[...]
Ignatieff acknowledged, however, that delivering on a national child-care program will be difficult if Canada remains mired in deficit — a condition that Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has already forecast to last another five years.
"How you phase it in depends on what these guys leave in the till — and they've spent the cupboard bare," Ignatieff said. "It's a very clear commitment... It's a legacy issue for the Liberal party."
Not that this is a bad idea. Far from it. But it takes me back to the old days, when Kurt Cobain was still alive and I could go to a rock show and not feel like I was a leering old perv, or that the youth of today ought to be smacked in the head for their nose-rings and tattoos and stupid green hair.
In short, the Liberal party has been promising a national health-care program for the majority of my adult life (even down to the "we'll only do it if finances permit" escape clause). Again, not that that's necessarily bad--Conservatives haven't changed their message since Og clubbed Thag with a stone axe--but if anyone sneakily suspects that nothing will come of it just like all the other times the same promise has been made, well, their cynicism is understandable.
29 comments:
The next time maybe they'll think smaller...a very limited program geared to lower income (either single-parent or two working parents) families in urban areas where the absence of decent childcare has all kinds of negative economic and social consequences. I'm sure they could fund that by simply axing the Conservatives' stupid baby bonus program.
I've given up thinking we'll ever have the kind of economy again where it's affordable for one parent to stay home or a culture in which competitive consumption isn't the major factor in how people decide how much money the need.
National child care will always suffer from the fatal flaw it has always had in that it penalizes stay at home parents. Increasing the Child Tax Benefit would be more productive and give parents increased flexibility.
If Iggy keeps flailing long enough though, I'm sure he'll find some issue that's relevant to Canadians' current concerns.
You said it perfect Paul S. Increasing the Child Tax Benefit is fair and cheaper for the country as a whole.
National child care will always suffer from the fatal flaw it has always had in that it penalizes stay at home parents.
Why does it penalise them? Because someone else is getting something?
Stay-at-home parents don't *need* childcare.
It's obvious Ti-guy that conservatisms underpinnings are just greed. They view a program they have no need for as a penalty. Implying punishment. What punishment? It's fairly obvious it's only greed. Cut them a cheque which then gets clawed back( a real penalty) and they shut up. They love bribing so much they even are doing it with stimulus spending. Disgusting. Even more so since they are so moralistic with others.
Your comment makes no sense Ti.
You decry our consumerist culture yet want to penalize parents willing to give up career to raise their children.
Many parents want to stay at home but can not afford to. Liberal policy would force those parents to keep working instead of providing them with options.
It's obvious Ti-guy that conservatisms underpinnings are just greed. - Jay
Yeah, conservatives want to have the option to stay at home and raise their kids. Greedy bastards.
Enlightened Liberals, on the other hand, want to create a massive bureaucracy through higher taxes and then force all parents into a one-size-fits-all solution irregardless of what is best for the child.
And interestingly, the Liberal solution provides zero assistance to stay at home parents but demands they still pay higher taxes. Cause Liberals have the best interests of children in mind, right?
Yup, those conservatives are all about greed.
Ya, fair, uh, huh. Give a millionaire $100 a month, give a struggling family $100 month. That millionaire really needs my taxpayer money.
Liberal policy would force those parents to keep working instead of providing them with options.
Great, another Conservative that wants welfare for thee...
Enlightened Liberals, on the other hand, want to create a massive bureaucracy through higher taxes and then force all parents into a one-size-fits-all solution irregardless of what is best for the child.
Obviously someone that does not look beyond his backyard border to see what is available in Quebec...
(That would be a mix of private, public and stay at home options)
"Ya, fair, uh, huh. Give a millionaire $100 a month, give a struggling family $100 month. That millionaire really needs my taxpayer money."
Unless your a millionaire yourself they pay more in taxes then you make so I highly doubt it's your tax money.
You decry our consumerist culture yet want to penalize parents willing to give up career to raise their children.
Why is raising children a penalty?
Many parents want to stay at home but can not afford to.
Why can't they afford to? Seems to me they should think about that before they start having children.
It's obvious Ti-guy that conservatisms underpinnings are just greed.
I don't know. I think in this instance, it's just a bunch of blowhards from Alberta opposing another federal program because that's what they do.
"I don't know. I think in this instance, it's just a bunch of blowhards from Alberta opposing another federal program because that's what they do."
As opposed to a bunch of socialist trying to ram more government involvement down our throats?
There's that "ramming it down the throat" fantasy again.
Why is raising children a penalty?
Why is a national daycare program a good idea?
Why can't they afford to? Seems to me they should think about that before they start having children.
Yeah, I really wish Liberals thought that way too.
Great, another Conservative that wants welfare for thee... - Cherniak WTF
Iggy floated this trial balloon. He's all yours.
