NSNDP

November 28th, 2017

More stable funding needed for child care sector

Chender meets with child care stakeholders

HALIFAX – NDP Spokesperson for Education and Early Childhood Claudia Chender hosted a meeting today with child care stakeholders at Province House.

“We heard today that there is continued frustration around the patchwork of grants available to child care providers and that affordability remains a significant barrier to access for families,” said Chender. “Inclusion was also a key topic of today’s discussion and we were told there is not enough support for children with diverse needs in our child care system.”

The NDP is committed to working in consultation with the child care community to come up with a system that works for providers, staff and families. The patchwork of grants and subsidies needs to be eliminated and replaced with a stable funding model that would increase the number of spaces and allow early childhood educators to receive fair wages.

“The biggest issue for early childhood educators are wages and working conditions,” said Margo Nickerson, president of CUPE Local 4745 which represents unionized early childhood educators in the Halifax area. “With funding the way it is provincially, it’s tough for centres to pay their staff what they deserve and maintain quality programs.”

Today’s meeting was attended by representatives of the Private Licensed Administrators Association, the Nova Scotia Non Profit Directors Association and Early Childhood Educators.

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