SCYR Committee Meeting

SUB-COMMITTEE ON CHILDREN AND YOUTH AT RISK OF THE STANDING COMMITTEE ON HUMAN RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT AND THE STATUS OF PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES

SOUS-COMITÉ SUR LES ENFANTS ET JEUNES À RISQUE DU COMITÉ PERMANENT DES RESOURCES HUMAINES ET DE LA CONDITION DES PERSONNES HANDICAPÉES

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Wednesday, May 31, 2000

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[English]

The Chair (Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.)): Welcome to this session on parenting. This is part of a larger study that the Subcommittee on Children and Youth at Risk is undertaking. I might just spend a minute to give you a bit of context.

What the subcommittee is doing this year is looking at two of the elements that were mentioned in the government's Speech from the Throne last fall. There were actually seven elements all together, but we're focusing on a couple where we think we can add value, because the thinking on the two points we're looking at has not been fully developed, as we understand it, by the government.

One of them doesn't concern us—well, it does concern us actually. Both points come through very clearly.

One stream of our work has been on the whole subject of the work-family balance, how we help families achieve that balance and how we help companies and Canadians generally to do that. So that does relate to our subject of parenting very much today.

The other is the whole issue of where the community fits in in terms of supporting families with children. How can action at the community level improve outcomes?

You will recall that the Prime Minister—the Governor General in his name—said that the Government of Canada was looking to work out with the provinces a national action plan by December 2000 on early childhood development strategy at the community level. But all of this is contingent on the provinces and the feds agreeing to this. They'd have to agree on principles, objectives, outcomes, and fiscal parameters over a five-year period.

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So part of our work is trying to understand what that would actually mean on the ground for parents and families.

Those are the two themes that have brought us together. We're delighted you're here. We apologize.... I don't know whether you heard all the complexities of our life yesterday?

Do they even know what they missed?

The Clerk of the Committee: It's best they not know.

The Chair: No, they don't know.

You have no idea what you nearly were put through, but suffice it to say that under the arcane rules of this place, when you're a subcommittee of the main committee, the main committee has the right to dislodge you. The main committee were working on a big report and were about to invoke their bullying primacy, if I may put it that way, and we might have found ourselves meeting at 5 p.m—or who knows.

Anyway, they got through the report, we're right on schedule, and you don't even know what we were about to ask you.

Let me begin by welcoming a guest. I want to recognize very much the role that our colleague Eric Lowther from the Alliance has played in this. I want to thank Mark Genuis for coming the distance that he has. It's a considerable sacrifice. And I want to thank Eric for proposing him.

We're most intrigued to hear from you because we've been reading the newspapers, and we've read of this new meta-analysis, or an updating of a meta-analysis, I suppose, and we want to hear from you directly on this subject.

So welcome, Dr. Genuis.

Mr. Eric Lowther (Calgary Centre, Canadian Alliance): Before we get on, I have a point of order, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: Sure.

Mr. Eric Lowther: And my apologies to Dr. Genuis.

Regarding the mechanics that got us here today—and I don't know if I'll have an opportunity to bring this up again later before we have to adjourn—my office particularly was not aware that this meeting would be going on today and that we'd have Dr. Genuis before us until very late notice, as far as I know. I just request that we have a little more lead time on these things—and I know we have two members here.

The Chair: We're hoping that others will be able to join us.

Mr. Eric Lowther: I'm just voicing a concern—

The Chair: Sure.

Mr. Eric Lowther: —about the mechanics around this. I realize the subcommittee has additional challenges over a main committee, but particularly as you get close to the end of the session there are challenges on our schedules, and these sorts of last-minute things put together, I think, limit the effectiveness of what we get out of the witnesses. Also, it's very difficult to schedule to be here. I had to reschedule my own agenda for today once I found out what the plan was. I guess I'm whining a bit here, but I'm hoping you're going to take note of it and I won't have to do it again.

The Chair: Let me reiterate. I think it might be useful to ask our researcher to remind us of how we've tried to develop the work plan. I'm not quite sure about the lack of notice, but we've been under somewhat challenging conditions.

Do you want to just review when we developed the overall strategy?

Ms. Julie Mackenzie (Committee Researcher): Certainly. If you remember, we did have a meeting on future business where this particular meeting was proposed.

The Chair: How long ago was that?

Ms. Julie Mackenzie: That was the first week in April, I believe.

The Chair: Did we know this was going to be the witness at that time?

Ms. Julie Mackenzie: This was the proposed schedule. It was either the week before...I think we were bumped already by the standing committee one time, so everything was shifted back one week. So this session was originally proposed for last week.

But since about the beginning of May, this has been proposed as being for May 31. The complication was the schedule of the main committee, and we weren't sure we were going to get through the report on the main committee until about 6 p.m. last night. So that's why the formal notice didn't go out until this morning.

Mr. Eric Lowther: When did we know Dr. Genuis was going to be before us today?

