Good afternoon, and thank you very much.
I want to thank you on behalf of the Canadian Child Care Federation and Canada's child care and early learning sector for the opportunity to present today to all of you on part 1 of Bill C-74, specific to the measures noted with regard to the Canada child benefit.
Bill C-74, among its many items, calls specifically for new measures to be taken by the Government of Canada to index the Canada child benefit, or CCB, as of July 2018 to ensure it keeps up with the rising cost of living. This income supplement initiative, much like the CCB itself, is a progressive policy to lighten the financial burden on Canadian families, especially middle-class and low-income families, helping to support the costs of raising children. Like other federal income programs, such as the Canada pension plan, indexing CCB payments makes good sense and would be welcomed by eligible families.
Additionally, we support measures that ensure that appropriate taxpayers are eligible for the CCB and that information related to it can be shared with provinces and territories for certain purposes. As with indexing the CCB, this makes good sense and will help to ensure that those who are eligible will receive their benefit and any others that they may be provided by provinces, municipalities, or territories.
As an income supplement, the CCB is a welcome and important support for eligible families. The other integral federal support for Canada's families, which the CCB is not, is the federal government's multilateral framework agreement on early learning and child care, along with the companion bilateral agreements with the provinces and territories. Related to this, we are still waiting for the multilateral agreement on early learning and child care with indigenous communities to be formally signed, which will add another historic agreement, this one directly supporting Canada's indigenous children and families.
These agreements and frameworks are critically important, as they directly support the other part of Canadian family life, that being the need for high-quality, affordable, inclusive, and accessible child care, and just as importantly, start to address the national child care crisis in Canada. The Government of Canada has committed $7.5 billion over 10 years, starting in the last fiscal year, to fund these agreements, but significantly more investment is needed to bring Canada to the OECD benchmark of 1% of GDP annually.
Quality child care is the key element for economic security for the vast majority of Canadian families and for Canada's economy as a whole. While the CCB directly and financially supports families, it does not replace the need for progressive and significant investment in policy in child care systems and does not directly address child care affordability and accessibility.
A recent report by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives on the rising cost of child care across Canada found that the typical family with young children spends about a third of its income on fees. To put this into perspective, child care fees can cost up to $15,000 a year in Ontario and even more in the GTA, more than triple the average tuition cost to put another child through university for one year, a system that is more significantly supply-side funded.
Supply-side funding, therefore, is how Canada—its provinces, territories, and indigenous communities—should be approaching child care affordability, policy, and funding, and exactly how we are seeing the provinces of Ontario and B.C. moving forward with their significant and historic child care announcements made this year, addressing head-on the crippling cost of child care in their respective provinces. They will join Quebec and P.E.I. in moving past tinkering on the edges of policy into a holistic and comprehensive solution for children and families.
In his ministerial e-newsletter sent out on April 24, 2018, the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development, the Hon. Jean-Yves Duclos, stated:
For many parents, accessing quality child care is a major challenge. In fact, only one in four Canadian children has access to a regulated child care space. The development of Canada's early learning and child care systems is one of the best investments our government can make to help strengthen Canada's society and economy, and give children the best possible start in life.
We agree with the minister, and it is through direct funding from the federal government, along with policy, leadership, and partnership with provinces, territories, and indigenous communities, that Canada's child care crisis will be addressed. These things taken together with income support initiatives like the CCB will mean that Canada can join other OECD nations as a leader rather than a laggard with regard to investing in children and families.
I thank you for your time.