Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Good morning. My name is Judy Streatch. I have the privilege of being Nova Scotia's Minister of Community Services.
I am joined today by a representative from our department to help provide Nova Scotia's view regarding Bill C-303. l would like to introduce Virginia O'Connell, director of early childhood development services. Mrs. O'Connell manages the licensing, monitoring, policy, and standards for all licensed child care centres in the province. She has worked in the field of early childhood development for more than 25 years.
Personally, as a mother of four and a teacher for 15 years, I am passionate about the direction, progress, and diversity of early learning and child care in Nova Scotia. Let me tell you a little about the progress we've been making.
Nova Scotia offers programs that support families and foster healthy child development between the ages of newborn and 12 years, in accordance with the Nova Scotia Day Care Act and regulations.
In recognition of Nova Scotia's commitment to quality child care, my government created a 10-year early learning and child care plan for Nova Scotia last May. In developing the plan we took into account consultation sessions and heard from more than 2,600 Nova Scotians regarding their specific issues and priorities, including from commercial and non-profit licensed child care centres and parents. They told us to increase salaries, decrease the cost of care for all families, increase funding for child care, assist in stabilizing the workforce, provide more accessible child care for children with special needs, and increase spaces in licensed child care centres and family home programs.
Folks, l'm happy to say that we're doing all of this. The early learning and child care plan provides a foundation for licensed child care in Nova Scotia that will promote a more inclusive, accessible, and equitable system. To achieve this, we are focusing on the needs of Nova Scotian families by investing more than $137 million in our plan. The recent federal budget provides an additional $7 million per year to support the creation of child care spaces in our province, and it complements our made-in-Nova Scotia child care plan to further help our families access quality care for their children.
We will provide the opportunity, through capital funding, for the creation of at least 1,000 child care spaces. We are creating 550 more portable, subsidized spaces for low-income families. Funding for children with special needs will double.
We recently announced the child care operating grant funding. It provides funding per occupied space for children and infants, and is a key component of the plan to help stabilize the system and facilitate enhanced recruitment and retention of staff while allowing centres to consider future expansion.
We have also made available $1 million in repair and renovation funding across the province to make energy-efficient and accessibility improvements to centres.
We have embarked on our long-term vision for quality and sustainable child care in our province. As you can see, Nova Scotia has a plan, and our plan is well into the development of a child and youth strategy that will address the needs of children, youth, and their families by improving the accessibility of a range of supports and services. Our vision is this: that all Nova Scotia children enjoy a good start in life and are nurtured and supported by caring families and communities.
Bill C-303 presents a serious intrusion by the Parliament of Canada into an area of provincial responsibility. Although Bill C-303 does not compel the federal government to transfer funds to provinces and territories for the purpose of providing early learning and child care programs, it does establish criteria and conditions that provinces and territories would be required to meet related to the expenditure of these transfers.
The provision of early learning and child care is a provincial responsibility. Bill C-303 defines the means by which child care is delivered within each province and territory.
The bill refers to specific criteria. Nova Scotia's plan is built on a set of principles that includes each of the bill's criteria. In fact, these principles have their basis in the word CHILD--comprehensive, high-quality, integration, longevity, and developed on the basis of evidence and accountability.
As you can see, Nova Scotia is not standing still. We are already on the path of implementing a range of services and programs that reflect the diverse needs of Nova Scotian families.
Bill C-303, as federal legislation, would be used as a policy instrument to implement a one-size-fits-all approach to child care. Folks, one size does not fit all in Nova Scotia.
In order to access the funding that would need to accompany the bill, each province or territory would have to abide by all components of the bill's criteria and conditions. This approach would strictly limit the design and delivery of our current and future programs. This approach would require that all funded programs be regulated by provincial governments, and that all new programs or services be delivered by a non-profit agency or service. This would stifle provinces and territories in the creation of new and innovative programs that do not meet these restrictive requirements.
In order to meet the requirements of the bill, taxpayers' dollars would have to be invested in additional administrative and infrastructure costs rather than enabling the development and implementation of programs to best meet the needs of the young children and families of our province. Its administrative and reporting requirements would hamper Nova Scotia's current efficiencies and effectiveness with respect to the initiatives we already have under way and that already envelop the requirements of Bill C-303.
Nova Scotia is moving forward. We are doing so in respect of our families, our children, our early childhood sector, and our diverse cultural and geographic environments. We are currently amending our day care regulations and creating new family home regulations, heightening the standard for care and early education.
We also know that some services needed to support families, such as family resource, parent education, and early intervention programs, require further funding allocations to grow and reach out to the community if we are truly ready to provide comprehensive integrated programs and supports to families. Bill C-303 would severely limit this work.
Our hope as a province is to partner with the federal government to make those initiatives that are respective of Nova Scotians and that enable the flexibility to truly make a difference in the lives of children and families.
In closing, I would like to say that Nova Scotia wishes to continue to be an equal partner in the implementation and development of programs that will best serve the young children and families of Canada and Nova Scotia. We do not need Bill C-303 to do this.
The 2001 ECD and 2003 multilateral ELCC agreements are good examples of how governments have negotiated to provide additional funding to early childhood development, learning, and care programs and services. Nova Scotia would prefer to negotiate agreements like this with the federal government rather than having conditions imposed upon us.
I thank you very much for the opportunity to provide you with an overview of the great strides we are making on child care in Nova Scotia, and for listening to our views on Bill C-303.
Thank you. Merci.