Since the start of Ottawa’s $10-a-day program, Sandra Christian has had many families leave her private child-care centre in B.C. for a spot in a subsidized centre.
But that’s not what worries her — child-care services are in high demand so empty spots get filled quickly.
What worries her and her office manager, Carley Babiarz, is some of these families have said the money they’ve saved on child care has helped them buy a second property.
“We don’t believe that that’s the intention of the [$10-a-day] program,” said Babiarz, who works at the Creative Kids Learning Centers, which has nine locations in Surrey, Langley and Chilliwack, B.C. “It doesn’t best suit our low-income… families.”
Many other child-care workers shared the same opinion at the first national conference for child-care operators, hosted by the Association of Alberta Childcare Entrepreneurs on Tuesday.
Is this a massive problem or a couple people and what is their concern about what the money is spent on?
Yeah, a systematic breakdown of who is able to use the program world be more helpful than anecdotes.
Or just make daycare free for all like in civilized world?
Yeah but than they could not run this provocation slop to get “hard working folk” hot and bothered about the “free riders”
With greedflation these days, one’s hardpressed to buy lunch for $10. People who are in a position to buy a second property being eligible for such hugely subsidized daycare is nuts imo
As a parent with a kid in child care, my feeling is that it’s more efficient to make programs available to everyone, and manage wealth disparity with effective taxation.
I think people are more likely to support the funding of programs that they can use. And it’s better to avoid segregating children by economic status.
It’s this type of behaviours that justifies some people’s destire to abolish extra money/grants/sense of entitlement just because people had sex and had kids.
Fair enough. I’m pro supporting families myself. I’m against wealthy people helping themselves to things intended for working class families. It sounds like the government didn’t put the necessary checks and balances in place to ensure the subsidies go to those who need them
These subsidies cost Canadian taxpayers at least $6.03 billion, or roughly $214 per taxpayer every year. Source
Maybe we could take half of the O&G subsidies and tax breaks to properly fund daycares instead.
Taxpayer dollars going back to taxpayers (and increasing their living conditions) instead of corporate executives and shareholders of businesses that are destroying our planet and causing all sorts of problems for us and other living creatures?! What a radical idea. I’m all for it
No wonder the wait lists are so long
some of these families have said the money they’ve saved on child care has helped them buy a second property.
If this is true, everyone should be furious. We’ve been trying to find childcare for our two grandkids for YEARS. Their mother is in healthcare, and if we weren’t able to care for them (at our loss), she wouldn’t be able to work or survive.
Why are daycare services even offered to families who aren’t in desperate need? Those families can afford a babysitter.
Single parent homes, low-income homes, parents who work in an industry in crisis (education, healthcare, etc.) should be at the top of the list for $10 a day childcare.
