Locals pan child-care plan: $1,200 not enough, won't create any more child-care spaces, say those in the business
The Daily Courier (Kelowna)
May 3, 2006
By: Don Plant
EXCERPT

Kelowna child-care providers are criticizing the Conservatives' child-care allowance plan for falling short on dollars and fairness.

The proposed universal child-care benefit of $1,200 a year for each child under age six will start July 1, assuming opposition parties support the federal budget announced Tuesday...

But local providers say the $1,200 payments are not enough.

"It's not going to help those who need day care," said Marilynne Elliott, director of Kids Corner Day Care in Kelowna. "A hundred dollars a month won't even buy them a couple of days of day care a month."

Opposition MPs have blasted the plan, saying it favours single-earner families at the expense of middle-income, dual-earner couples.

A two-earner couple making $50,000 a year in total with a four-year-old child would keep $871 after taxes. In contrast, a stay-at-home parent would keep $1,134, even if the working spouse earns a six-figure salary.

Kelowna MP Ron Cannan defends the discrepancy, arguing the Conservatives are helping families with a parent at home.

"One of the problems in our country is families are falling apart. We need to build families and have a stronger community," he said Tuesday.

In many cases, child care falls to the grandparents or other relatives, said Kent Stralbiski, director of McDuff, McBuff and McBean child-care centre in Kelowna. He understands the government is trying to help stay-at-home parents and relatives who care for children. But parents need more options, he said.

"We see relatives who have been looking after their family's children say they don't want to do it anymore," Stralbiski said. "Our society chooses to be more independent than the traditional, multi-generational family structure."..

Not enough, says Carolyn Noga of the Clubhouse Child Care Centre on Sutherland Avenue.

"It doesn't address our lack of spaces," she said. "You can't hire workers in Kelowna who are licensed to practise early child-care education. They leave the field because they're not getting paid enough.

"You could have years of experience and get offered $10 an hour. They make more at Rona."

Cannan said his government doesn't regulate salaries; it's providing infrastructure to help create child-care spaces. The Tories are considering giving some businesses a $10,000 tax credit per child-care space, he said. His next goal is to legislate "income-splitting" so a two-earner family pays less tax overall.

"It's an incentive that would help two-income families," Cannan said. "We can't do it all at once."