2018 Federal Budget Submission
The Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada (CCAAC) has made a submission to the Standing Committee on Finance, which has started its pre-budget consultations in advance of the 2018 federal budget.
The Committee requested organizations and individuals address two questions specifically:
- What federal measures would help Canadians be more productive,
- What federal measures would help Canadian businesses be more productive and competitive?
CCAAC’s answer to both questions is a significant increase in the child care federal spending already allocated, accompanied by an expanded and more detailed evidence-based policy framework, with the goal of making high quality child care fully accessible to all families and inclusive of all children in every part of Canada over the next decade.
CCAAC’s long-standing assertion of the strong links between productivity, women’s employment and accessible child care was affirmed by a new report published by the International Monetary Fund : Women are key for future growth: Evidence from Canada. The study’s authors find that increased women’s employment would have a significant impact on labour productivity but conclude that high child care fees outside Quebec act as a disincentive for women to work.
The IMF researchers confirm what numerous studies have shown: child care services play a critical role in allowing the full potential of the female labour force to be tapped. Yet, Canada’s early childhood education and child care policies are weak, with Canada spending very little relative to other advanced economies.
The CCAAC’s brief makes some of the following recommendations:
- Replacing the 11-year allocation plan with a plan that will allow governments to build a universal affordable high quality inclusive system for all children and families in Canada. We recommend that the federal government allocate $1 b in the 2018-2019 fiscal year, most of which would be transferred to provinces/territories/Indigenous communities to begin building an ELCC system.
- We also urge the federal government to engage in collaborative work with its provincial/territorial/Indigenous partners and with the ELCC community to develop more robust public policy and implementation as outlined in our Shared Framework.