International Family Childcare Association -

National Family Childcare Association

NEWS RELEASE

May 20, 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Private Members Bill C542 – Family fair policies!

Ottawa— The National Family Childcare Associations Private Members Bill
C-542 will be a beginning to supporting all families in times of stress
caused by financial disadvantages through our unfriendly tax system.

“Bill C-542 is created to put the needs of our sick children first and
that is what the NFCA is all about.” explained Sara Landriault,
president the NFCA. “It is great to see a movement towards putting our
children first rather than leaving them with crumbs left over from our
bureaucracy”

Private Members Bill C-542 was created by Gord Brown Leeds- Grenville MP
of the Conservative Party.
Bill C-542 is designed to change the labour code to enhance benefits for
parents with gravely ill children.
This bill will ease the parent’s financial burden while they struggle to
save their child’s life mentally and physically. Bill C542 will allow
parental leave to care for a sick child.
http://www2.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?DocId=3478372&Language=e&Mode=1&File=36#4

The introduction of the Private Members Bill C-542 is a necessary
vehicle for families caring for sick children. Up to now, these families
have struggled to save for their children’s future under the burden of
medical and related costs. Unfortunately, they face such a huge cost
burden compared to many other parents. In some cases these families will
not have home for their sick children to return to after treatment.

“I’ve heard about a mother who spent 2 hours a day in the hospital with
her sick child and left him alone after that. Who could be so heartless
to not be with their child during this critical time, I thought. Well,
this mother was a single mother with no family around and had the threat
of losing her job if she took any time off work. So yah I think twice
now about who the heartless ones truly are”, says
Sara Landriault stay at home mom of 3.

Sharon Ruth and Fiona McKenney have started a movement for sick kids in
Leeds Grenville and would like to see National support for our
children’s needs. Both Sharon and Fiona are passionate and experienced
in advocating for this issue due to the fact they have surviving
children of cancer. The NFCA strongly throws all support into helping
Sharon, Fionna and any other parents of sick children across Canada to
create policy change on a Federal level.

The National Family Childcare Association is a grassroots movement
fighting to bring about policy change that will allow all families the
opportunity and the means to care for their children in a way that fits
their life.
–30–
Further information contact:
Sara Landriault, President
National Family Childcare Association

landriault@ripnet.com

NATIONAL FAMILY CHILDCARE ASSOCIATION

JOB POSTING

As you know Canada lacks in support of stay at home parents, we are fully discriminated against in the tax system and degraded among our peers due to pressure from the governments to release our children to non-profit daycare. The non-profit daycare claim through studies and union funding that non-profit daycare is higher quality than a stay at home parents.
The NFCA feels it is time that we are all equally respected but unfortunately we have no champion. Female MP’s are only dictating childcare as a non-profit daycare, and other MP’s do not believe that stay at home parents are a necessity in Canada’s economic growth. The NFCA is strongly searching for an MP who will stand up and be our CHAMPION.

Wanted:

Position:
Champion of Stay at home parents!

Qualifications:

Standing Member of Parliament

Either opposition or in government

Location:

Canada

Overall responsibility:

* Publicly demand equality for stay at home parents
* Make speeches in the house of commons regarding stay at home parents equality
* Support income splitting, vouchers and tax credits for stay at home parents
* Policy alternatives to childcare to include all children
* Giving parents a shoulder to cry on.

Duties:

* Media and public relations
* Federal & Provincial relations
* Changing diapers, walking in parks and some cooking

Please send resumes to landriault@ripnet.com or phone 613-720-6609 if you are qualified for this position.

All resumes will be accepted but do to limited time of a stay at home mom, not all applicants will be called back.
–
Thank you,
Sara Landriault
stay at home mom
President, National Family Childcare Association
www.careofthechild.com
www.incomesplitting.org
landriault@ripnet.com
613-720-6609

Call to pay parents to stay at home

Parents should be paid to stay at home and look after their children instead of being forced to return to work, a headteachers’ leader has said.

The current benefits system “entraps” vulnerable families and leaves schools and nurseries to bring up children, according to Clarissa Williams, the new president of the National Association of Head Teachers.

She said it was “chilling” that ministers felt it necessary to produce a “strategy” for play as children had become little more than percentages counting towards Government targets.

Speaking at the NAHT’s annual conference in Liverpool, Ms Williams said she had written to Gordon Brown calling for reforms to the benefits system to allow more parents to stay at home.

“There is a paradox between the current benefits culture which entraps the vulnerable, whilst insisting that all young mothers should find a job, leaving schools and other agencies to bring up the children,” she said.

“Why do we feel the need to send children into an educational environment at the age of two?

“Are parents so distrusted that we want to separate them from their children at the earliest opportunity?”

Ms Williams said “real communication” takes place “at home” around the dinner table, without the distractions of television and video games.

“In my letters to the PM I suggested a more creative approach to the benefits system - one which provides incentives for changing the deficit model of child-rearing; one based on rewarding parents who spend quality time with their children reading and talking to them and turning up to support their children’s schools.”

