Policy Shorts & Sound Bites For Child Care and Family

March 2021. Kids First Parent Association of Canada – (PDF doc): “Policy Shorts & Sound Bites For Child Care and Family“

Polict Shorts & Sounds Bites For CHild Care and Family
March 2021
Note: ELCC = early learning and child care

ENDING DAYCARE DISCRIMINATION

• Child care means the care of a child. Define “child care” and ELCC inclusively
  to include parental ELCC. End discriminatory definitions current in the federal and
  provincial laws.
  
• The government should be neutral on parental decisions regarding GDP sector
  work and family care work. (See ‘Principals’ in the 1999 Final Report of the Sub-
  committee on Tax Equity for Families with Dependent Children of the Finance
  Committee https://kidsfirstcanada.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/tax-paper-1.pdf)
  
• FUND CHILDREN NOT SPACES AND SYSTEMS: All ELCC funding – welfare for
  parents, child tax benefits, child care expense deduction, kindergarten, ELCC
  funding, EI parental leave – should go to families directly (demand side funding)
  based on age of children and perhaps/partially on income. A REFUNDABLE TAX
  CREDIT may be the least costly way to implement.
  
• (ELCC) EQUAL CHOICE = EQUAL FUNDING.
  
• FAMILIES ARE VERY DIVERSE. So is ELCC.
  
• CELEBRATE ELCC DIVERSITY. No ‘one size fits all’.
  
• BE FAIR: When the daycare ‘space’ is closed or your child is sick, the $ still goes
  to the space while you do the work.
  
• END DAYCARE DISCRIMINATION – COMPLY WITH THE CHARTER (Supreme
  Court of Canada’s) protection of parents’ LIBERTY rights to raise their children and
  children’s rights to security of person.
  
• POINT OUT THE IDEOLOGICAL HYPOCRISY: Some political parties, academics,
  activists, pundits, and media outlets pride themselves on equality, right, diversity,
  support for the vulnerable, fairness, personal autonomy, and sustainability. Except
  in family care policy where these ideals are tossed in favour of getting parents –
  especially mothers – to be, do and believe what big banks, big business, big unions
  and a few ideologues want. Point out that EXCLUSIONARY DISCRIMINATORY
  ELCC POLICIES exclude most children and most women and most parents.
  
  
  
  RESPECTING PARENTS
  
  
• STOP PUNISHING PARENTS FOR CARING FOR THEIR OWN CHILDREN.
  
• Put parents back in control of ELCC decisions by funding families not systems
  and spaces.
  
• Trust parents
  
• No more BEER AND POPCORN.
  
• THANK PARENTS FOR THE WORK THEY DO RAISING CHILDREN. WE ARE THE
  FRONT LINE WORKERS.
  
• FAIRNESS: how many parents have ‘Leave it to Beaver’ 9-5 Mon-Fri schedules
  that fit the ‘system’ schedule?
  
  
  
  QUALITY OF REGULATED ELCC
  
  
• Do not harm children: Ensure that licensing requirements for the ELCC do not
  compromise children’s well-being. Eg current allowable ratios are ‘a license to
  neglect’ – Dr Jay Belsky – top international academic on child care outcomes.
  
• QUALITY: we’re not talking about coffee here, we’re talking about the kind of
  ELCC that our most vulnerable receive: babies and little children. Government has
  allowed the scandal of inadequate quality to go on too long, harming children and
  society.
  
  
  TRANSPARENCY, TRUTH & INFORMED PARENTAL CONSENT
  
  
• Allow parents informed consent.
  
• Take on the “BEST START IN LIFE” LIE: point out that all studies of quality in
  license ELCC show that the majority is minimal to mediocre.
  
• EVIDENCE BASED POLICY IS NEEDED: For decades, daycare lobbyists and
  Statistics Canada have systematically misinformed the public and policy makers on
  ELCC – eg misleading data on % in “child care” with overly narrow definitions of
  ELCC and overbroad definitions of “work”, suppressing information of child outcomes,
  costs, and parental preferences.
  
• End the CAMPAIGN OF DISINFORMATION: Government needs to stop
  manipulating and patronizing parents by lying to them about what the REAL
  EVIDENCE SAYS about ELCC.
  
• End funding for the daycare lobby and its campaign of disinformation by
  government and government funded NGOs.
  
  
  
  SEXISM & “GENDER EQUITY”
  
  
• No carrots, no sticks: respect women’s choices when it comes to jobs and
  family care work.
  
• WORK IS WORK.
  
• Stop treating women as incompetent third class citizens when they prefer to
  prioritize family care work over full time jobs.
  
• GENDER EQUITY? It is harmful and misogynistic when government tells mothers
  they are not working, not contributing and not productive when they are working
  caring for their children.
  
• Stop treating women like little children: let us decide for ourselves who will look
  after our children without coercion in the form of government financial ‘incentives’.
  
• “Every mother is a working mother.” (feminist slogan)
  
  
  
  SUSTAINABLE HOLISTIC FAMILY CARE POLICY
  
  
• SUSTAINABILITY: where will all the very loving, highly trained child ELCC workers
  come from for the ‘system’? PARENTS WANT to do most of this work, and they are
  in fact doing the vast majority.
  
• A HOLISTIC APPROACH TO SUSTAINABILITY includes, recognizes, honours and
  FUNDS FAMILY CARE.
  
• AGREE WITH MARK CARNEY, former Governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank
  of England, that the GDP is inadequate to measure what we value**: add an
  additional measure, eg Human Development Index, Genuine Progress Indicator
  **CBC Ideas lecture Feb. 24, 2021 https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1865606723729
  
• Require FBA – “FAMILY-BASED ANALYSIS” – of policy to see the impact on
  families with dependent children and other vulnerable dependents/members. (Add
  to the GBA – Gender-Based Analysis).
  
• Universal daycare has long been pushed by big banks, big business, big unions,
  and some ideologues, but not by parents. LOW ENROLLMENT persists despite the
  fact that we have thrown billions of dollars at this. But it still does not stick. Parents
  are just not buying it.