The Chair: We took your suggestion, actually.

Mr. Eric Lowther: But when did we have the confirmation it would be this week?

Ms. Julie Mackenzie: I don't know when the formal notice went out. That goes through the clerk's office.

The Chair: I guess the challenge is that we had agreed we would try to invite these guests. So I guess the working assumption was that we would invite them. I see your point, because obviously we've had a communications breakdown. Maybe what we need to do is circulate informally to members a list of—

Mr. Eric Lowther: A work schedule would be great.

The Chair: Yes. We had the work schedule going back to April, but if we can have a little degree of informality in giving heads up.... Agreed?

Ms. Julie Mackenzie: Okay.

The Chair: Would that help?

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Mr. Eric Lowther: Not just an announcement in the committee, but actually a chart or a handout or something.

The Chair: Sure.

We agree with the point. I'm sorry if there's been a failure to communicate, particularly since it's your guest. Anyway, we welcome you. By the way, we also welcome Madame St-Jacques from the Conservative Party.

[Translation]

We are always happy to see her.

Doctor Genuis.

Mr. Mark Genuis (Executive Director, National Foundation for Family Research and Education): Thank you for inviting me to present the empirical information from the National Foundation for Family Research and Education.

Today I will be speaking about the care of pre-school aged children by their parents or by others.

[English]

In the letter I was asked to address generally two topics within ten minutes. It usually takes me twenty minutes to introduce a topic, so I will be slightly challenged today. One of them is the state of the family and the second one is, as the chair has mentioned, the issue in the newspaper, an updated meta-analysis on the issues of parental versus non-parental care internationally and the impacts on child development.

I'll state up front that the objectives of the information and the recommendations and the concept we present would be as follows, and I think it's critical to understand at the beginning. First of all, they would be the respect and dignity of the child primarily and child development; the respect and dignity for parents; the respect and dignity of the family as a whole and as a unit; and societal development.

We would hope to maximize options for parents and families in Canadian society and aspire to the greatest good for the children in Canada, for their most positive, healthiest development.

Given the objectives aforementioned, I'll start in just a little bit on the state of the family. Canada has a long history of strength of family. In all regions of our country, it has developed phenomenal strength and greatness in our nation. Unfortunately, though, we've seen some very significant and great shifts over the past 40 years.

Through some work with Statistics Canada, we would present a few numbers. For children prior to adolescence, 10 to 14 years of age in Canada, since 1955 we have an increase of 1,367% in pre-teen suicide. This is not suicide ideation and these are not attempts. This is an increase in real deaths of pre-teen children in Canada.

We have the third-highest rate of teen suicide in the industrialized world. Understand that for family breakdown in Canada, for every 10 marriages yearly, we have 4.6 to 5 divorces. That's for people being married between the ages of 20 and 49. We choose those ages because those are really the primary child-bearing and -rearing years in one's life.

I also had an interview a number of months ago with the Minister for the Status of Women, who in the interview twice reiterated to me that we have many families in Canada who are living in a manner other than that which they would choose or that which they would prefer. She argued that there are many families in Canada who are currently dual-income families with pre-school children who would prefer to be single-income families should they have a bit more of an economic opportunity.

When we take a look at the state of the family, we find some very challenging issues. Certainly there are many strong families, many great families in Canada. There are many long-standing and new families who are contributing tremendously to our society. But we have an increasing trend of challenges that as a psychologist or a scientist I would say represent increasing pathology within the family that we must pay attention to. The reason we must pay attention to it is that we're now seeing the societal effects.

This goes beyond the warm fuzzies of the relationship within the family; this goes to the fact that now people are affecting the society around them and people are not living the lives they would otherwise choose to live. So we have relationship breakdowns and personal breakdowns, leading to increased challenges within the society.

In the North American free trade area, for example, in significant part due to family stress, we now have more than $60 billion being spent on stress leave annually. That only includes three weeks or more of stress leave. That doesn't include short-term leave; that doesn't include retraining; that doesn't include lost productivity and so forth.

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Again, to make the point and not to belabour it too much, we have some of these challenges going forward and increasing. I would submit that they need some significant attention.

With regard to the child care issue and the meta-analysis that I'll present, we would present them within the context of a couple of questions. First, what child care options are in the absolute best interests of the child, of the children of Canada? I stress this point because it's the interests of children that we are responsible for as parents and as a society. Their healthiest, most positive and secure development must be our primary goal because it's our primary responsibility.

We can talk about many other issues with regard to convenience, care, business, lack of choices, and so forth. Our primary focus has to be what is the best opportunity for positive and healthy and secure development for children who will then grow up to contribute positively and in a very helpful manner to society. This is, I would submit, far and away the most important thing we must aspire to as a government, as a society, and as individual families.

So that's the first question we ask. What child care options are in the best interests of the children of Canada?

