CAMPBELL RIVER — A Campbell River woman will pass through the Comox Valley on foot next week en route to Victoria to raise awareness about the need for accessible and affordable child care.

Shelagh Germyn begins her 270-kilometre journey south on Tuesday morning and will take her message to the legislature Oct. 16.

“How can moms go to school, or get a job, if they don’t have daycare?” says the 49-year-old veteran runner who competes in 100-kilometre ultra-marathons.

Germyn and her husband Guy have two grown children, Candyce, 27, and Carsen, 25, who is a member of the Calgary Flames organization. She isn’t a grandmother yet but she does see many aging adults providing daycare to their grandchildren because there are no daycare spaces available or it’s not affordable.

“The accessibility isn’t there. If you’re pregnant, your unborn child is already on a waiting list. And I know of some people who have three kids who are going to three separate daycares,” she says.

Germyn believes the economic demands on today’s low-income and single-parent families are more demanding than when her children were young. And she became aware of the current situation last winter while watching a community forum put on by the Campbell River Childcare Committee.

“It is a dire situation,” says Gwen Bennett, who helped organize the forum. “There are not enough spaces and not enough Early Childhood Educators.”

Bennett operates Cari’s Infant and Toddler Centre, and relies on accredited childhood educators to run an effective program. However, in the past year, three long-term employees have left to take jobs with the school district which pays about $20 per hour and includes benefits.

“It’s certainly challenging and it’s complicated,” she says. “The childhood operational funding program does help. Over 90 per cent of this funding goes to labour but (the province) has reduced the amount. As a result, we can either reduce staff and wages, or raise fees.”

Most daycares can’t afford to pay benefits, and wages are in the range of $12 an hour. To increase wages, daycares have to bump up their fees, which parents can barely afford. As a result, instead of joining the labour force, single parents stay at home because they cannot afford daycare and at least they receive health benefits from the welfare system….