Debates of May 31st, 2023

Motion in Amendment

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families]

Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague from Alberta and I have many great conversations here in the House. I was thrilled to hear that he understands how child care is really a great contributor to social growth and the advancement of women. It is certainly something I value.

He talks about spaces, and even in his province of Alberta, 1,800 new child care spaces were created under the program, through the non-profit system. He also leaned into the issue of private care. That is why the Province of Alberta, determining where it had desert spaces, committed to another 5,500 spaces, going forward.

There is a system that needs to be built. The system is being built, and I would like to know if my hon. colleague will support Bill C-35 rather than debate the title of the bill itself.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Madam Speaker, there was a lot packed in there, and I think we addressed that a bit.

We talked about my home province of Alberta. It is a growing province. If we think about 1,800 day care spaces in a province that has had a migration influx of 50,000 people over the last year, we are talking about a need that is largely unmet. I referred in my speech to day care deserts. At the end of the day, 61% of those accessing day care in Alberta are in a day care desert.

We have problems and hurdles to overcome in order to deliver this to people. That is one of the reasons we want to make sure the bill we are talking about today addresses the concern of how it is going to meet the needs of Canadians.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, for me, in Vancouver East, the issue with access to day care centres around three things. One, it is about affordability, so $10-a-day day care will make a difference for families. The other issue, of course, is about access to spaces and the creation of spaces, which is also critical, because there is a long wait-list of people trying to access day care for their children.

Last but not least is a point the member raised. It is the issue around the attraction and retention of child care workers. The key to doing that centres around wages and working conditions. My colleague, the member for Winnipeg Centre, worked really hard to bring forward amendments to the bill to address this critical issue.

My question for the member is this. Would he agree that, in order to attract and retain quality child care workers, we must ensure fair, livable wages as well as good working conditions for them?

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Madam Speaker, that is an excellent question. Indeed, my colleagues on the committee informed me that they put forward these amendments to make sure there were caveats built into the system for the adjustments to labour that we talked about.

Colleagues should think about it from a supply and demand perspective. If there is no incentive to get into this business, for example through the provision of a service that is going to make sense for people, we are not going to have people entering it as a career or setting up a day care. That is why we are trying to expand access. It is to make sure it is available to all people and that the impetus is there, that motivation, to provide the labour and allow people to make a choice about what labour they are going to have so they see themselves fulfilling this career for the rest of their lives. That has to be part of this, because otherwise we are just putting words on paper one more time. Let us get something executable.

[Kevin Vuong, Independent, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his remarks. I appreciated his economic, financial and, frankly, social analyses.

Both he and I represent urban ridings. One of the things I think we both face is—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I just want to stop the member there for a second. There seems to be a sound coming through. I am not sure if the hon. member has something on a screen or a phone. Maybe we could try again.

The hon. member for Spadina—Fort York.

[Kevin Vuong, Independent, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his remarks. I appreciated his economic and social analyses.

Both he and I represent urban ridings, and, like him, I have heard the challenges around the labour shortage. There is no point in affordable, high-quality child care if there are no spots available. I would appreciate if you could expand on the labour workforce strategy, or perhaps the lack thereof.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The sound is still there whenever we open mikes, so maybe we will have somebody check that out, because it will be problematic for the interpreters.

Also, I want to remind the hon. member that he is to address all questions and comments through the Chair, not directly to members.

The hon. member for Calgary Centre can give a brief answer.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for that question. I have always been impressed with his economic analysis of these matters. He and I share a view on this about how we motivate people in society to get into where the gaps are. There has to be an incentive, which we talked about, from both a labour perspective and a space perspective. In the day care deserts, we have to make sure there is a motivation to provide that. That is why it is not only the not-for-profits and the public that are going to work here. It will have to be available for all the people who want to provide these spaces in the established day care deserts. There is a reason they are being served by other people right now, and they are jammed, so let us get those impetuses out of the way, those hurdles cleared and those bottlenecks broken. Let us get on with it.