Secondly, of course, how do we as a society build a system that recognizes this option and provides maximum opportunity for parents to make these choices that are in the best interests of the children? I would submit that we are in no position to tell people how to live their lives. We're in no position to try to direct people's lives, but we would be perhaps in a position, once we understand what the best options for children and for healthy development are, to try to make these options as available as possible for people to choose.

What is the best option for children? As our chairman said, recently there has been a fair bit of media around a study that the National Foundation for Family Research and Education was involved in. What we did was this. This is a little bit on what a meta-analysis is. We're all familiar with literature reviews. We take a number of studies, review them, and write about them. We can talk about individual studies.

Well, for a long time now we've been doing what we call meta-analyses as the next level of rigour in science. It removes the biases, well-intended as they may be, that are inherent in any individual studies and in any literature reviews. We take all of the published research in the world in a particular field and we make sure we include the research that meets a minimum standard of rigour. So it has to be reasonably good work to get in. We apply some specific standardizing mathematics to it and then we re-analyse the results of this work as a large study.

What that does again is it removes bias. It includes a phenomenal increase in the numbers of subjects that are involved and it meets important criteria of rigour, because these studies are already published and meet specific standards. If we want to talk about going to objective truth, it's far more objective and far more rigorous than any other study or group of studies that exists.

What do we find in this meta-analysis, which is now, I believe, the fifth one of its kind conducted in this area of study? What we find is that parents are not easily replaced. What we find is that parental care, time and time again, is the healthiest structure for a child to grow up in during their preschool years. We find that parents, while making many mistakes, overall provide a much healthier environment for children. They produce better results than non-parental care does overall.

This is not to say that all children in day care grow up to have tremendous problems. That's just not true. What we find is that children who are in regular non-parental care for 25 hours a week or more in the preschool years are challenged significantly more than other children are in four specific important areas of development. One of them, which I would argue is the most important, is the issue of the bond that a child forms with her or his parents. We find them much more likely to develop secure bonds. The reason I would say the bonds are the most important is that the bond that a child forms, that attachment, has a tremendous influence on their emotional and behavioural development as they grow.

Other areas that we studied included behavioural development, cognitive development, and socio-emotional development.

In this particular area of work, that's fine, it's wonderful, parents may be great, but one has to ask about the issue of high-quality day care. We've talked about standards. We've talked about quality. Everybody is studying quality now, and many people have tried to move beyond. It's not an issue of parental or non-parental; it's an issue of how good the quality of the non-parental care is.

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When we study all of the research from all over the world and analyse it objectively, I'm sorry to tell you the findings come out exactly the same: our current definitions of high-quality day care, as much as we have tried to bring them in, provide no significant difference in the outcome for these children as compared to children who grow up in parental care. That's a very challenging finding for all of us in today's society, but it also is reality, the best scientists can figure out now.

So we would submit to you that parental care is an option that must be taken very seriously and must be provided for in the range of options when government is considering policy. There are a number of ways to do that, which I would be pleased to address later on, if you are interested. But the bottom line of the information is, if we ask what is the best option for children in this country, if we're choosing between developing children or developing industries, we must say the children must come ahead of the non-parental care industry.

If we're going to invest in children, we must invest in the parental opportunity to choose to provide direct full-time care for children, which would see them separated overall for less than 20 to 25 hours a week on a regular basis during the preschool years. Of course it's the family's choice. This is a free country. What I'm arguing is this must be within the list of opportunities the government sees as a top priority for the family in Canada if children truly are our greatest resource. That's simply the data.

And that's my time. I'm open to your questions.

The Chair: Thank you for being so...[Technical Difficulty—Editor].

At this point I'm going to call on Carol Crill Russell from the Invest in Kids Foundation, simply because her foundation—and I think she is the director of research there—has also come out in fairly recent times with a major piece of research on parenting. These do not overlap, but there is some common ground. So I would invite Carol Crill Russell to speak to us now.

Dr. Carol Crill Russell (Vice-President, Research and Programs, Invest in Kids Foundation): I'm going to present the results of a national survey we did a year ago January. Hard copies of the overheads are in the materials before you. I'm going to speak very quickly, because you have in front of you hard copies of the findings from our survey.

We conducted a survey of Canadian parents with at least one child under the age of 6, featuring over 1,645 households that included 245 single mothers, 700 fathers, and 700 mothers and were representative of English and French Canada, income groups, and the regions of Canada. We wanted to find out how much parents with young children actually know about parenting, how confident they are of their ability to do a good job in parenting, and how supported they feel in their role.

Of the parents, 92% mostly agreed with the statement, “Being a parent is the most important thing I can do”, so it's clear that parents highly value their role. But we wanted to find out how much they know about child development, so we created a little test of information about child development. We found out their knowledge about child development is what we call a mile wide and an inch deep.

Parents know babies are learning from the moment they're born; 85% of parents knew that was true for certain. That's the mile-wide part. But when we come to the rest of it, we find out parents don't know the basic facts about fostering healthy development.

