Austerity Measures in Daycares Continue to Anger

Minister Nicole Leger

The battle between private daycares and the government continues, as they demand the resignation of Family Minister Nicole Léger. However, for one of her position, her behavior is not quite family-friendly toward those she represents.

The Marois Government is deciding to make $15 million in cuts in order to add 28,000 seats to daycares, which will in turn cost a large daycare operator an additional $28,000 per year. This might also force the businesses to cut staff members, which will reduce services. So far, unions are unsatisfied in how the minister has proceeded in refusing to negotiate with the members, eerily mirroring the exact methods the Parti Québécois were against by banging pots and pans with students barely a year ago.

Minister Léger told the media, "The negotiations are over, so I'm moving on to other things. Parents waiting for spaces [in the daycares] and I'm working on that. I will adopt the fiscal measures."

Sylvain Lévesque, president of the Private Daycares Association said, “We invest $2 million to open a daycare of 80 children; it's not from the pocket of the taxpayers.” Him along with other private daycares plan on organizing more protests as well as legal challenges, after battling for three months now.

However, they will not have another strike, as unfortunately, the last time resulted in businesses being fined $800 thousand in penalties.

The issue in this situation is not so much the cuts themselves, but who the cuts target. When budget cuts target children, the elderly, education funding, social services or the vulnerable of society, this is when issues arise. These are the resources the middle class require the most, yet we see these careless actions both provincially and federally.

Remember Prime Minister Harper making spending cuts to the CBC?

How about the spending cuts to universities that have been made for the past thirty years, causing tuition to skyrocket all across the country? Or the cuts the Marois Government made to Quebec universities several months ago, hurting our beloved education system yet again?

Did I fail to mention the cuts to welfare, where another member, Minister Agnès Maltais, also refused to negotiate?

These are all austerity measures, and while necessary, they are being done in all the wrong places.

Daycare workers can protest, wear whatever felt square they please and the Family Minister will not blink an eye because primarily, toddlers learning their ABC’s can’t stand up for themselves. The fact daycare workers won’t strike due to fines works exactly in their favor.

In a correction to an early article written last year, the Parti Québécois does not represent women, or families. In fact, the only reason there is constant yelling in the National Assembly amongst the PLQ opposition is because of one theory:

A quote from the book Malignant Self Love: Narcissism Revisited by Dr. Sam Vatkin, states, “We reserve our most virulent emotions - aggression, hatred, and envy - towards those who resemble us the most. We feel threatened not by the Other with whom we have little in common - but by the 'nearly-we', who mirror and reflect us.”

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