44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 6, 2023 10:00AM
- Jun/6/23 9:57:21 p.m.
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The hon. parliamentary secretary to the leader of the government.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to follow up with the member on that aspect. It is hard to imagine that the Conservative Party does not see the real and tangible benefits of this program, given that the Province of Quebec has had it for many years and we have seen a great deal of benefit, like more women getting engaged into the workforce. There is a wide spectrum of benefits from having this program.
I am wondering if the member could expand on why she believes the Quebec program has been as successful as it has and why it is, in fact, in Canada's best interest to try to duplicate that model nationwide.
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Madam Speaker, Canada can only gain from drawing inspiration from a model implemented in Quebec.
Earlier, I ended my speech by talking about a study done by economists who found that, in only a few years, this model helped increase women's participation in the workforce from 66% to 79%. I think those numbers are striking.
Furthermore, I would say that sadly, Conservative governments have questioned bills where the federal government was drawing inspiration from what was being done in Quebec. It was Stephen Harper's government, and it is Mr. Poilièvre himself who said that, once elected to government, he would dismantle this bill—
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- Jun/6/23 9:58:51 p.m.
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I remind the member that we are not supposed to refer to other members by name.
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Madam Speaker, I apologize. It is late. I meant the member for Carleton.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for another inspiring and enlightening speech. I think she is absolutely right. As I was saying, the Quebec model of early childhood education centres, the CPEs, has helped people enormously. It is a great social benefit for families in Quebec.
What does my colleague think about the fact that an agreement has been reached between the federal and Quebec governments? It improves funding to perhaps add more child care spaces.
In terms of long-term federal funding, what does she think about the fact that priority has been given to public and non-profit child care facilities, and that we are trying to ensure that families across the country have access to child care?
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Madam Speaker, as I mentioned in my speech, I would have preferred that it be written into the bill in black and white, as it was in the previous bill. I wanted the bill to say that it took into consideration the fact that Quebec pioneered this model and that it has every right to make the choice of not running the risk, in the long term, of being subject to interference in its areas of jurisdiction and having another quarrel with the federal government.
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Madam Speaker, it is a great honour to speak in support of Bill C-35 at this time. I could not agree more with some of the members who spoke before me, such as the member for Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill and the Bloc Québécois member for Shefford, who gave a great speech. I always appreciate my colleagues' efforts.
Despite the fact that it is late, I would like to give my opinion on this bill. This bill does more than set up child care services. It is important to highlight the principles of this bill: It aims to provide a system of early learning and child care to promote the development of young children.
It is really important to stress the way that Bill C-35 embraces things that many of us have been working on for years, early learning and child care. This is about improving the life chances of children, because the evidence is very clear that children learn with qualified educators who are doing more than making sure the children are watched through a morning or during the day while their parents are at work.
The principles of Bill C-35 underscore that child care must be accessible, affordable, inclusive and of high quality. These are things that we desperately need to see.
In the debate over the bill, I heard legitimate concerns from colleagues, particularly among the Conservative benches. These are fair points. We cannot find enough early childhood educators for all the spaces that are being created. Child care workers should be paid appropriately, and I am saddened by the reality that the existing agreement between the Government of Canada and the Province of Ontario puts in place a payment schedule for child care workers that is embarrassingly insufficient for the work that we are entrusting these workers with.
They should really be paid more than CEOs. They should be paid more, with all due respect to colleagues across the way. I know at least one of our colleagues in the Conservative Party was a very famous hockey coach. We should pay our child care workers more than we pay our hockey players.
What is more important in our society than ensuring our children have the best start in life? Our teachers, at all levels, are underpaid. Early learning and child care educators are professionals whose work needs to be recognized and properly compensated.
However, it is not an unfair point to say we cannot find enough child care workers for all the $10-a-day child care spaces that are being opened up. The point is, we will. This has just come in. The agreements with provinces are very fresh. I am very encouraged that we are going to have it in law, in this piece of legislation, that one hopes any future government could not tamper with this. We have agreements with each of the provinces and territories, and that is a huge accomplishment.
