44th Parl. 1st Sess.
January 31, 2023 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Vaughan for sharing his time.
It is a pleasure to be here in the House today. It really is an exciting day for me to be speaking on Bill C-35. There are many reasons I am excited to be speaking on this bill today and to be representing my riding of Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill. Many residents in my riding could benefit greatly from this bill, and it is with great pleasure that I am here to support it.
We have already heard many members speaking about the benefits of the early learning and child care system. Members from the Bloc Québécois have illustrated the benefits it has given to Quebec society, and we are very grateful la belle province has gone ahead with this.
In the rest of Canada, it is not for want of trying that we are without a program. We have been trying for decades. Rather than going through all the economic benefits of this program, I would like to spend a couple of minutes on personal stories and history. This is not only about our economy and families or affordability, although it is about all those things; it is also about women, their choices and their ability to make those choices.
It concerns me greatly when I hear members opposite talking about the freedom of people to make these choices. I think back to my mother, who raised four children. She had a career in nursing, and she and my father both wanted a family. In the sixties and seventies, when my mother was raising her family, there were few choices for child care. If one was not lucky enough to have a mother or a mother-in-law live nearby or have a community association or maybe an organization in a church basement, one stayed home and raised one's family.
While I know my mother valued that, and we all do, I also know that she would have loved to stay in the medical profession. I imagine my mother would have continued her training, and she would have gone on to be a doctor and work in the medical field, contributing not only to her family but also to the larger society. When I think about my mother in the sixties and seventies and the history in Canada, I must give a nod to all those who have worked on this over the years. It has been over 50 years.
For those who do not remember, the first time this was recommended was in the 1970 report from the Royal Commission on the Status of Women. The commission was headed by Florence Bird under the government of Lester B. Pearson, and one of the recommendations was universal affordable child care to address key issues on gender equality in Canada.
It was not until 1982, in the Royal Commission on Equality in Employment, that under Judge Rosalie Abella and Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's government, there was another urge to implement a national affordable child care program. Around that time, when I was working with the National Action Committee on the Status of Women at the University of Toronto, I was thinking about my career. We did not have child care. I was looking ahead and thinking about how I could balance the kind of career I wanted with raising children. I did not think I could. I waited quite a while to get married and have children.
I am very fortunate to have a wonderful family. I have enjoyed being part of that and helping to raise children, but at the time, it was not a clear and easy choice to make. For women across this country, many of us made choices over the decades that we might not have made if we had affordable, quality, accessible child care. For the women of Canada, for the women in my riding, this bill is incredibly important.
I do not want to overlook the other issues I mentioned. Bill C-35 is not just about women. It is about Canadian values. It is about equity and inclusion. It is about supporting families, and very importantly right now, it is about affordability. It really makes me wonder why people are in opposition to this bill at this time. There are certainly some concerns. We have all heard that there are things needing to be worked out.
However, I would suggest that any member who is concerned about this look at the agreements that have been negotiated between our government, the provinces, the territories and our indigenous partners, recognizing those jurisdictions and the needs and concerns of those organizations, read the differences between these agreements and understand that it is in partnership with our partners that we are moving forward on this and not forcing anything on people.
An hon. member: Oh, oh!
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- Jan/31/23 2:27:39 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, ironically, the notwithstanding clause is a legacy that was strongly endorsed by Pierre Eliott Trudeau at the time. The rooster is about to crow for the third time.
According to what the minister said yesterday, he has nothing against the notwithstanding clause, he is against its pre-emptive use. The thing is, it can only be used pre-emptively. It is like a vaccine. We do not get vaccinated because we are sick, we get vaccinated to avoid getting sick, and we use the notwithstanding clause to avoid going to the Supreme Court. If it cannot be used pre-emptively, then what is the notwithstanding clause for?
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- Jan/31/23 2:28:53 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the representative appointed by the Prime Minister has a rather unflattering view of Quebec. A discussion about Quebec's history and secularism would do Ms. Elghawaby some good.