When we ask things such as, “True or false? Parents' emotional closeness with their baby can strongly influence that child's intellectual development”, we're down to only 50% of parents knowing that's true for certain.

“If a baby does not receive appropriate stimulation by being read to, played with, or touched and held, his or her brain will not develop as well as the brain of a baby who does receive these kinds of stimulation.” Again, we're down to about 50% knowing that for certain.

“The things a child experiences before the age of 3 will greatly influence his or her ability to do well.” We're down to about a third of the parents knowing for sure that's true.

“Every baby is born with a certain level of intelligence, which cannot be either increased or decreased by how parents interact with him or her.” Only 30% knew for sure that was false.

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And the numbers keep dropping. I'm not going to go through every one of these, because we don't have that much time, but you can see the numbers fall off to even down below 10% for, “Intellectual development is the most important part of being ready for school.” This is false, and yet only 8% of parents knew that for certain.

So we found out most parents are certain that babies are learning from the moment they're born, but only about half of parents are certain that the stimulation and nurturing they provide influences how babies and young children grow and learn socially, emotionally, and intellectually, and very few parents are certain about brain development and its relationship to mental health or the intellectual development of their young children.

So while parents recognize the importance of their role, they often don't really know what to do. Parents feel they have the most knowledge over the part of development where they think they have the least amount of influence, and that is physical development.

When we asked parents, “What area of development do you have the least knowledge about: physical, emotional, social, or intellectual development?”, about a third of the parents rated emotional or social or intellectual development as the area where they had the least knowledge. But when we asked, “Where do you have the most influence?”, again we found it was in the areas where they have the least knowledge.

So we see parents are not sure what signs to look for to tell them their infant or young child is healthy or about right for his or her age; their knowledge about physical development is low, and their knowledge about social and emotional development is even lower; and parents feel they have the most influence over emotional development, but this is the area where they have the least knowledge.

Furthermore, we find that below the surface, many parents are unsure and insecure. We asked parents to rate whether they agreed with these types of statements. “I find it hard to understand my child's feelings and needs.” One out of three mostly agreed with that. “I lack confidence in my parenting skills”—one out of two. “I don't know how to handle difficult situations with my child”—one out of two.

And after their first baby was born, they felt even more insecure. “I felt afraid of doing something wrong”—two out of three. “I felt unsure about what to do a lot of the time”—two out of three. “I felt afraid of not being a good parent.”

But parents are hungry for knowledge. When we asked them if they agreed that “There's always room for improvement in parenting skills”, 90% of them said they mostly agreed with that. “Before our first baby was born, I tried to prepare for parenthood by reading, seeking advice, etc.”—70% mostly agreed with that. “I would be interested in learning more about brain development and how young children learn”—65% said they mostly agreed with that.

So while parents claim they know how to make their children develop fully, underneath they're unsure of their skills, their children's feelings and needs, and how to handle difficult situations. Parents are especially insecure around the birth of their first child, but parents want to know more to improve their parenting skills.

Furthermore, we found parents do not feel supported in their parenting responsibility. When we said, “When I first became a parent, I felt I received enough emotional support”, only 50% of the parents agreed with that. “When I first became a parent, I felt I received enough practical support”—again, only 50% of the parents agreed with that. But even more disturbing to us is that when we said, “I think Canada values its young children”, only 40% of the parents agreed with that statement. So only 40% of parents think Canada values its young children.

To summarize, when put to the test, parents seem to lack basic knowledge about child development; parents think they have the most influence in the area of emotional development, where they have the least knowledge; beneath the surface, parents are insecure and unsure about parenting; parents do not generally feel supported when their first baby arrives; and only 40% of parents with at least one child under the age of 6 think Canada values its young children.

So we need to create a climate supportive of healthy child development. Parents cannot do this alone. We have to work together to do this. And we need to fill the parents' knowledge and skill gap. We think more knowledge and skills will drive increased confidence in application.

I'll just give a quick summary. Parents need a lot more support. There is a feeling in Canada among parents with young children that the role they do is not valued and that they need more support than they're getting.

The Chair: Well, my goodness! That was also an extremely efficient presentation, and I thank you for it.

It seems to me we're in the midst of a paradox here. We have one study that reveals that parents seem to do the best job, and another one that says the parents are not certain they're doing it.

To resolve this contradiction—that's a bit of a set-up—I would invite Kerry McCuaig to speak to us.

Voices: Oh, oh!

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Ms. Kerry McCuaig (Executive Director, Better Child Care Education): In answering the question that was in the letter, I looked at the national longitudinal study on children. One of the most telling figures there was that the poorest outcomes for children are associated with depressed mothers.

As much as we may like to separate the child from the family, we can't get around the fact that the well-being of the child is tied extremely closely to the well-being of the parents, particularly the well-being of the mother. So as we make choices for children, we also have to take into account the way that public policy impacts on other members of the family, particularly the mother, if we really want to be concerned about outcomes for kids.

