Hon. Rosemary Moodie: Senator Seidman, I just wanted to ask a question about the definition point you raised. I know that in committee, one of the key groups that raised this question was the Canadian Child Care Federation. Recently, in the last three or four days, we all received a letter from 20 key stakeholders in this area, one of which was the Canadian Child Care Federation. In that letter, they retracted any request for a change in definition.

What would you say now about your concern that these stakeholders were forceful then, but are now retracting?

Hon. Rosemary Moodie: Honourable senators, I strongly believe that every Canadian should have access to child care for their children in their language of choice, and that it must be an ambition of all governments and every jurisdiction to ensure that, one day, meaningful access for official language minority communities is a reality. I am sure that no one in this chamber disagrees with this ambition.

I want to thank you Senator Cormier for your leadership on these issues and for how passionately you champion this amendment. Although I will be spending the next minutes forcefully disagreeing with you, I do respect and admire you.

As I stated in my recent remarks, I do not agree with the concerns posed by you, Senator Cormier, but I acknowledge them. It is my view that the intent of this legislation is to include official language minority communities for the long-term.

Colleagues, I also want to remind you that Bill C-35 was adopted with support from all parties in the other place. Furthermore, Bill C-35 contains multiple provisions which highlight that funding for child care must include investments for official language minority communities. Paragraph 7(1)(c) states that funding must support:

. . . the provision . . . of early learning and child care . . . from English and French linguistic minority communities, that respect and value the diversity of all children and families and that respond to their varying needs;

Subclause 7(3) states that federal investments into child care must be guided by the Official Languages Act. Subclause 11(1) states that the minister should have regard for the importance of having members of the council who are from the official language minority communities.

You will recall that I spoke about clause 7 at length during my speech a few weeks ago. This clause provides the rules of engagement; that is, the terms and the conditions. This is what I think matters most.

In this respect, I disagree that the amendment to clause 8 would be helpful — not only because of the legislative language that already exists in clause 7, but, along with the language within the agreements and the political pressure that all Canadians can place, these factors culminate in a meaningful protection of official language minority communities and a guarantee of long-term funding for those communities.

An amendment to clause 8 does not improve this reality, colleagues. In fact, the assertion here is that for those not included in clause 8, they are not guaranteed funding despite clause 7. If this is the case, does that mean that funding for children with disabilities is not guaranteed if they are not named in clause 8? What about families from rural communities? Is this paragraph in clause 7 insufficient for them as well? If you carry out that rationale all the way, then the provisions of clause 7 are altogether useless and meaningless.

I believe that it is more reasonable to assume that the guiding principles for funding are sufficient and that the purpose of clause 7 is to commit ongoing funding to partners based on the guidance that exists in this clause.

Let me use a parallel example. Consider the Canada Health Act. We are all familiar with this act which sets out, in sections 7 through 12, the criteria for a cash transfer from the federal government to the provinces. I recall that section 5 reads:

Subject to this Act, as part of the Canada Health Transfer, a full cash contribution is payable by Canada to each province for each fiscal year.

All this section tells us is that money will be paid. How it is presented is contained in other parts of the bill. Note that no one thinks that certain types of funding or funding for certain populations are not guaranteed because they do not sit in section 5 of the Canada Health Act because we understand that this is dealt with in other sections, namely, sections 7 through 12.

This is what clause 8 of Bill C-35 is intended to do. It makes a statement of money that will be transferred. The conditions, the rules of engagement and to whom is set out in clause 7.

Colleagues, two other notes. I mentioned the agreements. You will recall that in all of the agreements — except for Quebec, who has an asymmetric agreement — there is a stated objective of ensuring the official language minority communities have proportional spaces available equal to or above their share of population.

Additionally, I want to point out the investment of more than $60 million over five years included for early learning and child care in francophone and minority communities, including supports to develop the workforce through the Action Plan for Official Languages 2023-2028.

I will not repeat all the remarks I made a few weeks ago, but I want to emphasize for all of us that, as it stands, the bill does what those seeking this amendment wanted it to do. The amendment is redundant and does not bring any further clarity, in my opinion.

I want to be clear on this: Today, a mere two years from the beginning of this Canada-wide early learning and child care system, families are still facing many issues in accessing care. We all know that for a project of this scale, it will take the better part of a decade before access to spaces is no longer a significant issue.

Colleagues, I am confident that Bill C-35 in its current form will result in generations of official language minority communities getting access to child care, to put it simply. We may not see it yet. But if we do feel an urgency, as I believe we all do, then amending this bill to do something that it is already doing and delaying its assent is the wrong decision.

Colleagues, it is also important to note that this question has been dealt with before. In the House of Commons, advocates presented these amendments. While changes were made to clauses 7 and 11, this amendment was never tabled. When it was tabled in the Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, it was rejected by a meaningful margin of 7, no; 4, yes; 1 abstention.

Your committee heard hours of testimony from witnesses from throughout the country — experts, academics, child care operators, Indigenous leaders and others. Your committee, having heard this information and considering it for many weeks, voted against this amendment. As you decide how you will vote on this amendment, please consider this decision that your committee made.

When thinking about urgency, colleagues, I explained a few weeks ago my process as to whether or not I would vote for amendments. In light of the political situation in the other place, the question is whether or not adopting this amendment would warrant the subsequent delays in the adoption of the bill. The consequences of these delays may be significant.

The delay inserts uncertainty. Provinces, Indigenous governments, communities, municipalities, not-for-profits, child care workers, parents and others are looking at us today. Jurisdictions are evaluating the trustworthiness of their federal partner. Cities and not-for-profits are planning the future development of spaces and the development of their workforce. Workers are wondering if they are going to have ongoing support and whether this is a sector worth staying in. Parents are wondering whether they need to give up on their dreams or if the possibility of affordable child care is coming soon. If this bill is delayed, it will significantly harm the development of Canada-wide early learning and child care, or ELCC, and I propose that this delay is not necessary.

I will end by reading the letter I referred to earlier in my question — which many of you have seen — that was sent to all of us this past week, signed by over 20 child care advocates who are experts, researchers, operators and workers in the early learning and child care sector from all over the country:

Canada’s child care movement, made up of a broad range of diverse organizations, urges members of the Senate to adopt Bill C-35 at third reading without further amendment. It was over 50 years ago that the Royal Commission on the Status of Women recommended that the federal government immediately take steps to adopt a “National Day-Care Act” to make federal funds available for the building and running of child care programs. Surely, we have waited long enough for such legislation to be adopted.

We recognize that several organizations, including from our child care community, proposed amendments to the Standing Senate Committee for Social Affairs, Science and Technology. Most reflect important concerns with respect to early learning and child care. We believe these should be addressed not by amending Bill C-35 but through a Standing Committee study. We believe that at this stage, Bill C-35 is sufficiently robust to ensure equitable access to child care for generations to come.

Colleagues, I ask you to please not delay the passage of Bill C-35. Do not let another year begin without federal child care legislation in place.

Thank you.

Hon. Rosemary Moodie: We did have discussion in committee. At the time, the Indigenous leader who had the question addressed to him, President Natan Obed, did make a comment. I will quote it because I have it in front of me.

The question asked was, “Do you think such an amendment would have any impact for Indigenous peoples? If so, what would it be?”

Mr. Obed replied:

I was not aware of the amendment that you reference, but very often official language status for French and English is a sledgehammer that allows for those two languages to dominate in our communities. The very history of Inuit participation in Canada through health care delivery, education and government is the dispossession of Inuktitut in the face of federal, provincial and territorial legislation that empowers English and French even in our Inuktitut-dominated communities.