The NFCA has sent Teacher Associations across Canada this plea,

Press Release by the National Head Teachers Association from the UK

{Parents should be paid to stay at home and look after their children instead of being forced to return to work, a headteachers’ leader has said.
The current benefits system “entraps” vulnerable families and leaves schools and nurseries to bring up children, according to Clarissa Williams, the new president of the National Association of Head Teachers.
She said it was “chilling” that ministers felt it necessary to produce a “strategy” for play as children had become little more than percentages counting towards Government targets.
Speaking at the NAHT’s annual conference in Liverpool, Ms Williams said she had written to Gordon Brown calling for reforms to the benefits system to allow more parents to stay at home.
“There is a paradox between the current benefits culture which entraps the vulnerable, whilst insisting that all young mothers should find a job, leaving schools and other agencies to bring up the children,” she said.
“Why do we feel the need to send children into an educational environment at the age of two?
“Are parents so distrusted that we want to separate them from their children at the earliest opportunity?”
Ms Williams said “real communication” takes place “at home” around the dinner table, without the distractions of television and video games.
“In my letters to the PM I suggested a more creative approach to the benefits system - one which provides incentives for changing the deficit model of child-rearing; one based on rewarding parents who spend quality time with their children reading and talking to them and turning up to support their children’s schools.”}

The National Family Childcare Association wishes to extend its appreciation to the Head Teachers Association in the UK for promoting the advancement of paying parents to childcare their own children.
Canada seems to be behind the times, and many advocates accuse women who are at home with their own children of being a bad influence on the economic society of Canada, we at the NFCA believe that parental choice in childcare is a truly progressive concept for the 21st century around the world.

The National Family Childcare Association would like to invite all teachers associations to join our affiliation and help fight for parents at home as well as daycare situations.
If we pool our resources we may be able achieve goals for all childcare across Canada (please see attached release).

Please contact us for more information.

–
Thank you,
Sara Landriault
stay at home mom
President, National Family Childcare Association

Special needs kids may be forced into foster care

Updated Fri. May. 2 2008 9:26 AM ET

ctvwinnipeg.ca

Government infighting has families in a northern Manitoba community in anguish about how to best care for their children.

The Norway House Cree Nation has told the families of children with special needs that they may be forced to give up their children because the First Nation can no longer pay for their care, and federal and provincial governments can’t agree on who should pay.

For mother Crystal Hart, it means she may have to say good-bye to her daughter, Priscilla.

“I want her to get the services that she can get,” she said while wiping tears from her eyes.

Priscilla Hart has Ritscher-Schinzel Syndrome. She can’t speak or eat and needs to be fed through a tube. She requires constant care from a respite worker who looks after Priscilla when her parents go to work.

The Norway House Cree Nation has been paying for those services, which are required by 37 children on the reserve.

However, the band said the money has run out and the services will end May 31.

“Bureaucracy is what you call a nightmare, I guess,” said band councillor Mike Muswagon. “Trying to get what you can for your community and for your people.”

Muswagon said the First Nation has been fighting for funding from the province and the federal government for years. He said each side argues the other should pay for Status Indian children.

Jordan River Anderson

It’s a familiar story. In 2005, the community rallied around another sick child named Jordan River Anderson.

Jordan spent the first part of his life hooked up to machines in a Winnipeg hospital. When he was two years old, doctors were ready to send him to a medical foster home, but for two years provincial and federal government officials argued over who should pay for it. They couldn’t even decide who would cover the cost of a special showerhead he needed.

Jordan never left the hospital and eventually died in February, 2005. He was five years old.

In December, Members of Parliament in Ottawa vowed never to let that happen again. They unanimously voted in favour of a private members motion called Jordan’s Principle; children should come first when it comes to funding disputes.

On December 12, 2007, Minister of Health Tony Clement wrote this letter of support:

“Indian and Northern Affairs Canada is working closely with Health Canada as well as provincial and First Nations partners to ensure that jurisdictional issues do not impact a child’s quality of care. Governments need to work together to see that First Nations and Inuit children have access to the same services available to other children.”

Native children ’short-changed’

Charlene Ducharme works with the Kinosao Sipi Minisowin Agency, a social agency on the reserve, and said she has yet to see Jordan’s Principle in action. She said the children of Norway House deserve the same care that other Manitoba children get.

“Our premier said Manitoba would be the first one to implement Jordan’s Principle… we’re still waiting.”

In an interview with CTV News, Manitoba Health Minister Keri Irvin Ross said the provincial government is not required to pay for the children’s care. “These issues are a federal responsibility,” she said. “We need to make sure the federal government is held accountable for it, but we are committed to supporting this community and these children.”

But not with any funding. Irvin Ross said the provincial government is offering its support by working with the Norway House Cree Nation in its negotiations with Ottawa. Irvin Ross said the fact that the provincial government is at the negotiating table is “new ground”, and is a signal of its support for Jordan’s Principle. She said the federal government has yet to respond to numerous letters requesting its involvement in finding a solution.

CTV News contacted Indian and Northern Affairs Canada. In an email, Senior Communications Advisor Patricia Valladao said “I was informed that we’ve recently met with our partners including the province on this matter, and we’re working diligently to respond on an urgent basis. We will be meeting with the First Nation very soon.”

Neither the federal or provincial response is very reassuring for the Harts. Little Priscilla’s parents said they may quit their jobs to care for her. They said they’ll find a way to make it work and keep their family together.

With a report from CTV’s Caroline Barghou