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am happy to rise in this late evening to once again speak about some incredibly important work to ensure that all families in Canada have access to affordable child care.

First, I want to acknowledge the work of so many in our communities who have tirelessly worked to ensure the successes and movement that we are seeing today in the right direction to provide child care.

The NDP has been carrying this torch for generations, fighting alongside families, local organizations, unions and members of our communities to bring forward legislation that finally ensures families have access to the care they need. As a matter of fact, in the 40th Parliament, prior to me having the honour of being an elected member of Parliament, NDP member of Parliament Olivia Chow introduced a child care bill. Following her, my current NDP colleague, the member for London—Fanshawe, put forward another bill on child care.

Now, in this 44th Parliament, my NDP colleague, the member for Winnipeg Centre, has been working tirelessly to apply the pressure needed to see movement by the government. After years and years of consecutive Liberal and Conservative government inaction, the NDP was able to push the Liberals to commit. Now we need to see the delivery for all across Canada.

In order to move forward for families that have been waiting for too long, we need to see the bill before us move forward and not continue to see delays. I fail to understand, which I was asking about earlier in questions, how hours of debate tonight about the short title of the bill, and not continuing on the debate at third reading, will help us move in the necessary direction. It is disheartening to say the least.

Regardless, I take delays like this quite personally. I am a single parent of two, one now an adult and the other a teenager. I am not quite sure how that happened so quickly. I worked multiple jobs and returned to school as a mature student to build a better future for my family.

One ongoing barrier I experienced was a lack of affordable, accessible child care. Even with the provincial subsidies at the time, many of the options remaining for my children were still unaffordable. To make matters worse, there were multiple examples where I had to choose subpar child care, which is often less reliable, and in more than one instance had outright horrendous child care options. The stresses surrounding child care meant that my children and I struggled. My hard-earned but low income directly impacted the quality of child care made available to my children.

All children need access to quality child care. Children living in low-income families should not be the exception to this rule. All I wanted, which is what everyone wants for their children, was to have the peace of mind that my children would be cared for. I could not afford to stay home with my children and I could not afford for them to go to child care. What an impossible situation this is for anyone to be in.

Unfortunately, these struggles continue to be felt by those raising children today. Constituents in my riding of Nanaimo—Ladysmith continue to reach out, struggling to find quality child care and affordable child care. I am disheartened to have to share with these constituents that we are seeing delays in moving this bill forward to ensure that $10-a-day child care is made a reality.

However, none of this will be made possible without a workforce strategy. Child care workers are specialized professionals in our communities. Many undertake four-year bachelor's degrees, for example, in child and youth care. In order to earn this bachelor's degree, students pay for unaffordable tuition fees, as well as the high cost of books and supplies. Despite taking four years away from the workforce to invest in a quality education and to develop the skills required to contribute endlessly to our communities and the future of our children, these qualified workers are offered positions that pay meagre wages. I am perplexed how those who provide the care for our children, those who shape future generations, would be so undervalued and disrespected in their field.

This is another example where we see a vital field of work overrepresented by women being severely underpaid. As a matter of fact, of those who work in the child care profession, 98% are women and one-third are immigrants or non-permanent residents. Also, those working in the field are more likely than workers in all other occupations to be racialized.

As my colleague from Winnipeg Centre so eloquently said, “This is not...a worker shortage; it is a wage shortage. It is a respect shortage.” Those who choose the honourable profession of caring for our children need to be paid fairly to do so, to have access to a safe working environment and to know they will have access to a retirement income and medical benefits. Where is the incentive for individuals who enter the field of child care if they cannot be assured, at the very least, that a livable income will be provided? We will never see any increases to the workforce under these conditions. We need to see the government follow through with a clear strategy to ensure an increase of those working in child care. Without them, we will never see improvements for generations to come.

