Debates of May 31st, 2005

Business of Supply

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, I am not sure where to begin. There were a lot of comments and a lot of questions.

In terms of the early comments that were made and in talking about invasions and interventions, and all of the rest of it, all the hon. member had to do was to be in Winnipeg, Regina, Gander, Hamilton or in Halifax for those child care announcements. The public in the room did not feel intervened upon. Those ministers responsible did not feel intervened upon. Those premiers, and four out of the five premiers were there for those particular announcements, did not feel intervened upon.

As I said earlier in my remarks, we are talking about our understanding of what a federation is and what the role of a federal government is and can be. In those areas that are understood as big priorities, things that are of importance to Canadians, we must find a way of delivering what is needed to the public. In a lot of instances the provinces or territories are simply not in a position to deliver on that kind of priority at a particular time.

If anybody went back 12 or 13 months, there were no big changes projected over a five or ten year period in terms of early learning and child care. They were not going to happen largely because outside of the province of Quebec there were not any provinces or territories in the position to, or with the ambition and priority, give a big push to early learning and child care that would make that much of a difference.

That is why all of this and why those five announcements had the kind of reaction that they did. In terms of the main estimates for 2005-06 as compared to 2004-05, the main estimates for 2005-06 total $29.4 billion which is a net increase of about $945 million over the 2004-05 estimates.

The major changes are: an increase of $953 million to the income security programs due to changes in the average rate of payments and in the population based on revised demographic data; an increase of $39.3 million in voted grants and contributions mainly due to the budget 2004 items that were approved as part of the 2004-05 supplementary estimates; and an increase of $19.4 million for payments to private collection agencies. This item was transferred to SDC which has responsibility for the management of collection activities.

There was a decrease of $44.4 million related to the employee benefit plan contributions due to a decrease in salary costs and in salary rate for benefits passing from 21.5% to 20% and there was a decrease in $21.6 million in operating expenditures resulting from the allocation to HRSD Canada of shared corporate services provided by SDC and from other technical adjustments.

I guess beyond that we could talk about what it is we do. Is there a question about early learning and child care?

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Chair, I had 15 minutes allotted to me to ask questions. We are partnered this evening, so do I give someone else the floor now or do I have a few minutes left for myself?

[The Chair]

You have only two minutes, that is all.

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Chair, I know full well that the provinces have welcomed the child care system with joy, as the minister says. Nonetheless, in Quebec it is another story. We are not against the fact that this national child care system is being implemented in other regions. However, we have asked the Minister of Social Development whether a province that does not want to participate in the program, because it already has its own, can have the right to withdraw with full compensation. That is what it means to respect provincial jurisdictions. Nonetheless, the minister insists on negotiating with conditions.

I will not get into a debate over it. However, in the meantime, I want the minister to know that the $5 billion he allocated to child care over five years may seem very generous, but let me remind him that since 1998, when the program was set up in Quebec, the federal government has saved $1 billion in unclaimed tax deductions. Accordingly, if every province contributed to implementing a child care system, which costs the Government of Quebec $2 billion, then perhaps the government could give more latitude in terms of the money that government will invest in child care.

I want to hear what the minister has to say about his willingness to respect provincial jurisdictions—

[The Chair]

The Minister of Social Development.

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, as has been said in the House before, in terms of understanding the role that the Government of Quebec has played in early learning and child care in this country, it is clearly the forerunner. It is clearly the model. I think of it more as the inspiration that was probably behind the commitment that was made in the last campaign.

Entering into discussions with Quebec, all of that is understood. It is absolutely clear the amount of financial commitment that has been made by the Government of Quebec in early learning and child care, which is far more than anyone else has made. By acting earlier than other jurisdictions and acting in a more ambitious way, the Government of Quebec will not be penalized for that early and ambitious action.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Chair, it is an honour and indeed a pleasure to have the opportunity to speak to the minister from this seat belonging to the Leader of the Opposition. I usually sit in the corner so I do not get the chance to go face to face with the minister when I ask him questions in the House on some of these really important issues.

I am pleased to be here tonight with my colleague from Winnipeg Centre who is very passionate, as are all New Democrats, about some of the programs for which the Minister for Social Development and his colleagues now have responsibility. These are program that support and help people live life to its fullest capacity. They help those in difficulty and those who want opportunity. They support people in their health care needs and support families and children in their education needs. The minister and his colleagues all have a great responsibility on their shoulders and we are here as New Democrats to work with them to achieve some goals on that score.

We are willing to stay this evening because we are concerned, interested and actually excited about the possibilities since the new NDP budget was passed at second reading in the House. I know from being in my own riding, as does my colleague from Winnipeg Centre who was in his riding last week, that people are very excited about this new budget, the new commitment to spending on programs that will support people and communities and make life better for everybody.

Just off the bat I want to suggest to the minister that he not, for even a nanosecond, think about replicating what Mike Harris did in Ontario from 1995 to 2003 because that was a devastating, damaging, destructive, heart ripping experience for the people in that province. I know because I was there. I served for eight years in opposition to that program. We could not do anything because it was a majority government and it kept changing the rules to make it easier for it to drive that agenda.

