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Click Here to view all 12 Christmas verses! Dalton McGuinty will receive via e-mail one verse for each day of the 12 days of Christmas. Also, watch the CTV News video & interview
The Premier often says that “there’s never a wrong time to do the right thing”. As some municipalities, including Toronto are threatening to sell or close publicly-operated centres and the transition to full-day kindergarten has affected the viability of community-based, not-for-profit child care for infants and toddlers, the carolling moms said “this is the right time to invest in the future of children and families, by investing in a legacy of not-for-profit and public child care.” Our neighbours in Quebec did just that when that provincial government created what is now a $7 a-day child care program.
For starters the moms called for an emergency fund of $200million to stop the collapse of child care across Ontario and the expansion of for-profit and ‘Big Box’ child care. Yesterday, Edleun one of the largest for-profit chains announced its initial entry to Ontario with the acquisition of seven centres. Four are in the Greater Toronto Area and three are in Windsor where nine municipal not-for-profit centres were closed by the city last year.
Between December 13 and Christmas Day, December 25, the Premier and all Ontario MPPs will receive a daily 12 Days of Child Care Christmas email verse ending on the twelfth day with the following:
On the twelfth day of Christmas,
The Premier’s leg- a-cy*,
Uni – ver- sal child care,
Kids are not for profit,
Child care for toddlers,
Real plan for child care,
Cost-of-living increase,
Keep our pub-lic centres,
New way of fund-ing,
Two hund— red – mill—yan,
No-o wait- ing lists,
No big-box,
No-o centres closed,
And a prom -iss of bet- ter – child care.
A worthy legacy for the Education Premier would be a real plan for a publicly-funded public/non-profit system of early childhood education and care for all.
Merry Christmas, Happy New Year. Best wishes for the holiday season.
Click Here to view all the 12 Days of Child Care Christmas verses
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Stella Yeadon, CUPE Communication (416)559-9300