Prior to the pandemic, child care was already the second-biggest expense for families after housing, and many people caring for children were forced to delay their return to work because they could not find or afford child care. Before COVID, there were only enough licensed child care spaces for one in four children under six. With COVID-19, women's participation in the workforce dropped to its lowest point in 30 years. This staggering, unacceptable fact demonstrated the dire need for child care. Businesses, child care experts and economists agree that people caring for children cannot go back to work without safe, reliable and affordable child care.

Accessible and affordable child care is also an issue of gender equity. Women are more likely to be caring for children and are therefore more impacted when quality care is not made available. Everyone should have the right to decide what is best for their families, and child care is an essential piece in providing those options.

This bill is not only about the care of children today. It is setting children up for success moving forward. We know that when children receive quality care, they are better set up for success once they enter school. These early years are vital to the future of children and child care, and for many, they are key in early learning and child care.

Child care needs to not end once a child enters school, as we all know. There are endless examples where child care remains necessary once a child enters school, like before and after school and during school breaks. In my prior role as a school board trustee for Nanaimo—Ladysmith, my fellow trustees and I worked to incorporate and embed child care opportunities, in partnership with the Province of B.C., directly into the existing public school system, and we have seen successes of exactly this in Nanaimo—Ladysmith public schools as a result.

I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the incredible work and advocacy of the Canadian Union of Public Employees to make possible affordable public child care, such as what we are seeing in Nanaimo Ladysmith. It makes so much sense to provide child care where the children already are, operated in-house by already qualified staff, with fewer transitions and improved care for children.

Quality care must uphold human rights, including the rights of indigenous people. This is why it was essential that this bill include the amendment to uphold the right of indigenous people to free, prior and informed consent on matters that pertain to their children. We all know the disgraceful history of residential schools, where children were kidnapped from their parents, without consent, as well as the continued abuses against indigenous families in the sixties scoop. Now we see more indigenous children in care than there were at the height of the residential school history. If we are to reconcile in this country, we must acknowledge this truth while respecting the rights of indigenous people, including the rights of indigenous families and children.

I have said this before in this House, and I will continue to say it: We need to see public money going into public services. We need to listen to experts in the field, who reiterate that public child care is the best way forward, with affordable, high-quality and accessible child care for families who need it. We also know that public child care provides better wages and working conditions for staff.

My hope is that we can stop the delays on getting this bill to move forward, so that we can see affordable child care made accessible for everyone across Canada.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Madam Speaker, I just want to reiterate that there is no holdup. These agreements are already signed with provinces and territories.

What is important now is a lot of what the member has brought up. There is no labour strategy, something that we put forward in committee. It was actually voted down by the NDP and the Liberals. We know how important this is.

The other issue that I know the NDP cares deeply about, and I support, is those who are less fortunate, those who are living in poverty. This bill has been criticized by many people for having a Matthew effect. The Matthew effect is basically when the government intervenes by increasing public provision, but this ends up advantaging higher-income rather than lower-income groups.

Does the member feel that the bill needs to be strengthened to ensure that those living below poverty also have access to child care?

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her work in this area. I know she has been working hard in this area as well.

I am happy to answer questions around access to quality child care and income not being a barrier to accessing that child care. This is exactly the root of why my NDP colleagues and I have been pushing for publicly funded child care. We know that, through publicly funded child care, we see increases in access to child care and better working conditions for those who are working in the field. Ultimately, this helps to ensure that we have equitable opportunities for all children, regardless of income.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Madam Speaker, I listened to my colleague's speech with great interest. I think sharing stories about our own experiences, particularly those of us who have been single mothers, is very valuable.

Comparing her situation with mine, I was a single mom in Quebec, where I had access to quality low-cost day care. This permitted me to go back to school and improve my situation. It was excellent-quality, publicly funded day care. Could my colleague comment on why she had such a difficult experience? Why did her province not have a similar system?

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am always happy to hear from other parents and women who have raised children or are raising children in this House. We definitely need to see more representation. I am happy to hear that the member had such a positive experience.