Of course, we had accomplished it back in 2005, when, speaking of hockey players, a famous former minister responsible for the file, Ken Dryden managed to accomplish inked, signed deals with every province. Then we had the election of 2005-06, and the whole program, even though funded, with signed agreements, was scrapped by the incoming Conservative government of Stephen Harper. I wish I did not have such a good memory because thinking about that transition, where we lost Kyoto and Kelowna and child care in a relatively short period of time, is painful to recall.
The advantages of ensuring that every Canadian child, whether from families, as the hon. member for Nunavut was explaining so eloquently, that have not had the same advantages and privilege, or from families from equity-seeking groups, would be able to ensure that the child care program that allows the parents to go to work is of high quality.
I want to stress that part because early learning and child care is a different prospect than child care on its own. I have heard horror stories over the years, as a single mother myself, of child care arrangements that just were not adequate. They were actually unsafe. It is critical we elevate the professionalism, recognition and respect we give to the workers who do this work in early learning and child care.
I also want to mention, because it came up when the hon. member for Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill was speaking, why it is I continue to proselytize the virtues of the rules of Westminster parliamentary democracy that are ignored in this place. In the Palace of Westminster in the U.K. or any of the other Commonwealth countries that use the Westminster parliamentary system, reading a speech is not allowed. It is still a rule here, but it is not only ignored, it is ignored and encouraged with handing out podiums to people so they can put the speeches they are not supposed to be reading on a podium so they can read them.
In any case, I want to spend a moment on the advantage of not allowing a written speech. In the situation we are in right now on Bill C-35, we had a complete failure of House leaders to determine what kind of time was needed to deal with this bill in this place. This happens over and over again. The hon. members across the way will know this is the game that it is played.
In the old days, and I remember the old days because I am old, a minister or a House leader would say to another House leader that a certain legislation was coming up and ask how many speakers they thought would want to speak on it and ask how much time should be allocated for it. There would be an honest and fair-minded decision made based on knowing that so and so was deeply invested in the issue and would want to speak on it and that so and so would also want to speak on it so that probably there would be x number of speakers.
Of course, if one is not allowed to read a speech, which is the case in the Palace of Westminster in London, one would basically know who was prepared to speak to it because they were among the handful of people who know the legislation and the issue well enough to stand up and speak about it without a note in front of them.
I read a very interesting article some time ago now where Conrad Black reflected on his time in the House of Lords and how he contrasted it with the Canadian Parliament. In that comparison, we do not fare well my friends. He said it was wonderful that no one could speak with notes or a written speech and had to be able to stand up and talk about the legislation at hand because out of their own knowledge they could speak to the bill. He said that was far better; I agree.
One of the other advantages of that is one cannot play the game of “we can't tell you now how many of our members want to speak to that.” A House leader of either side of the big parties can say inscrutably that they are not sure and that it is maybe five, maybe 10 or maybe 80 speakers. That is how we find ourselves here tonight.
The government side, quite wrongly I believe, uses time allocation because it throws up its hands at the impasse it finds itself in with the official opposition. This is not about the politics. One can change the colours and the same problem persists. One just plays a game of silliness and says that maybe everybody wants to speak to it. We know what happens in the lobby. Someone says, “Hey, Joe, here's your speech. You're up next.”
I know some members of Parliament for the bigger parties, individual members, have told me over the years that they have refused to do that and are just not going to do it. One can kind of tell when someone is reading a speech they have not written themselves.
My only point here is to take the time to say we could do better. This bill deserves widespread support, and I hope it has it. It will pass. It will be a law.
Thanks to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance for believing in early childhood learning and education and thanks to the Minister of Families. Let us get this passed, but let us stop the nonsense of debating until midnight when no one here is really speaking to the bill but playing a partisan game of delay.
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Madam Speaker, I was really paying close attention to what the leader of the Green Party said, especially when she was focusing on what could have been, had Ken Dryden's child care plan been accepted and ultimately passed through. Unfortunately, it was not. It heartens a lot of people to reflect on what impact that would have had today in terms of the number and the quality of child care spaces, the rates of pay for child care providers, and so forth.