The story is now well-known across the country. All one has to do is mention the name Walkerton to understand that the Ministry of the Environment lacked the resources to put environmental inspectors in the field to ensure that kind of thing did not happen.

Everyone knows what happened in Ipperwash and how all of a sudden the attitude toward our first nations, in a very short period of time, changed dramatically from day to night.

Today the Ontario Liberal government is struggling big time to make ends meet and to find the resources to live up to the promises it made when it ran in the election of 2003. When it was elected it found out how difficult it was, as we knew it would because we were the government from 1990 to 1995 in some very difficult economic and challenging times. From 1995 to 2003 we had some of the best economic times in the country. However the government of the day under Mike Harris gave that money away. It gave tax break after tax break to corporations to the point where now there is no money left in the coffers of the Ontario government to support people and communities and for education and health care.

Health care in every community across Ontario is in dire crisis. It is a crisis everywhere. We cannot get enough doctors. Hospitals are struggling to keep beds open. Emergency rooms are shutting down over the weekends. All kinds of things are happening, things that we never thought were possible in a jurisdiction as rich as the province of Ontario.

It happened because we had a government that made a choice to make a priority of corporate tax breaks, which we talked the Liberal government out of in this federal budget. We told it not to spend $4.6 billion on yet another corporate tax break at the expense of investing in child care, in education, in the environment, of spending money in third world countries to take our role in the world as leaders and to do our part and at the expense of people who lose their jobs.

If this budget passes, we will have a fund to help workers who end up on the street because their companies went bankrupt and they did not have wage protection and therefore did not get paid. It will help seniors and retirees make ends meet.

Those are all the things that are now in the federal budget that the minister will have responsibility for putting in place. He will have that money. He will give leadership and as long as he continues to be the minister in the government he must make good on those promises.

Canadians are waiting in great expectation for the government to work to get the budget passed so we can make those investments in child care, in education, in the environment and in housing actually happen and we can see the results of that work.

I want to talk a bit tonight about child care. This is not something new. We have had these conversations before. I also want to talk about the clawback of the child tax benefits supplement. I have been appalled ever since it started, even as a member in the provincial legislature, that provinces would actually claw back money from the most at risk and vulnerable of our families, money that was given to them in the first place by the federal government to deal with the shamefully high child poverty that exists in this country.

I also want to talk a bit about a conversation we had at committee concerning social transfers. The reason we are having difficulty supporting the passage of Bill C-22 is that we would like to see the minister's department commit to a framework wrapped around that social transfer that speaks to some of the values the minister spoke to in his wonderful speech a few minutes ago and what he thought Canada should be about and how it should support its people and its communities.

We want to work with the minister to ensure there is a framework of accountability and transparency with that money so that when it flows to the provinces we will know and the provinces will know what it is for. In that way the federal and provincial governments can be held accountable for the expenditure of that money.

I also would love to talk about an issue that was raised by the Conservatives, a Canadians with disability act. That is a wonderful idea and certainly the government would get 100% support from our caucus on anything it might do on that front.

I also want to talk about housing. I just had a meeting this past week in my riding on some of the wonderful programs that were put in place to deal with the tragic circumstance of homelessness, particularly in some of our bigger cities. Some programs that have been put in place are now starting to work but they need to be firmed up. There needs to be core funding and there needs to be some stability put into the system to help those people who are working so hard on our behalf to ensure that people who are without homes have some place to sleep at night and a place they can call home. They need to feel supported and need to feel that they do not have to spend 50% to 75% of their time fundraising. They should be able to put in the energy, excitement, enthusiasm and effort that they have for this agenda into looking after people who are living on our streets without a home.

All of these issues are very important. All of these issues have been addressed to some degree in the new budget that we passed at second reading two weeks ago and that we need to get through the House in short order.

I think everyone knows where we stand as New Democrats. We want a national child care program and are convinced that the only way to give parents choice in this country is to have a national child care program. If parents are going to have the choice to either stay home or go out to work, they need to know in either case that their children will be looked after in a safe place and with quality programs of a developmental nature that will support them in their growth and development. If we do not have a national child care program in every community in Canada, parents will not have choice. The only choice they will have is to stay home. I am not saying there is anything wrong with that choice. As a matter of fact, my wife and I made that as a family choice because we could afford it and we had no other choice at that point.

As the minister said earlier today, more parents are making that choice today. With the economy we have and the education and training that women in particular are now taking advantage of and knowing what they have to offer society, I think we need to ensure there is choice.

The argument I would make is that if parents in every community across the country are to have the choice of either staying home or going to work, we need an affordable, quality national child care program operating and funded. We believe in a national child care program that is based on the QUAD principles. I will list the things we do not agree on. We think it should be delivered through a not for profit delivery mechanism, and we need to talk about that. Actually, that is going to be my question, if the minister wants to think about it for a bit. What research does the minister have to back up his claim that we will have the same quality whether it is for profit or not for profit? If he focuses on quality, he will get quality.

The research we have is from people working in the child care community who have strongly suggested that if child care is not delivered through the not for profit system we will not get the quality. It has been proven, not just in research but in practical experience around the world, that if we get into the for profit system, invariably the big box child care system starts raising its head and becomes the dominant player.