I think this really highlights the need for a national approach. We see differences across Canada in what is being made available to families. Quite frankly, the experience of many is that they are not being provided with the options at the cost that is required for them to access the care they need.

If we saw the federal leadership in place with the investment required, all provinces and territories would be better able to provide the care options that meet families' needs across the country.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague from Nanaimo—Ladysmith brought back to mind something that my colleagues in this place might find incredible.

In 1992, when I was a single mom making $24,000 a year as a self-employed contractor and executive director of Sierra Club Canada, I hired a babysitting firm. I was able to hire a caregiver for $1,000 a month. Since she made only $1,000 a month, she had 100% subsidized child care for her children while she looked after my daughter. None of it made any sense to me.

I would like to see this legislation through. I would like to make sure that every child in this country has access to high-quality early childhood education and learning and child care.

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Madam Speaker, I so agree with the comments that were made by the member. It really speaks to the fact that we need to be working with all those who are invested in this important work, including unions, non-profits, our public schools and the provinces. We all need to be on board with this work to move forward. I really reflect on the important work to integrate child care within the existing schools that is happening in my province of British Columbia, alongside school districts. This is essential to ensure that children have the care that they need before and after.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in this place and contribute to this debate on Bill C-35.

The Liberals claim that their goal with Bill C-35 is to provide affordable child care to Canadians. However, what is the point of creating a system of so-called affordable child care if Canadians cannot access it? Since this bill was introduced, we have heard from many individuals, many stakeholders, that the major issue with child care is that Canadians do not have access to it. This bill does nothing to address the issue of accessibility. It is disappointing to families across Canada that, despite the two to three decades of planning to nationalize child care, the government has come up with such a flawed piece of legislation that will do nothing to address the real issues that Canadian families are facing.

My home province of Saskatchewan, for example, has very few child care spaces. Only 17.8% of children from zero to five years of age have access to full-day or part-time child care spaces. It gets even worse when we include children from the ages of six to 12, as only 10% have access to full-day or part-time day care spaces. This bill will not create spaces to address this shortage. As a mom and a grandmother of 11, I understand the importance of having access to quality day care.

While this could have been an opportunity for the government to put forward thoughtful measures to help Canadian families get access to quality child care, the Liberals have failed to do this. Perhaps that is the issue when the elites believe they understand the problems that average Canadians face.

This bill was introduced as a part of the confidence and supply agreement, which sees the New Democrats support the Liberal minority government through to 2025. Despite the ongoing issues plaguing the government, the New Democrats have declared that they will stick by the government through thick and thin, while claiming to hold it to account. It is as though someone were telling people to put out a fire while simultaneously pouring gasoline on it. The bill was a priority for the confidence and supply deal, and it continues the government's culture of mediocrity and ineptitude. If the government had bothered to speak with average Canadian families about child care, again, it would know that the biggest issue is accessibility. We could make child care free, but if people cannot access it, it might as well not exist.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees currently reports that “in many communities there is only one childcare space available for every three children who need it, and waitlists are long.” The lack of spaces in child care is underscored by labour shortages, which we have heard about, and staff burnout. Many child care facilities do not even have enough employees to fully staff existing child care centres, let alone new spaces.

Government estimates also suggest that, by 2026, there could be a shortage of 8,500 early childhood workers. We also found, through my colleagues’ work at committee, that the government and its NDP allies are not really interested in helping families to access these child care spaces. At committee, Conservatives introduced an amendment to include all types of child care to ensure that the program was inclusive and reflected parental choice, not political ideology. Of course, this was defeated by the Liberal-NDP coalition as it sought to force an Ottawa-knows-best solution on Canadian families across the country.

Another Conservative amendment sought to amend the national child care council to have representatives from private, home-based providers alongside public and not-for-profit providers. This was supported by testimony from Julie Bisnath, program coordinator for the Child Care Providers Resource Network, who stated, “Championing home child care as a central part of CWELCC would increase access to a diverse array of child care options.”