I'm going to come at this from a larger public policy perspective and take it down to the community level. If we look at what kids need, they need a mix of public policy responses. The first one is income. It's very difficult to be a good parent if you don't have enough money to raise your kids.

When we come to the Canadian situation, we have a few unflattering distinctions as a country.

The major cause of child poverty used to be parental unemployment. Now poverty is largely due to low wages and insecure jobs. This is particularly telling because not only do we have an income gap in terms of our population, but we're having an age gap, where we see that, more and more, young families are falling into the category of being in low-wage and insecure jobs.

We are one of the few industrialized countries that does not have a universal child benefit.

We have a very high rate of child poverty.

We have a tax system that makes no universal distinction between families with dependent children and those without.

Those in themselves would indicate that Canada needs policies that support the development of decent jobs along with tax and income supports that recognize the cost of raising a family. It's infinitely more difficult to raise children, healthy children, without decent housing.

A second thing that families need is time. Parents need time with their children. An important part of any family package is maternity and parental leave. While the budget indicated a positive step in this direction, the leave could be more flexible, to allow mothers to return to work part-time. Eligibility should be expanded to include the majority of new mothers and parents who cannot access employment insurance. The benefit levels actually must be high enough so that parents can afford to take the leave.

In addition, workplace policies must recognize the unique needs of parents with young children. Quebec is the only province with statutory family leave, and the market has not filled the legislative vacuum elsewhere.

Most workplaces make no accommodation for parents, and those that do.... I think that's the interesting thing. You can find a list of companies who will track out their family friendly policies, but when you actually talk to the HR people in those companies, you'll find that they don't use them, that the culture of the workplace is such that if you do take advantage of the family friendly policies, you're not a good worker. This is particularly true for fathers.

To give you one example, Ontario Hydro, a big corporation, has had—

Mr. Peter Adams (Peterborough, Lib.): A former big corporation.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: Well, when it was a very large corporation, it instituted parental leave. Fathers could take up to four weeks' leave. There have been four fathers in the 15-year history who have ever taken it.

Family friendly policies that nobody takes to aren't very family friendly.

In terms of public policy, the final thing that families require are age-appropriate services.

I'd now like to turn my attention to child care as a family support. There is, I think, with the exception of what Dr. Genuis has presented to us, a very wide and broad body of research. Most of it, by the way, is North American; I think we should flag that.

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A colleague of mine, Peter Moss, who's the chair at the European Commission for child care, makes the interesting distinction that 95% of the child care research that is done in the developed countries is done by North Americans, mainly Americans. The Europeans really don't interest themselves in doing that much research. They just do it. Those countries that tend not to do it tend to study it. That is an interesting distinction.

Child care, despite its detractors, just seems to be this issue that doesn't go away. It goes up on the public agenda and down, but it's there because it is.... And I don't know if you've seen my colleague Martha Friendly's circle that she has developed about child care services being at the centre of public policy. They're at the centre because they simultaneously answer a number of important factors, and in terms of families, they do address the question of child and family poverty. There are a number of studies that show that a major barrier to parent participation in the workforce, to parents' ability to upgrade skills, rests on their inability to find adequate, affordable child care.

There are a number of other studies that show that lone mothers wanting to make transitions into the workplace cannot make those transitions if they cannot find child care. It's not just that they can't find child care, because there is plenty of public policy out there that will help them find child care, but that they cannot find child care environments where they're comfortable leaving their children. Those mothers tend not to complete their training program or tend not to maintain the employment they do get because the child care is inadequate.

Child care is also a very important aspect of the work-family balance. It's assumed that because there's so very little licensed child care that the majority of children are with relatives or with babysitters. In fact, the majority of working families provide their own child care: 40% of all child care is provided by parents who off-shift. That means she works days and he works afternoons or nights.

In our research, what we found in interviewing parents in those situations was that there were couples who had one day a month where they actually were together as a family. They described it as “serial single parenting”, where any communication took place with a note pinned to the door. I mean, that's the way parenting took place. I think we're all appalled by the stress that's on families. Well, I can't think of any greater stress. You do that for five or six years while you're raising a family and you come to the end of it and you look across the table on your one day a month at your partner wondering who you are. I think that says a lot about the stresses that are on families because of a neglect in public policy.

There are also related things in terms of the family meaning the community. What is often overlooked in what child care provides is an appreciation for diversity. In an increasingly diversified country, that becomes important. It also provides equity for children with special needs. It provides integration and identification of children with special needs, which can be extremely important in terms of family stress.

What we know is that these programs can be highly cost effective, but if we look at the Cleveland-Krashinsky study, it shows that they are cost effective if they're done in a certain way. They're cost effective if, one, they're high quality, and two, if they support parents, both in their parenting role and in their ability to work.

I would like to spend just 30 seconds talking about how these community-based services can be organized so that they provide three things simultaneously: child development, supporting parents in their work and study functions, and the parenting supports, so that all of those parents that aren't sure about those questions that Carol's study raised have a place, a community centre, a children's centre, to go and get that information.