What happens is that those institutions begin to find savings for the bottom line by cutting wages, cutting back on the food budget or by making child care workers the janitors at night after they finish teaching. By not investing in the kind of equipment, toys and facilities that we need, that results in a poor quality child care setting.

We believe child care should be a not for profit system. We also believe the minister should be working with us on legislation at the federal level to ensure that the provinces will deliver a quality national child care program and that the money that flows will be spent. Ontario is another example. The federal government did flow child care money to Ontario over the last three or four years under agreements that were signed by first ministers on child care and not a penny of that money was ever spent.

The same thing occurred in B.C. As a matter of fact, B.C. pulled its own money out and said that it was replacing it with federal money. In fact, the federal money was less than the money that was taken out of B.C.

We think we need some mechanism at the federal level to ensure that the money that flows, which is a significant amount of money, particularly if we move toward 1% of GDP, will actually be used for child care and that the federal government will be there at the end of the five years still contributing and helping to grow that system so the provinces are not left holding the bag, so to speak, which has actually happened in previous experience, and the provinces are worried about that.

We need some legislation that would speak to that, speak to the not for profit, speak to quality and speak to the QUAD principles. I would like to work with the minister on that.

I am running out of time so I will pose my question. What research do you have to back up your decision to allow for profit or not for profit? In doing that, why are you so confident that you will get the quality that you think is possible?

[The Chair]

We are fairly casual tonight in one way but we try to encourage members to address comments through the Chair and not direct questions as to “What are you going to do” but direct questions as to “What is the minister going to do”, and so on.

We will give the minister one minute to answer that question and we will see how he does.

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, in terms of research, the first point is that in every province and territory there is both not for profit and for profit. All of the western European countries, which, as we know, are much more mature systems, have both. The member is correct. Some of the research that has been done show some differences in the quality between not for profit and for profit and some of the research shows that the not for profits score better than for profits do.

One of things we will be doing very carefully in all of this is monitoring how we are doing. We have a $100 million accountability package. There will be action plans and information that will be required of the provinces and territories. We will be watching very carefully to see how the provinces and territories do. We will be watching to see who does better and who does worse in terms of the mechanism of delivery.

[Michael John Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Chair, I am pleased to have the opportunity to take part in the discussion this evening. I will be splitting my time with the Minister of State for Families and Caregivers and will have a question for him when I have had a chance to make a few comments. I truly do consider him to be a champion for some of the most vulnerable in our society.

I want to talk about an issue that is particularly important to me. It is the issue of voluntary caregiving. Caring for one another is a Canadian value. Across this country Canadians are caring for members of their families and for their friends and they are doing it more than they ever have before. For some people the responsibilities are manageable, but for some the demands are overwhelming.

Caregiving can be very intense for a long period of time. The personal and societal costs can be very high. There is a role for government to play in supporting unpaid family caregivers to help them meet their caring responsibilities to ensure that those who are receiving care have a high quality of life and that caregivers can provide support without significant risk to their own health and their own wealth.

Furthermore, by helping caregivers, governments are helping to relieve pressures on our formal health care system and our social services systems as well. Over 2.8 million Canadians are providing care to seniors, adults and children with disabilities and to Canadians with acute and long term health conditions.

Not all caregiving situations are the same. Caregiver situations are diverse depending on who they are, where they live, who they take care of, their level of income, their level of family support, their cultural background and a lot of different areas.

I want to talk about my own personal experience and put this in my own context. One of the most important experiences of my life was the period when my parents were dying and my family and my six brothers and sisters and I provided care so that they died at home. My father had stomach cancer and my mother had bowel cancer. From Christmas of 2002 until my mother's death on March 31 and my father's death on May 13, my two sisters, Shelagh and Brigid, gave up their jobs in Toronto and moved into the family home in Nova Scotia.

They were the primary caregivers to mom and dad. Led by them, we all provided care. We took turns. We came together as a family, quite often three times a day, to say prayers with them, to provide medication and to provide comfort and all the things that had to happen.

Of course it was a sad time for the family, but in many ways it was very rewarding as well. Not only did we grow in our faith, but we grew in our closeness as a family. There is not one of us who would be able to say that we were not enriched by the experience of being with our parents while they died after they had spent a lifetime giving to us. We never regretted being there. We never regretted the opportunity to give back to parents who gave so much to us.

But we had some real advantages in spite of this difficult time for our family. We were not a wealthy family, but we had enough financial resources. There were seven of us so we took turns, although my two sisters, Shelagh and Brigid, took the bulk of the load. We all took turns and that made it a lot easier.

It was a short period of time. I can vividly recall my father saying to me after my mother passed away, “I'm going to go into a hospital and be taken care of from the hospital and you kids are going to go on with your lives”. He said that was what he wanted to do, but we knew he did not want to do that. We knew that deep down he was just being the stubborn old man that he always was. He wanted us to convince him that we wanted to take care of him, which we did. That is what happened. I remember the day he said to us that he would let us take care of him, but the only reason he would, he said, was that he knew he was not going to live very long because he wanted us to get on with our lives.

So we had resources and it was a short period of time, but we also had employers who understood our situation. Each and every one of had companies we worked for that understood the situation or partners who understood and allowed us the time we needed to make this situation happen. We also had a lot of support from people such as Jack McNeil, a dear friend of our family and a deacon in the Catholic church, who provided spiritual guidance.