Despite being a common-sense amendment to address one of the major issues regarding child care in this country, the Liberals and NDP voted it down. One is left to believe that they are intent on imposing their views on Canadians instead of allowing Canadians to live freely and make their own choices for their child care needs.

It seems to me that we may be seeing a pattern here that the NDP-Liberal coalition is not interested in actually addressing the labour shortage, which is the biggest hurdle, as I have already stated, to providing more child care spots to Canadians.

There was another amendment put forward by Conservatives that would directly address the labour shortage. This amendment sought to amend the function of the National Advisory Council on Early Learning and Child Care and includes supporting the recruitment and retention of a well-qualified workforce and conducting regular engagement. It includes a specific mandate calling for maintaining and understanding available child care spaces, the numbers on wait-lists and the progress made to reduce wait-lists for families. It makes sense. Additionally, this amendment would have required the council to provide an annual report on its progress. That also makes sense if one is serious about addressing the real issues.

Another Conservative amendment sought to amend the reporting clause of the bill to include the Minister of Labour. What a novel idea when looking at addressing labour shortages to include the Minister of Labour in the annual reporting, and that the annual reporting must include a national labour strategy to recruit and retain a qualified early childhood education workforce. This supports witness testimony, which was again heard at committee during the study on the importance of a strong national labour strategy dictating the success of a national child care framework.

Bea Bruske, President of the Canadian Labour Congress, stated, “That would absolutely be an amendment we would support because we know that we need a robust workforce strategy to make sure that we can address the recruitment and retention issues in the sector.”

The Coalition of Child Care Advocates of British Columbia, in a briefing note, wrote, “We strongly recommend the National Advisory Council on Early Learning and Child Care must...provide an annual publicly available report to the Minister on the work of the Advisory Council in meeting the goals set out in the Act.”

Those two amendments, again, were both voted down by the Bloc, the Liberals and their NDP coalition partners. It is concerning that they may have voted against them just because they were brought forward by the Conservative members on the committee or it could be that the NDP members have forgotten that they are supposed to be holding the Liberal government to account to put forward meaningful and effective legislation. Whatever the reason, voting down these common-sense amendments shows how out of touch their Liberal coalition partners are. Canadians will be stuck on wait-lists for child care for years, if they ever get a spot at all.

Ontario’s Financial Accountability Office projects that by 2026 there will be 602,000 children under six whose families will want a $10-a-day care program and the province will only be able to accommodate 375,000 of them, leaving 227,000, or 38%, without access.

For a government that claims to be feminist, it is not considering the significant impacts that its policies are having on women with young children. Families are diverse and have different needs depending on their circumstances and a rigid, Ottawa-knows-best approach is not going to help them. The lack of spots will have an effect on women in the workforce as they will tend to be the primary caretakers if there are no available child care spots.

This bill does not address the major issues in the child care system that Canadian families are facing across this country and certainly not in my province. Despite Conservative efforts to improve the bill, it is obvious the NDP-Liberal coalition is not interested in seriously addressing these major issues.

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Saskatchewan for her comments tonight. However, I would encourage her to actually read what is available in the public data record on agreements online. Her own province, in 2022, created 1,800 new spaces and 409 new licensed child care spaces in 41 communities. What was a child care desert continues to be an issue, but without this work, without these agreements, those spaces would not have existed. Even more so, by the end of 2023, there will be 4,000 new spaces in 31 urban and rural communities.

The member talked about inclusion. The Conservatives seem to be redefining “inclusion”, but inclusion is very clear. It is about who receives care: those with vulnerabilities, children with disabilities and so on. However, should taxpayer dollars be paying for private entrepreneurship? I do not think so from the public purse. I would like to know, if those issues are addressed, as I have clearly explained, will the Conservatives support Bill C-35?