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Our own surveys indicate it is the day cares that provide, for many parents, their only source of information. We know that other professionals parents come in contact with, the pediatrician, etc.—first of all, it's a very expensive way of delivering parenting information, in terms of public policy, but quite frankly, pediatricians aren't experts in child development; they're experts in clinical and health issues.

I'd like to just note something in passing, before I leave you. We can be concerned about, and we should be concerned about, the state of Canadian families, but we don't have to go far to look at countries that have different approaches to addressing family needs. For example, if you look in broad strokes at Europe, they take two approaches. There is a natal approach, where their value system is that mothers of young children should be at home with their kids, and they design their public policy to make that happen. But they pay for it through very large family allowances that replace the earnings of mothers.

On the other hand, there are the pro-labour policies of countries like the Scandinavian countries, which encourage women to be involved in the workforce. They do that by providing generous maternity and parental leaves and legislated workplace policies that recognize that parents are also workers.

I'd like to make another point that whether there is a pro-natal policy or a pro-labour policy, both value sets do not debate providing preschool education to young kids. Both value sets recognize this as important, and it's not a debate.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much. What a rich series of presentations.

First of all, I'd like to welcome Peter Adams. He is the chair of the, dare I say, mother committee. I don't know if it's the father committee—

Mr. Peter Adams: Parent committee.

The Chair: The parent committee. We also thank him for being so effective in getting the report through. It will be very exciting when it's delivered tomorrow. I can tell you we were able to carry on, and they never even knew what threats they were under.

So welcome, Peter.

Eric.

Mr. Eric Lowther: Thank you.

As I listened to the three presentations, I tried to find a common thread through them, and I think there is one. We had a very clear statement from Mark Genuis about the importance of parenting, and bonding being key. Then from Ms. Russell we heard that parents want to do a good job and they're looking for credible help.

Then with Ms. McCuaig I got a little confused because I heard we need tax and income support for parents so they can, I think, spend more time with their kids because of this parental bond thing being important; then also that 40% of child care is actually with parents. They're splitting shifts because they're prioritizing parental care of their own kids. Yet on the other side you talked about this circle, with child care services at the centre. Up to that point I kind of saw parents at the centre.

Within the context of what's best for kids, I think about two-thirds or three-quarters of what I heard was this strong bond with the parent. I remember in the longitudinal study—just to digress a bit—like you, Ms. McCuaig, they said income was the key thing. I remember a longitudinal study where it said—

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: Excuse me. I said that maternal depression was associated with the poorest outcomes for children.

Mr. Eric Lowther: Yes, you did. Then you went on from there to say that income was one of the first things that impacted parenting.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: That impacted on the well-being of children.

Mr. Eric Lowther: Okay.

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Yet I remember looking at the longitudinal study, and when you dug down into that it actually showed that even some of the very poorest of families had some of the best outcomes with their children, not across the board, but it often did happen. It suggested, when you looked at the data—and I think they even made some comment on it—it wasn't so much the money they had but the quality of parental care that was extended that had a very significant impact on the outcome, from a healthy socialization critique, I guess.

I'd like to get a sense, from this set of experts—and I say that with great respect because I think you are all experts, far more than I am—of the significance of the parental bond relationship. With all we've discussed in this committee, that has become lost in it.

We want to help parents, we want to have child care, we want to have quality care, we want to have this and that, but it seems to me when you boil this all down, we're really concerned about the best interests of children. If this strong parental bond is paramount, and I think I've heard that pretty strongly here today, then isn't that where public policy should provide incentives and perhaps education?

What concerns me about education is whose ideology do we pass on to the parents? Dr. Spock was the guru when I was kid, and everybody was reading his books. All these parents were trying to do what he said, and now Dr. Spock has recanted on all his rhetoric and is saying he made a mistake, and nobody's listening to him.

The Chair: The table is surrounded with these mistakes.

Mr. Eric Lowther: We have to be careful about who is.... I think parents are hungry for the information, but they are also suspect of whose ideology they are embracing and whether they are comfortable with it. We may provide all kinds of good things that I agree with, but a whole bunch of other parents out there might not agree with that at all. They might want to make their own choices.

I've kind of rambled on here, and I apologize, but in the context of that rambling, I'd appreciate it if you'd comment.

The Chair: Who'd like to start first? We'll give a chance to everybody.

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: I can start.

Just responding to your analogy about Dr. Spock, when we were growing up, kids who got fevers were automatically given aspirin, but we now know that's associated, for young children, with the possibility of getting Reye's syndrome. So we don't give young children with fevers Aspirin any more; we give them Tempra or Tylenol. So things change over time.

Mr. Eric Lowther: I don't want to go on about Dr. Spock. I really want to focus on the significance of parent-child bonding in the long-term outcome of children.