Paul, your comment is an unsophisticated attempt to avoid admitting the fact that your argument cannot be substantiated. Your failure to explain how a national daycare program "punishes" stay t home parents pretty much speaks for itself.
Gail, it appears that progressives and Liberals alike still do not understand why the Lib's previous push for a national daycare plan went down in flames.
I would have thought that a few years on the opposition benches would have caused Liberals to perform a sober reassessment of their policies.
That Liberals are again promoting the same fatally flawed daycare program suggests they haven't absorbed the correct reasons why it failed in the past.
What Ti-Guy and Paul S. said.
A national daycare program makes it very clear that you are a rube if you stay at home with your children for any length of time.
Just as we're realizing the importance of parents (not just mothers) being a strong part of their children's lives, the LPC wants to move backwards and assure that we spend less time with our children at their most formative years.
Ignatieff is continuing to show his complete lack of contact with reality when he's championing a daycare program which will pay for the three children of the dentist's trophy wife to be looked after while she's taking pilaga classes.
This conservative would fully support a program that allowed for parents with incomes under a reasonable level full and complete subsidy. I would much rather have a parent giving their children a roll-model of someone working and bettering themselves, regardless of the cost.
However - the problem is that the grand Liberal scheme isn't just to provide child care, it's to create an "appropriate" child care program, with "appropriate" training of child care workers who fully embrase Hillary Clinton's suggestion that children are best raised by the community. And for them, it just wouldn't be fair if ALL children didn't have that same, uh, "education".
I think they had the same concept in Nazi Germany. Didn't work out so well.
And yet again Paul, you fail to answer the question. Rob did a little better, though I seem to recall the LPC plan would NOT have provided subsidized day care for the wealthy, and yet still no one wants to back up the assertion that a nationalized day care plan punishes stay at home mothers.
Though I particularly love Rob's condemmnation of the requirement for appropriate day care. Much better we subsidize daycare without having any standards at all.
Hey, why should we care what happens to all those kids unfortunate enough to be born into poor families?
I think they had the same concept in Nazi Germany. Didn't work out so well.
Guess you never heard of Godwin's Law.
. . .and yet still no one wants to back up the assertion that a nationalized day care plan punishes stay at home mothers. - Gayle
Gayle, it must be a blind spot in Liberals that they can not see the defects afflicting Mr. Ignatieff's proposal. I'll try again.
Parents who pursue two careers and two incomes will be rewarded with lavish daycare subsidies under Mr. Ignatieff's plan.
Parents who decide to make the financial sacrifice by giving up their job to stay at home with their children not only lose their second income but receive no assistance under the Liberal's plan.
Families in remote rural areas, of which there are millons of Canadians, while paying the higher taxes for daycare, will lose out also.
The Liberal plan is so rigid it also denies any opportunity for single parents who have some income outside of employment who want to stay at home with their children. Instead, these parents would be forced into the workforce during the critical child development years.
Does that make it any clearer? I am surprised by the rigidity of the Liberal's plan, especially after it failed so spectacularly under PM Martin.
The Liberal's plan still has the whiff (stench?) of elitism that their previous plan did where "experts" supportive of the Liberal proposal could barely stop themselves from saying that their expertise in the raising of our children was superior to natural parenting. Then there was Scott Reid's infamous "beer and popcorn" comment.
And I still haven't mentioned how Mr. Ignatieff's proposal infringes on the constitutional rights of provinces.
The Liberal's plan puts Canadian parents into a straitjacket regarding their choices, would be prohibitively expensive, and doesn't meet the needs of Canadian children. But somehow, I still don't think Liberals and their supporters will get it.
No Paul you would probably get through to a deaf blind mute before you got through to a liberal with visions of another goverment program in thier eyes.
Try again? This is the first attampt at an explanation.
Using your logic, you would have to agree the current plan punishes poor people who cannot afford to have one parent stay at home, or punishes single parents. Having any plan at all clearly punishes all we taxpayers who do not have children. Hell, according to your logic those of us who do not venture out of cities are punished by the use of our tax dollars to address rural concerns, and vice versa.
Or, we could be smart about this and try to find a plan that addresses the people who have the greatest need. But that is not what you are concerned aboout now, is it.
Families in remote rural areas, of which there are millons of Canadians,
No there aren't. Stop lying or at least try and get basic matters of fact straight.
Roughly 30% of Canadians live in rural areas. By my math that would be over 9 million.
Roughly 30% of Canadians live in rural areas.
Where did you get that statistic?
Paul S. qualified his rural population further as also remote. I seriously doubt there are millions of Canadians in that category.
Ti-Guy your lack of knowledge about your own counrty is pathetic.
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