- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Independent
- Spadina—Fort York
- Ontario
- Voting Attendance: 58%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $144,966.01
- Government Page
- Jun/13/24 3:13:13 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, reports confirm what everyone knows but the out of touch government and the 23 missing in action Toronto MPs seem to have missed, which is that Torontonians are struggling. The Liberals have a new buzzword to gloss over their mismanagement, and it is “fairness”.
There is nothing fair in having more unemployed in Toronto than in all of Quebec. Excluding the pandemic, unemployment is the highest since 2015, when the architects of incompetence stumbled into power. Over 1.26 million Canadians have missed a mortgage or credit card payment in the first quarter of 2024.
When the banks call, do Liberals advise Canadians to just say, “Boo-hoo. Get over it”?
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- Jun/15/23 12:11:35 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, we hear so often from the government's talking points about how seriously it allegedly takes the issue of foreign interference, and I implore them to please stop with the talk and show Canadians some action.
Honestly, I shudder to think what the Chinese Communist Party must think of the Liberal government's handling to date of foreign interference. They must be wondering just how pathetic this government can get with its flimsiest of efforts to crack down on foreign operatives roaming around our country. It seems of little consequence that Chinese operatives are free to interfere in our electoral system, intimidate our citizens and open any number of police stations across the country, all at will and even with some financial abetting from our government.
The recent bungling must have sent Beijing into convulsions of laughter when our government gave up to $200,000 in funding to a Quebec charity that the RCMP itself has said might be hosting a secret Chinese police station. I would like to ask the parliamentary secretary if the talking points have now settled on the number of Chinese police stations in operation in Canada, or does that number conveniently fall under the rubric of national security? I want to get this straight.
Canadian citizens can be followed, confronted, threatened, intimidated and live in fear on our soil, and their government is unable to stand up to defend them. What kind of government is that? When will Canadian citizens of Chinese ancestry, or not, finally get some answers?
How long does an RCMP investigation into Chinese police stations operating in Canada take? Has anything been done? Has anyone been arrested or declared persona non grata and sent packing?
The most important question that remains is this: Why has there been such a reluctance by the Canadian government to take definitive, concrete action against foreign interference in Canada? Does Beijing have something on the Prime Minister or the cabinet? Is there some vested financial trade deal at play? Is our government still haunted by the Huawei heiress and the Prime Minister does not want to receive another public dressing-down from President Xi?
Canada expelled a Chinese diplomat who targeted the family of an MP, and the government seems almost more apologetic than angry. Is our government even capable of informing China, in no uncertain terms, that we as a country are neither its personal plaything nor a doormat? Canada has the right to stand up for our national security and sovereignty, just as China does on the slightest perceived indignity, real or imaginary.
It is clear that the matter of illegal foreign police stations, just like the overarching issue of foreign interference in Canada, either of Chinese or Iranian persuasion, can only be fully addressed by the convening of a full and independent public inquiry. Will the government call a full, independent public inquiry in our lifetime?
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to join the debate this evening on Bill C-35, the Canada early learning and child care act. I believe this issue is non-partisan because it concerns the most important element of our country: its children. I want to begin with a quick level set just so that we are all working from the same fact base.
This bill sets out the vision for a Canada-wide early learning and child care system and its commitment to ongoing collaborations with the provinces and indigenous peoples. The bill also delineates principles where public and not-for-profit entities are exclusively called out for a focus that guides the ongoing federal investments established by the National Advisory Council on Early Learning and Child Care, as announced by members of the council on November 24, 2022. Additionally, the bill notes a realization of the right to benefit from child care services, as recognized in the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and it contributes to the implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Canadian parents have long hoped for the availability of affordable, safe and stable child care. To that effect, the government brought in a national child care program that proposed to cut day care fees by an average of 50% by the end of 2022 and down to an average of $10 per day by 2026. Earlier this year, the minister stated, per the National Post, that Bill C-35 would “enshrine the principles that provinces and territories agreed to in funding agreements with Ottawa, including the pledge to cut parent fees and create more spaces.”
The government had promised to introduce the legislation by the end of 2022 in its supply and confidence agreement with the New Democratic Party. While I wholeheartedly agree that affordable quality child care is critical, it becomes moot if people cannot access it or it simply does not exist. I am concerned that Bill C-35 does not address accessibility, and I am concerned that the government is embarking on a promise that it will not be able to deliver on. Moreover, I am concerned that $10-a-day child care does little to address the serious, real child care labour shortages and the lack of child care spaces.