Most people do not have those advantages. What was a sad but rewarding experience for us is a very stressful experience for many Canadians who do not have the level of income that they need to be able to take time off work and care for loved ones, be they adults, a spouse or a parent, or children who may be autistic or have other challenges. Those are very stressful times for Canadians and they are times when we as the Government of Canada need to support them.

It is difficult. There is no question about it. The demands placed on caregivers decrease their own capacity to provide quality care. If we as a government do not provide support it can negatively impact not only the quality of life of the people who are being cared for but that of the people who are providing care. Caregiving involves costs to caregivers, employers and society. Caregivers can lose income and have greater out of pocket expenses. There can be costs to employers to accommodate employees with caregiving opportunities.

I want to talk a little about the minister. I have had a chance to spend a great deal of time with him. He has taken the time to come to Nova Scotia, as he has for other parts of Canada, and do round tables with caregivers, because they quite often tend to be the forgotten people in society.

In Nova Scotia, I became a little bit involved with Caregivers Nova Scotia because of my own experience and have had the opportunity to meet many other people whose burdens are almost unimaginable.

The minister was with me in Halifax last month as the guest speaker to Caregivers Nova Scotia. One of the people who was honoured that day was someone who I believe had a spouse who was dying of cancer and whose child was diagnosed as autistic and Down's syndrome. How do people cope with that? How do people who do not have a significant income cope with that kind of pressure and responsibility?

One reason why we all got into politics was to help those who need help, not those who do not. When people are doing something to support the people they love and at the same time are taking a huge burden off the system, what better cause could there be for a government to support than that?

I know that the minister has spent a lot of time on this. I appreciate it, as do people at Caregivers Nova Scotia and other people across the country. Perhaps he could talk a little about what the government is doing to help all the volunteer caregivers who give so much of their time and energy to help friends and family members.

[Tony Ianno, Liberal, Minister of State (Families and Caregivers)]

Mr. Chair, first of all I would like to express my gratitude to and support for the hon. member for Dartmouth--Cole Harbour. We can see the compassion and the understanding of the issue that we face regarding caregivers, the unsung heroes of our society.

I have spoken to many in this House. I know that many have their own personal circumstances, which they have dealt with for a long time. Some are more fortunate than others. There are many who are not.

As a society and a government what we must do is work with all the stakeholders and all levels of government to find ways to help our aging population, the disabled and the families that care for them with willingness, with love and with compassion. We must ensure that we help those three million people who do this unpaid, who give of themselves and find economic opportunities to help their families, especially in certain circumstances, or when they age, and a spouse, a partner, a neighbour or a friend becomes affected and they are there for them, whether it is to help them shop for groceries, cut the lawn, take them to a doctor or do whatever they need.

Together with all levels of government we must find ways to help these people. Without them Canada would be in very dire straits, because all the money that we put into health care would not come close to what is required to give these people the kind of life we would want for our loved ones.

In this budget, the first step we took was to increase the medical expense tax credit from $5,000 to $10,000. It is a first step.

With the round table discussions that we had in Atlantic Canada, the prairie provinces and Ontario, and which we will be having in B.C., what we are hearing from all the stakeholders, all the persons who make up the society from a caregiving perspective, is a clear message that sometimes one person alone cannot do it. The message is that it is a responsibility as a society for all of us to share, to help and to be there, whether it is in an economic way, lending a helping hand or just lending an ear sometimes. I think we can do it. What we are finding with our round tables is that everyone has a different opinion depending on their circumstances. This is not one size fits all.

What happens on the first day someone is actually in a situation where a loved one needs attention? What do people do? These are the kinds of questions that we are asking of ourselves in trying to find out what the first step is. With our election platform of $1 billion over five years, working with the provinces and with stakeholders, what is it that we can do to help fill the void, the vacuum, which will alleviate some of the first pressures that people face? Where do they turn?

As we all know, all levels of governments often work in silos. On day one, where does that person begin? As we work with everyone at our September national round table and as we ask this committee to actually consider as a priority where members can work with government, with us, what we are hoping to do is find a solution to some of the problems. We are not asking members to wait until we come here and give the answers. We are asking members to work together because there is no one answer.

I was hoping that the committee would be able to do some of that as we are travelling the country and meeting with all the stakeholders and the provincial ministers responsible. I believe that is a start. It is similar to the early childhood and child care program: we start somewhere.

Yes, there are tax measures to deal with the disabled, the 25 points that were put in the budget in terms of what the committee wanted. We are always moving the agenda forward because 40% of our seniors are disabled and people, regardless of their framework in life today, can be affected.

I was at a fundraiser, a Bay Street crowd for MS, and I was able to speak. I very briefly said to them that any of them could go home that night and face the difficulties of becoming a caregiver. It is important for all of us to work together, to reach out and to contribute in any way we can on an individual and collective way. Together we can solve some of the problems that are faced by caregivers.

We have an aging population and Canadians are living longer and healthier lives. However, they will also require government to be a part of that process.

