ChildCare: Rising Costs, parents’ waiting list

On Jan. 27, 2009, the federal government introduced a budget that provided a $40 billion stimulus to the economy. There was temporary new spending for infrastructure, tax cuts for individuals and corporations and more money for employment insurance benefits and retraining. But there was nothing new for child-care.

Former prime minister Paul Martin, who ran for election in 2004 on the promise of universal daycare, also noticed: “A daycare plan would create immediate short-term stimulus and be good for the productivity of the country,” he said earlier this month.

After telling us about the high expense, the ineffectiveness of the “Harper hundred” subsidy and the lack of daycare spaces, some argued that the most urgent issue is that it’s the kids who are most affected by the current state of daycare in Canada. Here’s a summary of the themes that emerged.

Costs? What about space!

“The daycare cost is not the major issue for our family, although it does put a stain on our budget,” said SB, a parent in Winnipeg. “The main problem is the daycare space availability. For example, we had to place our child in a substandard private daycare in order for mom to go back to work, or lose her professional career.”

“For us the problem was less the cost and more the lack of availability,” a mom in Vancouver told us. “We have been on wait lists for months and heard nothing. We almost had to hire a nanny so that I could go back to work. I am lucky and at the very last minute found something great, but I saw some terrible places, and of those many of them didn’t even have space!”

It’s hard for first-time parents to think that far ahead, but as soon as they found out they were having twins at four months, they put them on several daycare waiting lists..