Here is a copy of the National Council of Welfare's comments to the HRD
committee on June 11, 1998. We can send this out to anyone in hard copy,
with the charts that I had on the original. Just e-mail me for hard copies
in English or French (or fax us at 613-957-0680) .
We suspected that we might not get an opportunity to say all of this, so we
handed this statement out at the session.
There was very little opportunity for discussion with such a big group of
experts and such a short session. You should be aware that although some
of the speakers did support the emphasis on early brain development, early
intervention, many of us opposed the idea of creating a new focus for
children's work given the underlying issues (such as child poverty, etc.),
and many of us raised objections to the readiness-to-learn orientation of
the session. Read especially Martha Friendly and Sharon Hope Irwin's
comments.
FOR RELEASE AT 9 A.M., JUNE 11, 1998
Notes for a Presentation to the
STANDING COMMITTEE ON HUMAN RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT
by Armand Brun, Vice-Chairperson
National Council of Welfare
June 11, 1998
Good morning ladies and gentlemen. I’m Armand Brun from Shediac, New
Brunswick, the vice-chairperson of the National Council of Welfare. With
me this morning is Joanne Roulston, the Council researcher. I want to
thank the Committee for its invitation to speak about preschool children
and readiness to learn. These are issues of great interest to the Council,
and they are of particular interest to me after many years of involvement
with children and youth as a teacher and school principal.
The National Council of Welfare is a citizens’ advisory body to the
Minister of Human Resources Development. Its mandate is to advise the
Minister on issues of concern to poor people. The Council’s advice
normally takes the form of reports to the Minister, which are also
distributed free of charge to the general public.
The Council has made families with children a priority for the next few
years. Last year, the Council published a report called Healthy Parents,
Healthy Babies, which made several recommendations about best practices for
children’s programming. We have made copies of the report available for
the Committee members. We are now working on a follow-up report on
preschool children which we plan to publish this fall.
There are three recommendations we would like to make to this Committee
regarding programs for young children.
The most important point is that all initiatives for children and
families must be part of a comprehensive and integrated approach.
Over the last few years, the federal, provincial and territorial
governments have introduced many programs for children and families. At a
federal level, these include the Community Action Program for Children, the
Canada Prenatal Nutrition Program, Aboriginal Head Start, the Child Tax
Benefit and its re-investment funds, and the newly announced Crime
Prevention Centre funding. We are here today discussing yet another
approach to early childhood: readiness-to-learn. Most of these ideas make
pretty good sense, and we are glad that the federal, provincial and
territorial governments, and this Committee in particular, are taking an
interest in the welfare of children. However, as long as there is no
national family policy to weave all these pieces together, many
opportunities will be lost.
Until a national family policy exists, programs such as the Canada Child
Tax Benefit will always be faced with obstacles. The Canada Child Tax
Benefit is intended to encourage parents on welfare to find work, but until
it has the support of good labour policies that make sure that there are
jobs that pay adequately to support workers and their families, and good
policies that provide affordable and high quality child care, the program
will always struggle to meet its objectives.
The Council believes that the federal, provincial and territorial
governments should take the lead from the work of the government of Quebec.
In that province, child benefits, taxation, welfare reform and child care
have been woven together to create one comprehensive family policy. Within
a few years, child care will be available for all preschool children in
Quebec at a cost of $5 a day.
The second point we want to raise is that social programs, no matter how
good they are, cannot replace income security.
Children are poor because their families are poor, and children’s welfare
is inextricably tied to the welfare of their families and the communities
they live in. The poorest families in Canada are families headed by women
who are single parents, and the poorest among these families are very young
single mothers.
Although the rest of the economy enjoyed modest growth in the five years
after the last recession, the poverty rates of single-parent mothers rose
to 61.4 percent by 1996, and child poverty rates reached 20.9 percent, the
highest rate in 17 years. Since 1989, when the House of Commons resolved
unanimously to eradicate child poverty by 2000, Canadian children have
become poorer.
