EXCERPTS
Parents and child-care workers who want to see a national daycare program confronted Human Resource Minister Diane Finley in Ottawa Wednesday.
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Child-care advocates say the Tory tax credit is a far cry from what parents need to help cover the cost of child care. Parents also say there are very few spaces at daycare centres across Canada.
"I'm really surprised that you would come here," said Diane O'Neill, an Ottawa-based child-care worker. "There are more and more people waiting for child care in this community."
Finley says concerned parents should direct their concerns to provincial governments instead of the federal government.
Child care is constitutionally the responsibility of the provinces, but the minister says the federal government has provided money for programs.
"That's why we have given an additional $250 million to the provinces - because we're trying to help," said Finley.
Since 2007, businesses which create new child-care spaces for their employees receive a 25% investment tax credit up to $10,000.
NDP interim leader Nycole Turmel says the Tory plan fails families.
"This is a Conservative smokescreen," Turmel said. "The government has failed and there's nothing to celebrate here. What we really need is a national child-care strategy."The Liberal Party said the Conservative plan has meant five years of lost opportunity.
"They've always dismissed a national child-care program as the creation of the nanny state," said Grit MP Rodger Cuzner. "The research and the academic support for early education and child care is really overwhelming. We believe there is role to play for the federal government."
-reprinted from Canoe