The Prime Minister knew what he was doing. He and the Liberal Party will stop at nothing to strip the Quebec National Assembly of its authority, particularly when it comes to language and secularism, which must be protected. The notwithstanding clause is the last line of protection.
Are the Prime Minister and his government disavowing the legacy of Pierre Elliott Trudeau?
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- Jan/31/23 2:29:35 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Pierre Elliott Trudeau's Charter was created to defend the rights and freedoms of individuals. The same is true of René Lévesque's original charter. We are proud of Canada's traditions when it comes to charters and protecting minorities.
The pre-emptive use of the notwithstanding clause goes against the spirit of these charters and the dialogue between Parliament and the courts. As I just said, the first word should not be the last.
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Mr. Speaker, today we are debating Bill C-35, an act respecting early learning and child care in Canada. The purpose of this legislation is to try to solve the issue of high child care costs in Canada.
This legislation does not address the serious economic challenges of implementing a Canada-wide early learning and child care agreement. I believe that this proposed legislation and the current agreements made by the Liberal government with the provinces will fail to provide universal access to affordable child care and will cost far more than what the government has estimated. In fact, I found it quite shocking that the Liberal speaker who came just before me admitted that this is not a universal program. He is right and he admitted the truth: It is going to be a two-tiered program where families who are lucky enough to get a child care space will benefit immensely while an estimated 182,000 families, according to the PBO, will be excluded and not have access to an affordable child care space.
Child care in Canada is provided by several mechanisms, including for-profit and non-profit models, parental care and care by other relatives. For the past several decades, the wages of average working families have not increased significantly while the demands on family finances through taxes, housing, food and child care have increased substantially. In the last few years alone, the costs for families have significantly outstripped wage growth.
The cost to provide child care varies based on age but is a minimum of $1,000 per child. Lower-income families have traditionally had access to subsidies, but these benefits vary across the provinces. Having one parent stay at home with a child is becoming unaffordable for many families and is far easier for families with higher incomes. Access to day care is already limited in Canada, with wait-lists. According to reports out of Quebec, there are an estimated 50,000 children waiting for access to an affordable care space. The price of child care in Canada is too high for most families, and access to affordable care is limited.
Why is child care so expensive? The key costs for child care according to operators, in order of magnitude, are labour, the cost of the facilities and the cost of food and supplies. Child care is a labour-intensive operation and wages vary. The cost to create a space that is child appropriate and the accompanying rental, mortgage, insurance and maintenance costs are significant. Finally, the cost of food and other supplies has increased dramatically.
What is the common factor of all three of these costs? They have all been severely impacted by high inflation. Inflation has increased the cost of labour and the cost of rent and mortgages dramatically, and as everyone can see at their local grocery store, the price of food has gone up by 12%. Child care operators are not immune from these costs. The fact is that the Liberal government, through its inflationary policies, is driving up the cost of child care in Canada.
The government's solution to this problem, a problem that it created, has been to sign agreements with the provinces to subsidize the cost of child care and to implement cost controls on wages, facilities and food in order to regulate a price for families that will eventually reach $10 a day. Unfortunately, this is unsustainable because since it is government spending that caused the inflation in the first place, more spending will only increase inflation further. The result will be an inflationary spiral that will further increase the costs of child care and the costs to maintain this program. Given our current deficit, the government will either have to raise taxes on Canadians or take on more debt to sustain this program.
What are some examples of this inflationary spiral? Speaking to child care operators in Alberta, I have already heard a number of significant challenges that the government has failed to address. Child care workers in Alberta can be paid up to around $23 an hour, but due to regulations under these agreements, operators cannot raise their costs by more than 3% annually. According to Statistics Canada, private sector wages rose by over 5% last year. Government regulations prevent child care operators from paying their staff even enough to keep up with the rate of inflation.
There is also intense competition for child care workers. School districts can often afford to pay $30 an hour with benefits. I have been told that schools are even poaching staff from day cares because they are in desperate need of these workers as well. Under the government's agreements, day cares have been put at an economic disadvantage in attracting workers, which will lead to a significant loss in day care capacity, meaning less access to child care.