Studies have shown again and again that socio-economic status is the most
significant determinant of people’s health. Children from poor families
are disadvantaged in many ways. We know that one of the solutions to
resolving other social problems such as crime and violence lies in ensuring
that children get a good start in life.
Several American studies have proven that children from very disadvantaged
families can be given tremendous help when they are enrolled in very high
quality preschool programs. Results from programs like the Perry Preschool
in Michigan or the Abecedarian Project in North Carolina show that children
who experience high quality preschool benefit from many advantages over
other children from similar backgrounds. The Perry Preschool researchers
estimate that the value to society of these improvements is worth over $7
for every dollar spent on the preschool programming.
These results are exciting, but it is important to remember that these
programs are designed to treat and repair the damage caused by the severe
disadvantage that poverty creates. The National Council of Welfare
believes that the federal government must ensure that children are not
placed at the level of risk that makes the widespread use of these kind of
programs necessary.
Some children and families will always need the extra help of
high-quality, intense treatment programs. However, strong income security
programs and labour policies must provide the foundation of a family policy
that ensures that parents get the supports they need to raise themselves
and their families out of poverty.
Just three months ago, we learned that Ontario is cutting an allowance for
pregnant women on welfare and replacing it with a service. This kind of
practice undermines parents’ abilities to take care of their families’
needs and is simply unacceptable.
The fact is that welfare incomes for all recipients are inadequate
everywhere in Canada. Although services and programs for families with
children can be helpful, the most important and urgently needed support for
poor families is income support.
This brings us to the last point: national standards for social programs.
The National Council of Welfare has made repeated recommendations that
there be firm guarantees by the federal, provincial and territorial
governments to respect minimum national standards for welfare. That alone
would go a long way to reducing the risks that poor children face.
The results from the studies of American preschool programs show that the
key to their success is that these programs are of a very high quality,
with adequate resources to provide highly trained and skilled staff to work
with the children and their parents. Studies of early childhood care and
education in Canada and around the world have proven that high quality care
is essential for optimal early childhood development.
It is clear that good programming for children and their families has to
vary according the needs of children, their families and their communities,
but it is also clear that without national standards, children in some
parts of Canada will fare far worse than others.
The National Council of Welfare believes that it is essential that the
federal, provincial and territorial governments create national standards
for programs for children and families. Programs must be given adequate
funding to ensure that they can provide the quality and the stability
essential to providing the best possible start to a child’s life. And
governments’ commitments to these programs must be maintained so that
children and families do not suffer every time a new government reshapes
programs for purely political or ideological reasons.
On behalf of the other members of the National Council of Welfare, I would
like to thank you for the opportunity to discuss these important issues.
Chart of child poverty
----------
> From: Sam Lanfranco <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Canadian Children Prenatal to 6 Years - Readiness to Learn
> Date: September 1, 1998 3:50 PM
>
> On June 11, 1998, the House of Commons Standing Committee on
> Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with
> Disabilities was used as a venue for a four hour Roundtable
> on (Canadian National) Children Prenatal to 6 Years -
> Readiness to Learn. The full transcript of that meeting is
> at:
>
> http://interparl.parl.gc.ca/InfocomDoc/HRPD/Meetings/Evidence/
> HRPDEV40-E.htm (note that the URL is line-wrapped)
>
> Liberal M.P. John Godfrey has a summary of the discussion on
> his web site: http://www.johngodfrey.org/roundtable.htm
>
> These discussions are likely to shape (or reflect) Federal
> thinking with regard to the funding of services aimed at the
> wellbeing of children in the prenatal to six age bracket,
> and to shape the Federal position when negotiating with the
> Provinces.
>
> It would be useful for CLICK4HP if several of the CLICK4HP
> subscribers dug into the discussion and captured the main
> points and contested areas for the benefit of others on this
> list, and for the benefit of the wellbeing of children
> across Canada. Any takers?
>
> Sam Lanfranco, CLICK4HP ListMgt
> Distributed Knowledge
> <[log in to unmask]>
>
>
|
