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A Great Place to Grow: Public Child Care’ – that’s the banner for a country-wide tour that CUPE will be mounting this fall. Child care activists and staff attending the child care sectoral meeting at national convention learned details of the tour, and heard from tour speaker Martha Friendly.

One of the country’s leading experts on early childhood education and care, Friendly has just co-authored a book with Susan Prentice entitled ‘About Canada: Child Care’. They argue that the absence of a universal, publicly-funded system is detrimental to Canada’s future.

The session heard, among other things:

  • How Alberta is using temporary foreign workers for much of its child care workforce
  • That 77% of mothers with children between the ages of 3-5 are in the workforce full time
  • The total number of licensed, regulated child care spaces in Canada can accommodate only 20% of children aged 0-5