There are many issues that will in effect be important for the committee to look at to ensure that we will make a difference in lives of people. I am excited about this issue because it really is a non-partisan issue. I can speak to any member, as I have in the past. I know members care just as deeply as we do. I challenge them to put some energy into this so we can come up with some solutions as we travel the country to make a difference. Some members have personal experiences and know better than others on how to solve some of these problems.

[Rona Ambrose, Conservative, Edmonton—Spruce Grove, AB]

Mr. Chair, I will be sharing my time with the member for Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock.

I would like to thank the Minister of Social Development and the Minister of State for Families and Caregivers and their officials for being here tonight at such a late hour to answer our questions about issues that are of importance to all Canadians and very much make up the social fabric of our nation. I will speak specifically from my own viewpoint and that of my peer group. That is what I can do legitimately on this topic.

I would like to express my views on the policy. The minister of state referred to his area as being something he would like to see us treat as non-partisan. I truly believe that the issue of child care and choice in child care will have such a significant impact on not only my gender, but on my age group. I really want to share, frankly, with the Minister of Social Development where my peer group is coming from and what I am hearing from them, which is that this is not the sixties.

My peer group is professional, young, educated, urban women who have access to the workforce. We are competing very successfully in medical schools, in dentistry schools, in law schools and in all professional schools. We also are competing very successfully in the workplace. I would like to say that we compete successfully in the political arena as well.

However, we also want to have access and we want all of our choices treated equally, whether we choose, if we have children, to stay home or to work part time or to work full time and to have access to day care. We want all those choices. My peer group want the government to facilitate our choices, not restrict them.

One of the things I have noticed in the report on plans and priorities, and the Minister of Social Development referred to it, is that the Government of Canada plans to spend $100 million for the development of a new accountability package that is supposed to support improved research and evidence based indicators. Could the Minister of Social Development share with the House if any of that money will go to either a gender based analysis of the child care program or an income based analysis, so my peer group and my gender can be assured that all women will be assisted by this program in an equitable fashion?

In my academic background, I have a lot of feminist theory training and gender based analysis training. My concern is this program discriminates against young women in the workplace who would like to either stay home part time or full time with their children. It discriminates against women in low income jobs who more often than not do shift work. It also discriminates against women who live in remote and rural areas.

Has the Minister of Social Development done a gender based analysis and could he share those results with me tonight?

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, in terms of the accountability package, the details of the strategy still need to be worked out with the provinces and the territories. However, there is a good basis for collaborative work in this area. For example, work is currently under way both by the FPT committee on early childhood development, knowledge, information and effective practices and the provincial-territorial directors of early childhood education and care.

In brief, we are still working out exactly those things that would be looked at and measured.

The hon. member talked about choice. Every program, every policy that one implements is a choice. There is no program that is not a choice. Health care does not deal with everything. Education does not deal with everything. Early learning and child care does not deal with everything. It was not intended to, it does not and it will not.

The question for all of us is, what will her party deliver in terms of choice? The only concrete information we have heard from her party was in the last campaign. It was a $2,000 tax benefit. It would cost roughly $2 billion to do that. The impact on child care would be minimal. That is a choice. She can make that choice. However, it is a choice as all these things are choices.

[Rona Ambrose, Conservative, Edmonton—Spruce Grove, AB]

Mr. Chair, it is the government's choice to implement a program that is restrictive and only offers one choice. However, what we have said on this side of the House is we want an equitable program. We support formal day care, but we also support informal day care, at home day care. We support a parent's right to stay home if he or she would like to part time. Real choice is about that. We want to know if the government will financially empower all choices and not just one.

Gender based discrimination is a serious issue. I hope the minister can make a commitment tonight to do a gender based analysis of the program with the $100 million which he has committed. I think he will find out that some women will fall between the cracks, who will not have access. That takes me to another question about universality.

My concern is this program is not universal. The minister has made the commitment and has said that he respects universality. However, I do not understand how he can claim that a program is universal if it is not accessible to all. If he has committed to the QUAD principles, I want to know which of the QUAD principles is most important? Which ones will you commit to following through on and will you commit to a gender based analysis of this program?

[The Chair]

Just a reminder again to members to please address their comments through the Chair and call the member by either by his riding name or in this case by the title. The Minister of Social Development.

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, to follow up my previous answer to the member, we do intend to develop a gender based analysis.

In terms of universality and what principles are the most important, one does not have QUAD principles and decide that the Q and the A are more important than the U and the D. One has QUAD principles. It is quality. It is universal inclusion. It is accessibility. It is developmental. All those things are part of an appropriate and ambitious system. That is what one would want in health care, in education and in early learning and child care. We need all those things to deliver on the others. We need quality in order to deliver a system. Nobody is particularly interested in a system that is entirely mediocre. Nobody is interested in a system that is not developmental or affordable or the rest of it. All those are parts of the same thing.

[Barry Devolin, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Mr. Chair, I would like to continue with the same line of questioning. I have heard the minister say on many occasions that this is a program that will be universally accessible in a similar way to public education. If I can speak in the context of Ontario, which is my home province and that of the minister, we see now that the Ontario government is moving to focus its day care and early learning opportunities within the elementary school system. It is taking JK and SK and building day care into the schools.

