (ECEC) is about rights and citizenship.
Yet Canada is one of the world’s ECEC laggards. Canada is the lowest spender on ECEC programs of any Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development
(OECD) country and ranks at the very bottom of international assessments of ECEC access and quality. Many other countries now routinely provide publicly-funded early childhood programs for their three to five year olds but Canada has yet to take even this first step. Our record of neglect brings shame to Canadians who were once so proud of our record on social programs.
In this election, let’s remember that Canada STILL needs child care!
* This analysis is based on public information available as of September 10, 2008.
Q. Will your party increase federal transfers for child care, starting with an additional $1.2 billion in the first year?
Q. Does your party support adopting federal child care legislation to ensure these funds are used to build a non-profit child care system?