I wonder if the member can reaffirm the support and the need for the legislation, given that if we do not have this legislation passed, there is no guarantee that the program will be there into the future. Could the member just emphasize why it is important that this legislation, in essence, be passed to protect the program, going forward?
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Madam Speaker, I wish I could believe that passing the bill means that a future government will not repeal it. I recall spring 2012 and an omnibus budget bill, Bill C-38, which repealed the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act, repealed the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy Act and gutted the Fisheries Act. There were 70 separate pieces of legislation destroyed in that.
I will also say that if we had not lost Kyoto, Kelowna and child care in the 2006 election, we would not be on fire now. Canada would have reached our Kyoto targets. They were on the books and fully funded. Therefore, there are tragedies in losing that government of 2005.
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Madam Speaker, with all due respect, these are not partisan games. As critic to this file, I have received thousands of messages from parents, who are screaming for help, and from operators, who are ringing alarm bells. All anybody at home has to do is google “child care” right now, and they will get article after article. These are health care workers and shift workers. They do not have access to child care. Erin Cullen is an engineer out of Newfoundland, and she is going to have to leave her province because she cannot access child care.
This is not about partisanship. These agreements are in place. It is our job in this House to ensure that things are done properly and fairly. Twenty-nine per cent of children are accessing child care, so 70% do not have access. Fifty per cent live in a child care desert. Does the member not think this warrants further investigation? Our amendments put forth in committee were turned down by the Liberals and the New Democrats.
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Madam Speaker, when I referred to partisan games, I was merely referring to the public statements that have been made by the leader of the official opposition on the intent to gum up this place with as many obstructive tactics as possible. If he did not intend for those comments to apply to this debate on Bill C-35, I apologize to the hon. member.
I agree with her. There are many things, as I mentioned in my speech, including legitimate concerns about access and the shortage of qualified early learning and child care educators. I hope we can work together in a non-partisan spirit to ensure that the vision of the legislation is actually implemented. I agree with 90% of what the member said. It needs to be worked on, and it needs to be delivered.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague for her speech, although, with so much about House goings-on, it shifted away from early childhood education. This is concerning to me as a former early childhood educator who spent many years working hard for wages that were not livable.
We know the facts are on the table. Early childhood organizations are very clear. If we do not have a workforce strategy that pays livable wages, benefits and pension plans, we will not have a national child care strategy; we will continue to have a shortage of spaces. We need to focus on workers. Does my hon. colleague agree with this?
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Madam Speaker, I could not agree more with the member for Winnipeg Centre. I apologize to her for changing to a different topic. However, I think it is critical, and I thought I made it clear in my speech, that we support and respect the child care workers who deliver early learning and child care. Why do we pay CEOs and hockey players more than we pay people doing the most critical job in our society, which is taking care of our children?
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to be joining the debate. I am glad I caught your eye and was able to rise before my colleague from a different part of Quebec who wanted to speak as well.
Just to continue on something the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands said, I hope I will not be accused of using notes. I have not used notes in many years in this place. I am sure that if we ever moved to benches, that would probably help with the use of written notes and the prolonged speeches that are perhaps prepared by others. Many members like to prepare their speaking notes way ahead of time.
This is government legislation that some of my constituents have written to me about. As I remember, this usually comes up at election time. I always have a few constituents who are concerned about access to early childhood care, and they usually mix different types of things together.
When I was growing up, my mother was a single mom and used day homes quite a bit. We are talking about quality care for children, but that was the experience for a lot of us immigrants who were newcomers to Canada and did not have many choices. We made do with what we could find. I know the government, through these agreements it signed with the different provinces, is hoping to fill that space in between, but when I look at the summary of the bill, it states:
This enactment sets out the Government of Canada’s vision for a Canada-wide early learning and child care system. It also sets out the Government of Canada’s commitment to maintaining long-term funding relating to early learning and child care to be provided to the provinces and Indigenous peoples. Finally, it creates the National Advisory Council on Early Learning and Child Care.
