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Malcolm Allen is the NDP Member for Welland and he made the following statement last week in the House of Commons in Ottawa:

Malcolm's Statement on Child Care, Fri 13 Mar 2009, http://malcolmallen.ndp.ca/node/83

"Mr. Speaker, thousands of workers are finding themselves unemployed or facing unemployment and the cold response from the government to the needs of Canadian families will unfortunately be felt largely by the most vulnerable: our children.

It is time that the Conservative government stopped peddling the $100-a-month child care benefit as a national universal child care program.
By driving almost half a million Ontarians into poverty the recession demands a sense of urgency from the government, if not a moral imperative to help those who cannot support themselves and their children.

Families need child care services. People cannot work or retrain for new jobs without them. Families living on low incomes spend every extra penny they receive just to survive, and this includes the $100-a-month child care benefit that most often goes to putting food on the table to feed their family.

Unlike the Conservative government, New Democrats will not turn our backs on the children of Canada. We will continue to fight and enact our early learning and child care act and establish the first truly universal child care and early learning program in Canada.

New Democrats gave us medicare. New Democrats will give us early child care."