EXCERPTS:
Tuesday's Liberal-NDP budget deal will save about 2,000 Toronto daycare subsidies and ensure the province's poorest residents aren't ignored, child care and anti-poverty advocates say.
The Liberals added $242 million over three years to help stabilize the province's struggling child care sector as 4- and 5-year-olds move into all-day kindergarten. They also boosted both welfare and disability benefits by 1 per cent at a cost of $55 million. NDP Leader Andrea Horwath had originally asked for just disability rates to increase by 1 per cent.
"We're very pleased that increases to social assistance rates played such a key role in the budget negotiations," said Jennefer Laidley, of the provincial Income Security Advocacy Centre.
Laidley and other advocates were shocked when rates, which are between $5,000 and $10,000 below the provincial poverty line, were originally frozen in the budget.
"Both the Premier and Ms. Horwath took steps to make sure that people relying on both Ontario Works and the ODSP were not left out of the budget, which is an important step forward," she said Tuesday.
However, Laidley noted that the 1-per-cent increase doesn't cover the rising cost of living and won't make up for budget cuts to emergency housing and health benefits for people on Ontario Works.
Child care advocates were thrilled with the new money, especially in Toronto where 2,000 subsidized spots have been on the chopping block for several years.
"It will go a long way to addressing our funding shortfall," said Toronto Councillor Janet Davis, a member of the city's community development committee.
"With the new money we will not be facing the reduction in child care spaces that we had anticipated in 2013. It's a huge boost to child care."
However, without a new funding model, the system will not be able to expand to meet expanding needs, and centres will still be at risk due to rising parent fees, she said.
"Toronto has been mired in 1994 service levels," she said. "In 2005 our subsidy waiting list was 3,500. Right now it is over 20,000. Demand has just continued to grow and yet the system has not."
-reprinted from the Toronto Star