I have never had parents tell me at the door that they were looking for an advisory body to oversee something nationally. What they are looking for is someone they trust to watch their kids, where the kids will learn something new. As a single dad, that is what I always look for when it comes to my kids. They are much older now. My oldest son, Maximilian, just graduated from junior high on Monday, and I have two other kids in the Catholic school board system in Calgary. However, there was a time when that would have been one of the options that I would be looking for, because I was always trying to find something where they could learn something related to not only STEM, math or language skills but also art, getting dirty, doing things with their hands, just some hands-on learning and interacting with other kids. That was always something I looked forward to for my kids to have.
As has been mentioned in the House before by other members, the system the government is implementing here is one-size-fits-all. One of the big sticking points for my home province of Alberta before signing the agreement with the federal government was that it wanted more private care options to be eligible for funding through the Alberta government. In my area, there are a lot of newcomers and immigrants. Because their credentials are not recognized, and they do not necessarily have family support here, they are running day homes.
I know that in one family in particular, and I will not mention their nationality because they would be able to figure out quickly who they are, the mom runs a day home and is an accomplished musician. She helps kids learn different musical instruments. Maybe that does not meet everybody's expectations, but it is quite popular as a choice. It is a private day home. Because of legislation like this, and the agreement the Alberta government signed, this day home is going to have a tough time making ends meet, because it will not be one of the eligible options on the table for consideration for funding.
Some articles have talked about the potential problems and risks of the facilities that are currently running, such as the uncertainty this might create; the operator's experience, including whether they have certification to perform standard first aid practices; years of operation; the number of children the centre can accept; the ratio of children to caregivers; age group; the minimum and maximum numbers of children under care; and protocols for sick children or employees.
We often talk about the quality of care. The member for Saanich—Gulf Islands talked about how important early childhood educators are and said that we should pay them better. However, if we are setting up a system where we are only paying them $10 and there is a cap, somebody has to pay. Then there is the question of who pays. In this case, it will be the federal government. Taxpayers will pay, because there is only one taxpayer at the end of the day.
In my pre-political life, when I was looking for other options that were out there, obviously, I leaned on extended family. That was always the first choice. If that choice was not available, then it was friends of the family who are so close they are essentially like family.
We all have those types of people in our lives with whom we would be happy to leave our children. Maybe parents want them to play with other children or be watched for a few hours while the parents are trying to get some work done. In many cases, they are trying to get to their shift, they are coming back late from a shift or they have irregular hours and are uncertain about how they will be able to watch their kids. As a dad with three kids, I have said this before, but it is difficult. I try to make sure I am back in Calgary whenever I possibly can be and it is my turn to watch over them.
I do have a Yiddish proverb, despite the fact that it is so late. I have Yiddish proverbs all the time, because there is always a good moment for them. I will say it in Yiddish, so I would ask members to bear with me on the pronunciation.
[Member spoke in Yiddish]
[English]
That means, “With a child in the house, all corners are full.” I am sure everybody has had this experience, especially with younger children. They have a knack for filling every single room they are in with stuff that they find, everywhere they go. I salute the people who accept kids in their homes from other families, who make the extra effort to try to teach them the life skills that they need. These things maybe do not earn them an A+ in school, but they include things like picking up after themselves, being kind to other people and teamwork, doing things in teams. They try to teach very simple things, such as basic cooking.
I mentioned this one family where the lady who was the main provider, the main caregiver, is a very accomplished musician. Providing these types of soft skills is quite useful for many people. I wanted to convey that Yiddish proverb, because it is something I think about with my kids, how they fill not just every corner in my house but every corner of my life as well.
Affordable care, which we have been talking about, is mostly a principle in this bill, because there are already agreements with all the provinces. What more could we do but talk about the principles and ideas behind the legislation that the government has put forward and that many of the members on this side of the House have already spoken in favour of? We support the bill, but we have concerns that we want to express on behalf of constituents.