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Madam Speaker, it is an interesting question: if those issues are addressed. However, they are not. The bill does not address the very issues that many other members in the House have highlighted: affordability, accessibility and a labour strategy to ensure that we have a robust workforce to provide the services that Canadian families are calling for.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Madam Speaker, many members of the Conservative Party have stood up tonight, despite the fact that this is simply a debate on the title, to talk about affordability for Canadians. However, one of the biggest challenges I have is that we see time and time again Conservatives voting against those things that would make life more affordable.

I am wondering if the member could speak a little bit about the fact that things like dental care make life affordable for Canadians and things like support for housing make things affordable for Canadians. Could the member talk about those things that would make things more affordable for Canadians and perhaps tell us, as much as she says that she likes child care and that she believes in child care, why she would not want the bill to go forward even in a flawed form knowing that it would provide child care to so many Canadian families?

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Madam Speaker, it is not that I like child care. I mean, that is diminishing the importance of child care to say “Great, she likes child care.” Child care is important.

As a mom and a grandmother, I had to access child care. I have children who have to access child care, and when they are getting close to their maternity leave being finished, there is anxiety created, because they do not know where they are going to find child care so that they can go back to work to provide for their families.

Under this government's policy, with the support of the NDP, Canadians are struggling to pay their bills and put food on the table. Having to worry about access to child care is not something that we should be supporting by introducing a bill that would not address accessibility, affordability or a labour strategy.

[Ted Falk, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Madam Speaker, the member talked a lot about accessibility, and that is very important. I represent a very large rural riding, and there are folks there who require child care for their children as well. They have been creative and found solutions through family, friends and community members, but they are not licensed day cares and so they would get punished by this government with this policy by not getting $10-a-day child care. I am wondering if my colleague thinks that is fair.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Madam Speaker, families across Canada are in need of flexibility when it comes to child care. They will have different needs depending on their circumstances, particularly families, as he has pointed out, who have needs outside of standard hours of operation.

My suggestion is that this government go back and take a look at this legislation that it has introduced, review the testimony that its members have heard, and really seek to address the issues that families all across this country have highlighted to be inherent with this piece of legislation.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is great to rise in this House to speak about Bill C-35. In fact, what we have been discussing today, with very lively debate, is an act representing early learning and child care in Canada. What we have heard in this debate has a lot to do with affordability, and the Liberals and New Democrats have been talking about this a lot. I find it interesting that, despite child care being promised since about the 1990s, the Liberals have finally made a move on it, driven in large part by the affordability crisis that is hitting Canada.

We have first-time homebuyers who are having a very difficult time getting into the housing market, buying a home and starting a family and starting that Canadian dream. We have those who maybe have a house who are struggling to eat. We see that food bank usage is up pretty much everywhere in this country. One alarming rate that was in the news not too long ago was that first-time food bank usage was up, and that is a very startling statistic, when we think about those going to the food bank for the very first time. That is the desperation that is being felt across Canada.

Now we are discussing a child care bill that really would not do anything with affordability. I will kind of explain why I believe that is and articulate, and maybe build on, some of the arguments that were made here tonight in our speeches.

We still have the issue of the labour shortage in the child care spaces, so that is the one part of this very important puzzle that really is not addressed in the bill, and we see that labour shortage is starting to affect many other sectors of our economy. It can be in health care, child care and pretty much anywhere. I think anywhere an employer is, they are probably looking for workers. We need to address that, and it is not being addressed.

We also are looking at the ability to just access spaces that are there. In the bill, priority would go to the public and not-for-profit spaces. There is no room for those private sector spaces that are being created to help alleviate the crises, both affordability and access to spaces. Of course, if we had more choice of public, not-for-profit and for-profit in a competitive marketplace, we would actually find more options. When we have more options we have better choices to make, because competition makes everything better. We would get a better product at a better price with a better service. Everyone tries to improve with that model.

