Not enough workers, not enough child care - coincidence?
Letters -- Kathy Rae on behalf of the Campbell River Child Care Planning
Vancouver Island News Group / Campbell River Mirror Committee
December 27, 2006

Nov. 20 was National Child Day, an opportunity to bring to light a growing concern in our community and across Canada. There is not enough child care to meet the needs of families. Not coincidentally, employers are struggling with finding enough employees.

First we would like to dispel a myth. No credible Early Childhood Educator (ECE) has ever advocated for an institutional, state run child care system. Ever.

We believe at our very core that families should have choice, choice to stay at home, or go to work. Choices of centre based or in- home care. Different choices work for different families. What research confirms is that ALL families need support for the critical role they play in raising healthy children.

Some families have extended families to draw support from. Some families look to a larger community of support, and in an ideal world all parents would have an array of resources to draw from. Child care is an important component in this range of supports.

The reasons why there is not enough child care are complex. The bottom line is that there is not enough funding. Public funding is needed to sustain child care programs and pay ECE's a fair wage. We know, we know, the critics will jump up and scream that we don't really care about children; we just want to pad our wallets. That's a dangerous disregard of the circumstances.

In Campbell River, some child care facilities are not operating to full capacity because they can't find qualified staff. Others have had to reduce their spaces or consider closing for the same reason.

In fact, the ECE's of this country have been subsidizing child care through low wages for decades. The vast majority of child care workers have worked for wages well below the poverty levels of our country. There are not enough able or willing to continue to sustain the field of early child development. It's hard work, it's important work, it s rewarding work, and at the end of the day child care workers must pay for their own groceries and a roof over their heads.

ECE's are leaving the field to find better paying jobs, because they, too, need to support their families.

Colleges report a significant drop in the number of students entering ECCE programs. Increasingly we hear that businesses can't find enough staff. This will get worse as our baby boom generation retires.

We also hear of parents leaving employment, or having to put their child's names on long waiting lists because they can't find a child care space. The federal government is promising to build more spaces by giving businesses incentives to do so. That s great. But should the spaces be built, who is going to look after the children?

Families of the 21st century need child care. They need to work to support their families, to buy a house, and to just get by.

This is true nowhere more than Campbell River where recent School District 72 reports show that 25 per cent of families with school age children earn a combined income of $30,000 or less.

The BC Atlas of Child Development (2005) reports quality child care contributes to positive development in preschool age children no matter what their family income, but especially for children from economically vulnerable households.

What should matter most is what is best for our children. What is best for children will be, in the end, what is best for all of us. Whether you believe in child care or not, more and more of the children in Canada who need it can't get it.

Properly funded child care, like education, is sound public policy. It is good for our children, good for public health, good for strong citizenship, and good for our economy. The time has come.

We must create a child care plan that meets the needs of today's families, whatever their choices may be.