Mr. Speaker, the concern, given the tremendous backlog and the evidence we have, is that we know how much this harms the economic well-being for women, and how ultimately this harms the economy.
The International Monetary Fund recommended an expenditure of $8 billion a year on child care, which would be good for the economy. Through increased workforce participation and taxation, it would pay for itself. However, the Library of Parliament has calculated that the current government at this point has only committed 8.8% of that funding, which is a 91.2% funding shortfall compared to what the IMF recommended that this country spend.
Budget 2017 does not allocate funding for any new child care spaces until 2018-19. However, as the member said, with two provinces, British Columbia and Alberta, being ready to go with construction of new child care spaces and supporting child care workers, we need a government that is willing to make the significant investment early on to create those new spaces, to get women to work, and to get child care workers the secured spending.