You talked earlier about consultation with the provinces on the creation of child care. Why bother consulting your provincial social services ministers when your government told them last week you have no intention of transferring funds to the provinces and the territories for them to deliver child care because you want to deliver it? This means it's a top-down model, and I'm worried that you will create duplication, confusion, and wasteful bureaucracy. My question is, isn't delivery of child care really a provincial jurisdiction, a provincial responsibility? Why would you say to them that, no, we won't give you the money, we want to do it, in whichever model you have? I thought a lot of provinces, whether it's Quebec, Manitoba, Ontario, etc., already have child-care spaces being created, so why wouldn't you transfer the funds to them and give them some standards and guidelines, except Quebec of course, and let them do their good thing? Instead, you want to deliver it through the federal government. Isn't that creating more bureaucracy and confusion and duplication?
On June 6th, 2006. See this statement in context.