I think the point of universality is that something can be theoretically available to everyone, which if it is run in a school, it is. However, people who choose not to use it still have to pay for it. Stay at home parents could choose not to use it. They are essentially bearing the cost twice, once through their taxes to pay for the program for everybody else and then they pay for it out of their own pocket through lost income if one of the two parents chooses to stay at home.

My fear is what we will have in Ontario is a program based in the school system which operates from 9 a.m. to 3 or 4 p.m. Monday to Friday, with summers off. In my riding, which is rural, I have many retail workers who work evenings, weekends and in the summer. I think for many people who are focused at least as much on the custodial child care and the cost of the custodial child care part of this equation, as they are to the early learning, they feel the system which we appear to be moving toward in Ontario will inherently discriminate against them.

It will work well for professionals who tend to work from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday to Friday, but it will not work well for shift workers or people who work irregular hours.

What seems to be in the process of being implemented in Ontario is not universal to everyone, is not accessible to everyone and ironically it will discriminate against many people who are in lower income levels because they work irregular hours. They feel that this system will not work for them. Not only will it not work for them, but they will end up paying for part of it through their taxes.

That is why we say that if the financial assistance flows through the parents and the parents have options to choose different choices, including full time professional care, then this would ensure that all parents would have access to some financial support for their child care costs.

I would appreciate it if the minister would comment on that.

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, the Ontario plan is a wrap around to kindergarten and junior kindergarten. It is not of the school system. In those instances its site is within the school, but it is not of the school.

In terms of school hours, as the member says of 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., those are not at all necessarily the hours of the early learning and child care service that is offered within the school.

As I have said to the member and to others before, this is a system that is evolving. It is difficult to know exactly who the central server will be.

The hon. member for Sault Ste. Marie worries about the big box stores. The member Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock is worried about the school system taking it over in a way that makes it less flexible for the particular needs.

We have to ensure, first, that it does not happen and second, specifically as it relates to Ontario. Again, it is sited within the school, but it is not organized as the school would be. I would suspect that to a great extent in the future the schools would be more and more involved in that way because they are at the centre of a community. They are there in smaller towns to a great extent. They can be delivered in ways in which it is often difficult otherwise.

[Barry Devolin, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Mr. Chair, the minister has said many times that this is the first of many steps. I have taken the Quebec model and used the numbers to determine how many spaces are being provided in Quebec and extrapolated that cost structure across the country. It would cost in excess of $10 billion a year to implement that nationwide for all children.

The federal government is talking about $1 billion a year which begs the question, where is the other $9 billion coming from? If I were a provincial or municipal official, I would be deeply concerned that the federal government was going to launch something with great fanfare and I was going to end up with a large part of the tab.

Ontario has early years centres which are actually geared toward parents taking their children in. The children and the parents can have an enriched learning opportunity. Many stay at home parents use these centres on a regular basis, including my wife with our own children. It would appear that the Ontario government is moving away from that. It is starving the early years centres of funds and moving those dollars into the school based system. I see there may be some disagreement with that point.

I would like to ask the minister, does he support the early years centre program in Ontario? Does he think it is valuable for the work it does for stay at home parents? Will he ensure, in his negotiations with Ontario, that early years centres are properly supported?

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, we indirectly help support those centres now. They do good work.

As I said earlier, in terms of providing services for parents and for kids all kinds of different services are needed, and that is one of them. They do good work. I would suspect that a lot of the child care centres, five or ten years from now, will have that kind of component. It will be almost naturally within them.

One of the great advantages of a child care centre is that three year olds cannot walk to it by themselves. They need to get there somehow. They need to get there with their parents. Their parents have the opportunity to walk through the door of a child care centre in a way which they cannot do in an elementary school or a high school.

Once they are through that door things can start to happen. They can see what is going on. They can meet with other parents, talk with other parents, and talk to the people who are there. They can learn. They can turn something that was an accident into something quite important and useful. That is what the natural evolution is going to move toward.

[Eleni Bakopanos, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Social Development (Social Economy)]

Mr. Chair, I want to change the subject a bit, but it is very much related in terms of what our department is all about. It is about communities; it is about people. I want to talk about a file that I had the privilege to pilot through the federal government.

This is a new file for the federal government, but not for Quebec's elected representatives. Quebec has had a social economy for 20 years. Internationally, however, the movement has been known in Italy since 1800. It is a movement of cooperation and collaboration between individuals and communities.

I am really delighted the federal government has decided to look into the matter and try to give communities the means and resources they need to look after their own people and their needs.

The social economy for me is a movement. It is not a program. It is a movement which is citizen-led and community driven. The role that a government should play is a role that is fundamental in terms of how I view and how the department has viewed the establishment of this framework. How do we give tools to citizens, how do we give tools to those who are disadvantaged, and how do we give tools and resources for them to be able to improve their own well-being and that of their community?

I had the privilege of visiting across Canada, when I was nominated as the parliamentary secretary, different non-governmental organizations that have provided work and other tools for their citizens. It was one of the privileges to see how men and women from all walks of life take responsibility for their future and the future of their communities. We as a government would like to empower them and give them the tools to do so.