There is going to be an increased demand for child care, but it is not going to solve the frontline problems with staff shortages, burnout and difficulty in accessing spaces. It does not really matter whether it is public, private or something in between, it is from coast to coast. Different provinces have different problems. When I look at those who choose to work in this field, in the next 10, 20 and 30 years, we will be facing a shortage of workers in general. It is going to be hard to convince people to retrain themselves to pursue this as a field.
When the Statistics Canada data is looked at, at the bachelor's level and above, there is essentially a job for every person who is looking for one. There are sectors where that is not the case and where it is hard to retrain someone, but at the high school level and below, there are a lot of vacancies. I do not think we consider early childhood education low skill. That is not a low-skill job. That is difficult. Put eight to 10 four-year-old or five-year-old kids in a room, and that is a full-time job. It is very difficult to get everybody on the same page, working in the same direction on the same tasks. That has to be remunerated a certain way. There has to be a total compensation package that attracts good people who want to work with children, who can be trusted to work with children and who have a skill set that lends itself very well to providing children with some of the early skills that they are going to need to succeed in school. That is important as well.
There is a high burnout rate in this area. Whenever there is a staff shortage, others are asked to do even more. This is just like the troubles we have in our school system with trying to find teachers in the early years; similar types of shortages will exist over here. Where are we going to find the people when we are already facing record shortages in multiple sectors across our economy?
To bring it back to newcomers to Canada, many will choose this as what I will call a temporary survival job, because that is really what a day home becomes. I spent my time growing up in day homes, but I know many other families depend on them, too. Many of these agreements cut those day homes out, and that is what I am concerned about. Although I support this bill, I think we should be debating the principle of the bill and the impact it will have on newcomers and others as well.
To bring it back to the Yiddish proverb, children do fill every corner of our homes and every corner of our lives. We can do better than what we have done before. This legislation, though, has faults in it that we should look at, and we should be debating the principles.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his comments. As someone who is of Jewish descent, I always find his pondering of Yiddish proverbs interesting, to say the least.
He spoke about his home province of Alberta and the lack of flexibility and lack of understanding of the unique circumstances of families, but the Alberta agreement includes an additional grant for operating flexible and overnight child care. It is an operational grant to address spaces that are necessary for frontline health care workers, shift workers and so on, many of whom, as we know, are newcomers to Canada in various fields.
The principles of the agreement are about high-quality child care. Does the member not think that high-quality child care is the key component here and that while we have flexibility, we need to ensure high quality? The member mentioned that he supports the bill. Does that mean the Conservatives will support it?
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Madam Speaker, to go back, the person who deserves great credit for negotiating the deal was the minister at the time in Alberta, Rebecca Schulz, who was re-elected in this past election. She deserves an incredible amount of credit for holding out until Alberta got a better deal.
The problem with what the member just laid out as the deal for affordable care operators, who basically run a dual system that is part private and part public, is that they are basically being told to keep two different ledgers. Staff cannot go in between the two systems, which is written right in the agreement. It is highly complex, and for those in this space, it is hard to figure out, as a facility owner-operator, what exactly they are supposed to do. The agreement is so complicated that many have already come out in public and said that it is too complicated and that they will have to pick one or the other. Either they will do all shift workers and nothing else or they will just have the standard nine-to-five child care.
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Madam Speaker, we are at the report stage of the bill right now, and I noticed, looking at parliamentary publications, that we have one motion at report stage. That has been brought forward by the member's colleague from Peterborough—Kawartha. She is moving that the bill be amended by deleting the short title. Essentially, the Conservatives want to get rid of the opportunity to call the bill the Canada early learning and child care act.
I am curious. Does he understand the rationale behind wanting to delete the short title of the bill?
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Madam Speaker, procedurally it was necessary in order to have this debate tonight, which is one of the things in Westminster parliaments. We sometimes have to put forward these types of motions in order to have a debate like this. That is my understanding of why it is on the Order Paper.
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Madam Speaker, following up on that, it is true that at report stage the only amendments that can be brought forward, generally speaking, are deletions. However, certainly the official opposition had a choice of what part of the bill it might want to delete. Is there anything the member can add as to why the choice was made to delete the short title?
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