Daycare spaces needed, not cash; Child-care benefit clawed back through tax, says parent
Richmond News
September 23, 2008
By: Nelson Bennett

When the Conservative government started cutting $100 cheques for each child under six each month as part of its national child care benefit, Susan Pickrell was thrilled.

She and her husband Doug have three children, two of whom are aged six and under, so they got $200 every month.

"We spent it, happily, on trying to find alternative care, hiring babysitters, because there's not enough child care spaces," Pickrell said.

But come tax time, she and her husband, who have a combined income of $120,000, saw all the money they received under the program clawed back.

"My household income is too high to keep it," she said. "In the end, I owed more money this year than I've ever owed because I had to give all the money back. This year was the first year I owed $1,600."

Pickrell was one of a couple of parents with small children at the Brighouse public library Friday, where Richmond Conservative candidate Alice Wong was joined by the Lynne Yelich, the parliamentary secretary to the minister of human resources and social development, to talk about child care.

"One of our main focuses has been families," Yelich told a group of moms, dads and squirming babies and toddlers.

The parents are among the 1.4 million Canadians who have received $1,200 per year per child aged six or younger under the federal child care benefit.

The benefit was intended as an alternative to government-sponsored daycare. It allows families -- whether both parents worked or one stayed at home -- to use the money as they saw fit.

"Every family can use it their own way," said Yelich, who is the MP for the riding of Blackstrap in Saskatchewan.

Pickrell said she thinks the Conservative child-care benefit is "fabulous" for people on lower income and families with stay-at-home moms or dads.

But she said it does nothing to address a lack of day care spaces and after-school care programs here in Richmond for those families where both parents choose to work.

"I need child care spaces," Pickrell said. "It's not good enough to give me money because you're just going to take it back."

In addition to the child care benefit, the Conservative government has provided funding intended to create new child care spaces, Yelich said….

"We believe the provinces are best suited to create child-care spaces," Yelich said.

….Even if parents can get their kids into daycare or preschool, once their kids start school, they face long lineups trying to get their kids into pre- and after-school care programs.

If after-school care is where the money is needed, Yelich suggested it should be up to the B.C. government to decide that is where to spend the money it gets from Ottawa….