One of the examples actually is not very far from here. It is called the Good Day Workshop which is here in Ottawa. This is a non-profit outreach program which specializes in providing furniture refurbishing by hiring persons with special needs due to addictions, those suffering from poor mental health, the homeless and the unemployed. Participants in this type of social enterprise program have much to gain in the way of new skills, sheltered work, limited shared income and peer support.

Also in my riding of Ahuntsic, there is an organization known as Amrac. As in the example I mentioned before, people are learning restoration and furniture building at the Atelier de meubles recyclés Ahuntsic-Cartierville, and the furniture is sold to the disadvantaged, who pay a modest sum and not market price. So they invest in a training program for the unemployed and in the purchase of equipment.

The difference between private enterprise and a social enterprise is that the profits generated by a social enterprise return to the organization to give greater opportunity to those who are unemployed to have a few resources and a job and make a contribution to society.

One of the best definitions that was ever given to me of the social economy was how do we take disadvantaged groups out of being dependent on the government and the state. How do we make them productive members of the economy? I think that is the role of our department through our various programs in not making people dependent but by giving people the tools and the resources that they need in order to become productive members of our society.

As parliamentary secretary, I had the pleasure of visiting a dollar store in Halifax affiliated with Nova Scotia hospitals. It hires and trains persons with a disability to get them into the labour market while it sells items at an affordable price to local residents. I was there when people came into the store. Those who are working there are clearly proud of having a job and doing something useful for society. That is what they want to give.

In Vancouver, at the other end of the country, I visited Potluck Cafe. I believe one of my colleagues knows it well, because people living in Vancouver know the cafe. It is located downtown and looks like the usual cafe. However, the meals are free or at low cost to those in need. The cafe is subsidized by the revenues it generates as a high end caterer. It hires and trains people from the neighbourhood.

Canada has one of the most vibrant, non profit sectors in the world. About 10,000 enterprises and organizations employ about 100,000 people across the country. They deliver a wide variety of services, be it health, education, employment, social services and community development, from the arts to culture to religion, sports, recreation and the environment.

Organizations like these are an integral part of Canadian life and I want to ensure that we all thank the volunteers who actually give their time, talent and energy to ensure that their fellow citizens have a better quality of life. That is the essence of what we are trying to do in terms of both the social economy and the other programs we have put in place in social development.

To fully understand the social economy and how it contributes to a healthy community requires a closer look at the complex factors that help to determine the quality of life in communities. Issues such as employment and economic conditions, natural environment, housing, health and social supports each affect the social climate within a community. No one body can provide all of the links in this chain of factors. When conditions are less than optimal, it takes a collaborative approach to find successful solutions.

How did we set up this collaborative approach? When I was first nominated, I decided to go to the expertise. There are organizations that have been working in the area of social economy across Canada. We brought the stakeholders together and created a national round table. Through the recommendations of that national round table is how we hope to put together a framework that not only involves Social Development Canada but involves also Industry Canada and the four regional development agencies across the country which would in fact deliver in terms of the promise that we have made.

I was pleased in fact as parliamentary secretary to make the first announcement with the Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec. We announced $30 million over five years to be delivered through a third party, which is in a bidding process right now, in order to allow the third party with its expertise in terms of this file to give to non-governmental agencies and social entrepreneurs those funds and their patient capital funds, which we can go into further detail if anybody would like, to ensure that social enterprises keep growing and employing more in our society who are disadvantaged.

My department is also working to help community based efforts that improve the lives of children, seniors, families living in poverty and other vulnerable Canadians. I am sure we will have another chance to talk about this later.

I want to talk about something that the minister mentioned earlier which was elicited in the form of a question. I want to share an example of 12 communities from across Canada that found, through dialogue, innovative solutions in a pilot program called understanding the early years. As many of us know, early learning in child care is a priority for many communities. Understanding the early years is an initiative that helps communities develop a detailed picture of how their five year olds are faring as they prepare to enter school and how services and programs within the community can be changed to improve their children's readiness to learn.

This unique approach is based on an expanded local partnership between residents and organizations with similar concerns and who, together, have the power to influence community programs and services. In return, communities get a realistic sense of the situation and are able to respond to the challenges.

The very successful program called understanding the early years has been expanded to include up to 100 new communities over the next few years.

Other community success stories are due to the popular new horizons for seniors program. I had the pleasure recently, along with the minister, of making two announcements in my riding of Ahuntsic about two organizations working with seniors. One of them has created an amazing web site; it is designed by seniors for seniors, but it is also designed to help young people. This is an extremely innovative and extraordinary initiative. Thanks to this program by our government, we were able to allocate funds for the creation of this web site. We will be watching this organization closely, because I think that this will be the start of something that could prove useful for other non-governmental organizations working with seniors and wanting to help young people. The intergenerational aspect of this project was extremely interesting to us.

The new horizons program examines the needs of seniors by creating opportunities for them to take part in their community. We encourage seniors to play an active role in their communities, because we want them to continue to contribute to society.

We are also putting in place the necessary tools to help communities grow along with the social economy. As Canadian society becomes more complex and diverse, it is imperative to continue this dialogue with communities so that we may find new approaches to new challenges which undoubtedly will follow.

While some communities are experiencing significant success in addressing these challenges, other communities are finding it difficult to identify innovative solutions. We have to encourage dialogue. As I said, the national round table on social economy encourages dialogue and encourages bringing to the table innovative ways of looking at our problems and finding solutions to the problems which communities are trying to solve.