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: But you were questioning whose ideology, and I was trying to say that we go with the best knowledge we have available and make it a choice for parents. There will always be room for discussion and variation, and we always have to apply the best knowledge to a particular child and a particular parent.

I don't think that should keep us from putting forward the knowledge we have that's available for parents. I think parents are very hungry for knowledge, so whatever knowledge we have we should make available to them in as many different ways as possible.

I'd like to talk about some of the different ways of doing that, other than by just providing programs and support. Yes, there are child care programs and family resource centres—there are those ways of giving out information. But we also support the national Parent Help Line, which was just launched a couple of weeks ago, as a way for parents to get information by either talking to a counsellor or going to a library of messages and information. We've also heard that the CBC is expanding its children's programming, and lots of parents can get information that way. So there are a number of different ways that the information can get out, other than through the necessary community-based programs.

Dr. Mark Genuis: I would like to just follow up on that point, because I think Dr. Russell's point is eloquently made and bang on, on a number of levels.

• 1620

First, she's exactly right in that things do change over time, and that's one of the absolute reasons for studying and doing research as we go on and not just jumping out and doing things, because we make mistakes when we do things. That's not to say we have to put off action. Certainly appropriate action, ongoing, utilizing the best knowledge possible, is critical. I think some of the examples she has given are very worthy of note.

With regard to the issue of attachment and bonding, this is something that has been continuously studied since about 1944 by the Tavistock Institute in England and has gotten substantial prominence in the psychological and the psychiatric community there. Attachment disorders are now clearly identified within the DSM, and so forth. This bond is generally recognized in the academic community as one of the key central developmental human variables—that is, it's an emotional element of humanity that has a substantial influence on how children develop both emotionally and behaviourally.

Mr. Eric Lowther: So what about when it's not there?

Dr. Mark Genuis: When we study people who have secure bonds as compared to insecure bonds, we're looking at as severe cases as we can so that we can identify the differences between the groups as much as possible. Let me preface what I'm going to say by stating that. The terminology can become very provocative if you don't put that statement in at the front.

We find that insecure bonding is one of the determinants of issues such as poor school performance, behavioural challenges, attention deficit, delinquency, eating disorders in young children, various different pathologies. We've finished a few studies that are being submitted for publication now in the areas of development from insecure attachment to suicide.

So there are a number of different challenges, not saying that every child who is insecure is going to go this route and not saying that every child who is secure is not going to go this route, but the trends are clearly different.

One of the challenges we have with children who develop insecure bonds is to try to determine where they're going to go—if they're going to have a challenge, what that challenge is going to be. That's an extremely complex path, like the highway system in Toronto. It's very complex and depends on a number of different decisions that are made and experiences along the way.

That's why when we come back to a couple of key issues, one of those very key issues ends up being the security of attachment between the child and parent.

What was said earlier by Ms. McCuaig was that the time is really important. Again, it's a very important point, because it is during that time that we find parents are able to learn, able to make mistakes, and able to correct their mistakes and develop stronger relationships with their children and have positive influence.

The Chair: Ms. McCuaig.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: To start with, parenting is paramount. I don't think any of us here would debate that parenting is paramount, but again, if we look at the fact that you cannot divorce the well-being of the child from the well-being of its parents, particularly its mother, then we have to be concerned about the environment in which parents raise their children.

Child care is not a substitute for parenting. Child care is a supplement to parenting; it does not replace parenting. Parents need time to be with their children. No one is advocating that mothers get off the delivery room table and hop back to work, right?

Mr. Eric Lowther: Some people are, maybe not in this room, but there are some people out there who are.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: I guess you have to name for me who is.

In my field, we have looked at a comprehensive child care policy that includes three components. One is parental leave, which includes maternity leave and decent holidays—what's so special about a two-week summer holiday—having statutory leave so that parents can be parents, scheduling, and workplaces so that parents can be parents, services so that parents....

We can say parents choose to do the parenting, therefore they off-shift. Maybe for most parents that's the only choice they have. Maybe they would be better parents if they were actually in the same room together once in a while with their kids. Does work have to be organized so that parents...?

What we heard so much in our interviews with parents is about family get-togethers where always major people in the family weren't there because, for some reason, we have to have Boxing Day sales and we have to be able to go to the hardware store 24 hours a day—those sorts of things.

• 1625

Again, if we have to organize our lives that way, since children are small for such a short period of time, can there not be workplace policies that give some scheduling preference to parents of small children?

If we think parenting is important—and believe me, I do—then we have to get around that. It's a throw-off line that I hear so often, that of course child care is fine for those poor families, for lone mothers. If it's so important, then it has become vitally important that lone mothers also have a chance to be full-time parents. It also becomes important so that low-income parents have a chance to be full-time parents. That includes public policy; that includes actually putting money into a maternity system that would allow parents to have a break, that would allow parents to combine work and a break.