I suggest that Bill C-35 would be good for families who already have a child care space, but it would not help the thousands of families on child care wait-lists or the operators who do not have the staff or the infrastructure to offer more spaces. Additionally, the bill would increase the demand for child care but would not solve the problem of frontline burnout, staff shortages or access to more child care spaces. Simply put, there are not enough qualified staff to keep all existing child care centres running at full capacity, let alone operating new spaces. The Canadian Union of Public Employees has reported that “in many communities there is only one child care space available for every three children who need it, and waitlists are long.” That is a very sobering statistic.
Bill C-35 is also discriminatory. The majority of child care operators are women, yet the language and intent of this bill would prevent any growth in opportunities for privately run female child care operators. Also, how does the government expect more women to be able to go to work when there are no child care spots available and with wait-lists being years long?
The Financial Accountability Office of Ontario projects that by 2026, there will be 602,000 children under six whose families will want $10-a-day child care. However, the province will only be able to accommodate 375,000, leaving 227,000 children, or almost 40%, without access. That is two in five families that will be unable to access a spot. Government estimates also suggest that by 2026, there could be a shortage of 8,500 early childhood workers. This is another staggering statistic.
In British Columbia, 27% of child care centres turn away children due to lack of staff. One child care director, who oversees 13 child care programs with 350 spaces, stated, “In the past two years, we've had to close programs temporarily, whether it's for a day or two, or shorten hours for the week...in order to meet the licensing regulations”.
What then are worthy policy options to consider? I have three that I hope the government will seriously think about.
First, we must enable families of varying incomes to benefit. Based on the guiding principles of the child care framework, the government should support families that need child care most, based on their income, which in many cases is outlined within the individual provincial agreements. As well, the government should not be subsidizing child care of wealthy families that can already afford it.
Second, we should address the so-called “Matthew effect”. This is the increasing of the public provision that actually ends up advantaging higher-income families rather than lower-income groups. Even in the Quebec model, despite the gains in access, quality levels remain low when compared to the rest of Canada, with lower-income children in lower, rather than higher, quality settings.
Third, we should resolve the labour shortage. There are not enough qualified staff to keep all existing child care centres running at full capacity, let alone operate new spaces. I think that is a point that is important to reiterate. The reality is that we cannot create new child care spaces without staff. Not enough students enter the ECE programs across Canada to support any growth, and it remains difficult to retain staff without the financial incentive to work in the field. The reality is that in British Columbia in 2022, 45% of employers reported losing more staff than they could hire, and 27% reported turning away children because of a lack of staff.
The lack of child care spaces across our country is considerable. In Ontario, the percentage of zero to 12-year-olds for whom full-day or part-time day care space was available was 25%. For children zero to five years, it was 21.3%. There are also so-called “child care deserts”. This is where there is a lack of, or inequitable distribution of, child care spaces or an FSA, or postal code region, with a coverage rate of less than one third of the child population. According to a Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives report that was published in May 2023, 48% of children live in child care deserts, and the percentage of children living in child care deserts in Ontario is a considerable 53%.
What are the financial implications?
The 2021 budget pledged $30 billion over five years on a national child care system with an additional $9.2 billion annually coming after that period. The bill before us is about children, the future of our country, and we owe them a duty to ensure that we are getting the best value possible for them when it comes to our hard-earned taxpayer dollars.
In terms of stakeholder considerations, the major comments coming from child care providers suggest that Bill C-35, while a step in the right direction, is however too generic. The bill does not go into specifics. Additionally the private sector is cut out of the equation. There are also significant major labour shortages, with the majority of those who are working being overworked and understaffed. Bill C-35 would be good for families that already have a space but not for workers. The bill also would do nothing to address the long wait-lists for care across the country.
There are ways that Bill C-35 can be improved. In my province, the Association of Day Care Operators of Ontario suggested the following four amendments. First was to make the bill more inclusive by deleting the reference to public and not-for-profit child care providers. Second was to consider an addition that provides some guidance to advisory council members about avoiding potential conflicts of interest or the appearance of impropriety arising from their involvement on the council. Third was that advisory council members may also require guidance about avoiding any paid consulting or volunteer work related to political parties or candidates during their term on the council. Finally, fourth was to add additional specificity surrounding the composition of the advisory council with respect to regional representation as well as representation by female entrepreneurs and those involved in the direct delivery of licensed child care services.
In conclusion, I hope that Canadian families needing reliable, safe and affordable child care are able to access a national system that provides a viable program for generations to come.
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