The proposed solution for this inflation by proponents of even more government intervention in early child care is, no surprise, more inflationary spending. By raising wages even further for child care workers, school boards and others will also try to compete by raising their wages even further. This will result in an inflationary cycle where taxpayers will need to pay much higher taxes as schools and early childhood care centres compete for limited workers.
I have spoken with child care operators who have had to pay increased rents and mortgages on their facilities. As everyone knows, mortgages and rental rates have skyrocketed under eight years of the Liberal government, particularly in the last year. Under agreements the government has signed, child care operators are limited in the costs they can bill the government toward their rent and mortgage. Since they are mandated to charge families a fixed price for child care, there is no way for these operators to make up the difference other than by reducing other costs, such as food for children; shutting down their capacity by letting go of workers; or shutting down altogether, which we have started to see.
The laws of supply and demand mean that the government must either restrict the capacity of day cares or dramatically increase funding beyond what it promised. The first option is unfair, as it is going to leave many families out, and the second option is financially unsustainable. This argument is backed up by research from the parliamentary budget office, which reported in February of last year that the Liberals' plan is not sufficient to meet the demand for child care. In fact, it estimates that it will fall short in providing spaces for 182,000 children. That is 182,000 children who are being left behind by the Liberal government, with no plan in this legislation to provide their families with an affordable child care space.
What we are talking about here is essentially a more focused application of the wage and price controls implemented under the Anti-Inflation Act passed by former prime minister Pierre Trudeau in 1975. In seeking to combat high inflation at the time, the government passed legislation to control increases in prices and wages. The results were economically disastrous and the policy was rescinded shortly thereafter.
Today, the Liberals are trying to implement wage and price controls through their early learning and child care agreements. Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman put it better than I ever could by comparing this kind of policy to putting a kettle full of water on a hot stove. When the boiling water begins to push off the kettle lid, the appropriate thing to do is take the lid off and turn down the heat. Well, what the government is doing is putting a brick on top of the lid and letting the kettle explode. The result is that the pot will explode and this policy will collapse on itself. It is true for this child care policy.
The Liberals claim that this policy will reduce the effects of inflation on families, but the reality is that it is only meant to cover up, to mask, to hide the symptoms of inflation while doing nothing to solve the underlying issue of inflation. It is not a cure for inflation, because as the government continues to spend more, it will drive up inflation, and the cost of this program will continue to rise dramatically in order to maintain the fixed price of $10 a day. Demand from families will build up and eventually the program will collapse on itself.
Universal access to affordable child care is the stated goal of this legislation and the early learning and child care agreements, but the current plan fails to meet objectives. I believe that this plan will lead to a further loss in child care capacity as operators close down from unsustainable cost increases and the inability to find labour to fill their positions. The result will be a two-tiered day care system where those who are lucky enough to get their child into a regulated, affordable child care space will reap the benefits and save tens of thousands of dollars a year, while many families will continue to have to use expensive, unregulated child care or make arrangements with family.
The families that will benefit the most from this system are those with the highest incomes. Research from the OECD indicates that the vast majority of children in regulated child care come from those with the highest incomes. Children from low-income families are disproportionally under-represented in child care spaces. In its efforts to implement an absolute, across-the-board, no matter what one's income is price of $10 a day for all families, the government has failed to take into account the need to provide equity for low-income families. Consequently, the benefits of this Liberal program will disproportionately benefit those with higher incomes, who often already have and can afford a regulated child care space.
Ironically, it was the Liberals who ran attacks against Conservatives claiming that our universal child care benefit gave benefits to millionaires. The fact is that the Liberal plan benefits those with the highest incomes, including millionaires, far more than it does low-income families.
In conclusion, making child care more affordable is an important economic and political goal, but the current plan by the Liberals will fail to do that. It is unacceptable to leave 182,000 children out of the system, and it is unacceptable to put this debt burden on Canadians.
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