We can even go a bit further with this, in that child care spaces in a competitive market could be flexible to the very unique situations Canadians find themselves living in. Work schedules are not always nine to five. We have shift workers, students and a myriad of challenges that parents have to juggle with, and when we really limit the choices for parents, they basically get what they are given. Whether they like it and whether it works for them, it does not matter, whereas if there are more options and more choice, maybe there would be a day care, and I am sure there are many, that would adjust to the needs of very flexible schedules.

When there is abundance, there is peace. When there is abundance there is choice. The more abundance there is in any society, the happier the population. The less choice there is, the grumpier the population.

When we have the contracting of the economy and we have a space where there are shortages, we always see conflict, and that is why I think we raise this quite often. In all our speeches that I have been listening to tonight, the same points get made. We are hearing from our constituents these exact concerns over and over again, and once the government gets involved in providing a service, other competitors find themselves at a disadvantage. They have to compete against a subsidized environment, and then we start to phase out those additional spaces that are provided by the private sector, leaving only the government option, which as I mentioned just a few moments ago, is rarely flexible and often does not properly service rural communities.

Do not get me wrong. There are lots of providers in my community, and many others across the country, who are absolutely doing the best they can. I have yet to meet a child care professional who does not give their all each and every day. They are some of the best people I have ever met, and they do so because they love their community, they love their job and they want to see young ones grow up and be the best they can be. However, if people cannot access the child care spaces, it is hard to get that learning going.

It has to also be flexible. When the government oversees this level of control where only a certain selected few are getting funded, then basically it is just a proxy of government.

Money will be spent. Results will not be achieved like they could be. When we have a competitive market, we get rapid innovation. Let us think about what has been achieved over our lifetimes and those before ours and the economic prosperity that has been achieved. Things that were once only accessible to the very rich have become very affordable to the vast majority of Canadians, and that is a good thing. That is a great thing. We look back to when people used to wash their clothes by hand. Now, I believe pretty much everyone has a washer and dryer. That is a good thing because entrepreneurs, inventors and creators started to make the things that, at one time, only the rich had and made them affordable for the vast majority of people.

The same can be said for child care. When we have different ideas and different people doing different things, going back to abundance, and abundance equals peace, we can start to have a myriad of differences in the child care space. Again, that is a very good thing.

However, when the government continues to pick winners or losers in the marketplace, we get slower innovation. We see that in the energy sector and we see that in growing sectors with the government picking winners and losers in industries and expecting a better result.

I do not think there is any Canadian who is very happy with the telecom industry. There is no competition in the telecom industry. We sometimes like to pretend there is, but there really is not. People basically get what they are given, whether they like it or not. How is that working out for Canadians? We have some of the highest rates anywhere in the world. Again, when we talk about child care, it needs to include everything.

We talk about our energy industry. The government is contracting that. It has been punishing our oil and gas sector for years, and our mining industry. Forestry is hurting. The government is contracting the energy market, leaving what is available to obviously go up in price. One way it could lower energy costs is to strip away the tax. The other is to add supply. When we add supply to anything, it lowers the price. That is including food and day care too.

Since I am from Ontario, I will read this statistic out here by Ontario's Financial Accountability Office. It projects that by 2026, which is not too far away, there will be 602,000 children under six whose families will want $10-a-day day care, and the province will only be able to accommodate 375,000 of them, leaving about 38% without access. This is a major issue. Going back to what I first mentioned at the beginning of my speech, the labour part of this conversation is left out of this bill.

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families]

Madam Speaker, we seem to have delved into the energy sector when we are supposed to be talking about child care.

Nevertheless, I would like to remind the member that the bill reinforces the agreements. The Premier of Ontario signed their agreement. He was the last one to sign, and since signing that agreement, 33 new child care spaces have been created. It is one of the provinces that actively grandfathered in private child care operators and continues to work with them to ensure that there is growth, choice and flexibility within the province.

I do not seem to understand how we have gone from a bill that is aspirational to ensuring that we continue with this, considering the Conservatives ripped up the previous agreements from this time. Now that we are here, there are agreements and Bill C-35 is here, will the Conservatives support Bill C-35?