We know that dialogue with communities produces effective solutions. We also know that more sharing of information and more research into best practices are also necessary. That is why our department is actively pursuing these two areas to learn more about what works best and how best to spread these successes to more communities.

This approach has been central in terms of our current work with communities as I mentioned earlier. We will continue those efforts through ongoing dialogue at the local level, with the voluntary sector, and by working with coalitions that participate in programs such as the understanding the early years initiative.

Communities are built on social partnerships. The strength of these communities in turn is reflected in the social economy and other actions of our department. As a government, we must aspire to work smarter to help communities reach their full potential. That is what we are committed to in social development. That is what we will continue to be devoted to.

[Marcel Gagnon, Bloc, Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC]

Mr. Chair, I will try not to shoot as many questions at the minister as my colleague has just been doing. We in Quebec were used to seeing him in net for the Canadiens and he was known then as able to handle anything that came at him. This feels a bit like another hockey game here.

This evening, we are having a really interesting discussion. We all want the same: help us do more for the community. I think that the solution to all our problems would quite simply be to respect provincial jurisdictions. This evening, in fact, the topic of discussion is a provincial responsibility.

I have been a Quebec MLA. I have worked for the people you have been talking about. I have helped social workers organize. The whole problem is the two levels of government that are butting heads. There is a shameful waste of energy and money. Why are we against the creation of this department? Not because we have anything against the minister or the people that will make up that department, but because the money going to the 14,000 employees will not be getting to the provinces, to Quebec, to meet the needs we are talking about.

l appreciated my colleague's story about helping his elderly parents when they were dying. I had a similar experience in my own family barely three weeks ago. It is true that people need to be helped, but as long as there are two levels of government looking after the same thing, energy and money will be wasted.

The minister was saying “Help us”. Let us go back to the beginnings of this country, the Canadian Constitution, with its division of responsibilities and powers. There were provisions to ensure that each did what was its responsibility.

With the federal government it is not like that. In committee, I saw a diagram that illustrated it, but I do not have it with me. The federal government is feeling an increasing need to be everywhere. Rather than deal with the fiscal imbalance and return the money to the provinces for health, education, help to families and so on, they work along side the provincial government, establish their presence and duplicate the work, as if the two were competing over the same place. This results in wasted money, and on top of that there is a problem with control.

I recall in committee a question being put to the Minister of National Revenue, which caused him a little grief. He said that the department had become so huge that it was hard to control everything. Indeed, the machine has become so big it wastes a lot of money.

I would make a little aside. For as long as I have been an MLA and an MP I have known that it sometimes does not take a lot of money to resolve a problem. The government members know this. They announced $30,000 for a project in Quebec. I will refer only to the stolen part of the sponsorship scandal, the $100 million that has not been found. I am not accusing anyone. I am not referring to the entire budget for the sponsorship scandal, which is open to question, I refer to the part stolen. I divided it by 300 members. Do you know that each MP would have $333,000 for their community?

Do you know what can be done in a riding with this amount? It is pretty big. More can be done than was done with the sponsorship scandal, you will agree. A number of people can be helped. But there are too many people. Two governments are getting in each other's way and duplicating efforts, often causing each other harm.

I think this would be a way to help us carry out all the fine projects. I honestly think they want to see them succeed.

The issue I am concerned with has to do with seniors. A few years ago, it was discovered that thousands of seniors across Canada, some 270,000 cases recognized by the department, had not received the guaranteed income supplement to which they were entitled.

To get to the bottom of this, I toured Quebec and saw some awful things. In Sherbrooke, a woman passed away at age 88 after living through her old age on $6,000 a year. At the time of her death, the government owed her $90,000 in guaranteed income supplement. I have seen some terrible things.

I have two or three questions for the minister. Can he assure us that all seniors who are entitled to receive the guaranteed income supplement will receive it? When this file was handed over to us, there were 270,000 cases in Canada, including 68,000 in Quebec. The tour and the intense investigating that followed allowed us to find nearly half the cases. Some 110,000 seniors across Canada still were not receiving the guaranteed income supplement they were entitled to. I want to know if there are still any cases today and, if so, how many. I have another question I will ask later.

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, I will share the answer with my two colleagues.

Very quickly, in respect of his first remarks, happily I was in the net on a team where I was rarely bombarded with pucks, so that was a good thing.

In terms of the basic tone of what the member said, I do not accept the tone. I do not accept the tone of frittering away, of wasted money, of competing in that way. The experience most of the time in most circumstances is something that really is a collaborative arrangement. Even in the last number of months, whether it was negotiations over parental leave, earlier in terms of health care, all of them involved negotiations with the government of Quebec. All of them led to resolution in terms of the government of Quebec.

I will pass it over to my colleague in terms of the member's questions on seniors.

[The Chair]

This is a little irregular. The hon. Minister of State for Families and Caregivers.

[Tony Ianno, Liberal, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Chair, I know that the hon. member has a great concern in terms of retroactivity and those who were eligible but were not receiving the GIS at the time. The department sends out hundreds of thousands of information packages. We have outreach people. We continue trying to find ways--