Good morning.
Thank you for the opportunity to present to you today. I'm Donna Riddell. I live in Miami, Manitoba, with my husband and four daughters. I'm also the board representative to the Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada.
Quality child care services support children, families, communities, and the economy, and will improve Canada's competitive stance with peer nations. I'm here to say that child care in rural areas of central Manitoba does work for our families. Child care provides an essential service to my family. In 1996 my husband was self-employed, and I needed to re-enter the workforce. I needed to find child care for my two daughters. I tried local home-based child care, and while families have been lucky enough to find competent care, I was not so lucky. I hired someone to come to my home, and this was inconsistent. I had three different people who took turns providing care.
In discussion, I and other parents in Miami saw a need for child care in our community. That led to the development and building of the Miami Children's Facility. Governed by a local board of directors, this facility continues to be successful, using an integrated service delivery model. It has been vital, since the beginning, for this facility to provide inclusive services for both working and stay-at-home families. Quality child care with extended flexible hours, family resources, and nursery school programs are a few of the priorities of this facility.
Many other rural communities have developed and built their own child care programs tailored to meet their needs. With the support of grants, land donations, municipalities, bankers, and good luck, they have been successful. There are families who have moved to rural communities because of this provision of child care.
Community businesses have been able to retain a more secure workforce, farmers have been able to farm safely, centres provide employment opportunities, employees are able to increase their skills by taking training volunteer boards of directors also develop their skills, and rural children deserve early childhood education. Quality child care programs provide many developmental benefits. These benefits, however, will only be realized through a focused public investment strategy, ensuring that families have access to quality services. The child care space initiative will not succeed in rural areas. Rural communities do not have businesses willing or able to take advantage of any tax breaks to create new child care spaces.
Capital funding is needed for rural child care programs. Ongoing operating costs need to be covered, especially in rural communities, to compensate for the seasonal peaks and valleys in enrolment. Subsidy for rural families is critical. The farm economy, as you know, is quite dismal; also, lower incomes quite often are common in the rural setting.
Therefore, CCAAC calls on this federal government to adopt the recommendations in our briefing to restore and increase long-term sustained funding to provinces and territories, to enact legislation to replace the capital incentives for child care spaces with dedicated capital transfers to the provinces and territories, and to provide effective income supports for Canadian families.
Thank you.