Archive for the ‘Child & Family’ Category

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Ontario needs to remove barriers to child-care subsidies for low-income families

Saturday, September 16th, 2023

Ontario’s current implementation plan for child care and early learning agreements runs the risk of leaving disadvantaged families further behind… Inclusivity is explicitly stated as an important goal of the federal government’s Canada-wide early learning and child care initiative… The ultimate solution is publicly funded child care with enough spaces for everyone.

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Canada Child Benefit payments to increase this month for many families. Here’s how much it’s going up

Thursday, July 13th, 2023

Introduced in 2016, the CCB replaced the taxable Universal Child Care Benefit… The CCB is intended to provide increased support to low- and middle-income families with children. Families with an adjusted net income under $34,863 will receive the maximum amount for each child… The federal government indexed the CCB to ensure benefits keep up with inflation.

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Where are the Early Childhood Educators?

Monday, June 26th, 2023

Instead of creating more spaces that may end up unfilled, provincial governments need to prioritize funding on ECE attraction and retention. They need to raise wages, encourage career pathways for ECEs, and fast-track foreign credential recognition. They also need to improve working conditions and offer comprehensive work benefits.

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The criminalization of drugs creates more crime than it prevents

Sunday, June 25th, 2023

Illegal drug use is, always has been, and always will be a public health issue. Legal drugs are consumed to get through life — or simply escape life’s despair. Users inevitably end up addicted. This is a public health issue and instead of treating it as such, we waste incalculable millions trying to treat it as a criminal issue. So why do we not scrap the whole insane criminalization strategy and decriminalize all drugs? Profits. 

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What we can learn from 20 years of the Youth Criminal Justice Act

Wednesday, May 24th, 2023

The passage of the YCJA has resulted in a 95-per-cent decline in youth custodial sentences, while youth carceral facilities have closed across the country… This incredible transformation happened because the YCJA emphasizes restraint at all levels of the criminal justice system, from police intervention to charging, detaining and sentencing, and by using “extrajudicial measures” to divert young people away from the traditional court system.

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Not done yet: $10-a-day child care requires addressing Canada’s child care deserts

Monday, May 22nd, 2023

… child care deserts are a feature of child care provision all across Canada. This reality, which represents the dysfunctional child care market that has developed over time as Canada has, until now, lacked unifying early learning and child care policy and funding… purposeful and rational expansion of public and non-profit licensed child care is a critical next step to ensure that all Canadian families can access the more affordable fees already in play.

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Should we be taking money off Canadians’ paycheques for long-term care?

Thursday, May 4th, 2023

A public — not private — long-term-care insurance program could help pay for costly and unexpected expenses due to ill health or fragility that can be financially devastating… many will spend their later years living on a basic retirement income that likely won’t cover the thousands of dollars needed for health-related services, such as home care from private-pay personal support workers or nursing home “accommodation” co-payment fees. 

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Why bail reform in Ontario is an expensive mistake

Thursday, April 13th, 2023

It costs approximately $302 per day to keep one person in jail in Ontario… Two recent murders show how bail reform misses the mark… The failure here was not the law, but the police failing to use the law… Instead of locking people up to keep us safe on transit, we could put that money into lowering transit fares. Politicians need to look past bail reform and turn their attention toward a solution that actually makes us safer.

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The grieving mother of a murdered teen pleads for a stronger social safety net

Thursday, April 13th, 2023

Expanding the social safety net to address the root causes of crime therefore requires recognizing the vital contributions these organizations make to public safety — and providing them with stable funding to carry out their responsibilities. The vast disparities in government funding between police services and non-police organizations that work directly with people struggling with mental health, chemical dependencies and homelessness indicates that far more must be done to make this happen.

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Troubled life reveals gaps that led to murder

Thursday, April 13th, 2023

Failures of the health care system become problems the criminal justice system is expected to solve, even though it’s ill suited to do so. That said, the criminal justice system does play a role in issuing and enforcing orders for treatment and counselling… The only way we will solve these problems is by making a full-throated commitment to repair our frayed social safety net, to mend the gaps… and protect innocent people.

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