Canada

After all the childcare wars in Canada, all the promises, debates, golden pie in the sky, here is the final decision:

Feds Cancel Day-care Funding Plan
Last updated Feb 24 2006 09:03 AM EST CBC News

The federal government has officially terminated a day-care funding agreement with the provinces that would have sent $1.9 billion to Ontario over five years.

The deal will be replaced by a direct funding plan that will give $100 a month to families of young children.

In a letter sent out this week, Diane Finley, minister of human resources and social development, said Ontario would only get another $250 million of the money promised by Ottawa when Paul Martin's Liberal party was in power.

Mary Anne Chambers, provincial minister of children and youth services, says she tried to talk to Finley about the decision, but her call wasn't returned.

"What does that say about their attitude to parents in Ontario, who have said they need that kind of help?" Chambers said. "I would not be taking an autocratic approach to this conversation."

Chambers said the decision to cancel the deal would leave some 25,000 Ontario day-care spaces in limbo.

She noted some of those spaces are in Finley's own Haldimand-Norfolk riding.

"Actually, the minister has in her own riding 165 of those spaces," Chambers said. "I wonder what she's saying to her constituents."

Despite Chambers's criticism, cancellation of the funding deal came as no surprise.

During the election campaign that brought him to power in January, Prime Minister Stephen Harper promised to replace the provincial funding plan signed by his predecessor with the direct subsidy to parents.