Mr. Eric Lowther: Hearing you, Ms. McCuaig, maybe I've misunderstood your earlier presentation. I heard you say child care service is at the centre, and I thought that meant anything but parental care. Now, listening to you this second time, I'm not sure that's where you were coming from.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: I'm saying child care is at the centre of public policy. It's at the centre of public policy because it simultaneously addresses a number of issues.

Mr. Eric Lowther: Which would include providing incentives for greater parental involvement with the kids....

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: Absolutely.

Mr. Eric Lowther: Okay, that's a good clarification. Then I think there is some commonality across this group on that theme. Thank you.

[Translation]

The Chair: Ms. Gagnon, do you have a question?

Ms. Christiane Gagnon (Québec, BQ): Ms. McCuaig, I have the feeling we went to the same school.

You spoke about the support that should be given to parents and about the government's responsibility in that regard. Some of the issues you raised earlier involve the Canadian Health and Social Transfer Program. We must examine the responsibilities of governments and more particularly those of the federal government. Forty percent of people think that the federal government does not pay enough attention to the needs of children.

I am visiting all the ridings. I have been to some 30 ridings in Quebec. With respect to the Canadian Health and Social Transfer, people in Quebec are very much aware that the provincial government is responsible for education and for developing family policies, and everyone knows full well that the federal government's social transfers are no longer adequate. If the provinces don't do what they are supposed to do, that's one thing. In that case, it would be up to the federal government to use the necessary means at its disposal to convince them that it is time to invest. However, when I see what the Quebec government is doing, I realize that it is being penalized in the area of social development. Family policy is one of the Quebec government's objectives.

We have to be flexible with parental leave. You mentioned that. Let's have a look at the federal government's approach to parental leave. They grant twice as much time off, but with 55% of the salary. We have to face reality. If we want to help the children, we must reduce the stress on the parents, because an environment where parents are feeling stressed is not healthy for a child.

• 1630

Job security is also a determining factor in the quality of life that parents can give their children.

As to poverty, it isn't mentioned, but less and less support is given to families by shrinking the social safety net that is available through employment insurance. Where do the parents end up? They end up on social assistance. The Human Resources Development department has completely abandoned some communities, that couldn't manage to make ends meet because of lack of work or because of poor job security.

Let's have a look at the tax system. What was done in the last budget? I spoke of the $20,000 income range. For someone who is single, that represents $2 less in taxes per month for the year 2000. In 2004, this person will only be paying $80 less in taxes. In a two-income-two-child family where both parents earn $30,000, which isn't very much, this represents $21 less per month in taxes.

Therefore, when you take a close look at things, you see that low-wage earners are also very vulnerable. It's all very well to talk about children and developing parental skills, but we also have to see how families can manage to make a living. I made a 70-page presentation on poverty. During my tour, I noted that parents were becoming more and more desperate. They can't make ends meet. You can imagine what happens when, for example, a child wants to take part in an extra-curricular activity and the parents just can't afford it. I think we are ignoring a society where we could truly contribute to the welfare of both parents and children.

We can't deny that the way to ensure the welfare of the child is by ensuring the welfare of the parents. You mentioned that earlier. There are half a dozen ways to show that the federal government is no longer doing what it should. All it is attempting to do is to find some band-aid solution, but it will never solve the problem. Large amounts of money must be re-invested, billions of dollars. There have been six years of social deficit. And the entire up-and-coming generation might have to pay for those six years.

Therefore, I feel that we must begin to re-invest and to give the provinces money for education. If not, the federal government will have to manage a whole host of measures and structures that already exist in the provinces in the form of local community service centres, daycare centres, etc. The federal government can't do that work. If it wants to, then it should become a province. But the provinces need money for training and hiring more teachers, education psychologists, and qualified people to offer services to children.

It is true that this exists, and this is what I saw. I toured the ridings so as to make community groups and the population aware of this shortfall and of its effects on the day-to-day lives of people. I completely agree with you, Ms. McCuaig: we should develop and integrate parental leave and a family policy. But it's up to the provinces to do that, with the financial support of the federal government. Otherwise, we will miss the mark.

I don't really have any questions because I agree with what is being said. But at the same time, I think we need to give the families some breathing space, either through the tax system or through parental leave. Parental leave and the National Child Benefit are a good step in the right direction. That's all good. Moreover, when the provinces are told that they can take that and develop something else in parallel, no one is upset. We will need money for daycare centres and for family allowances. It will have to be divided. There will have to be different funds and the provinces will have to develop this type of program. As to the provinces that don't do it, they should be given a hand to establish such programs. But if it already exists, it is simply a matter of improving on what is already there and determining if the objectives have been met.

[English]

The Chair: There are many things you may wish to comment on. I just want to ask one question of Carol Crill Russell that I think was mentioned at the beginning of Madame Gagnon's observations.

I'm wondering if in your survey of parenting the sample size was sufficient enough that you could distinguish between the reactions, first of all, of parents in Quebec, for example.... In other words, could you do a regional break-out? Second—and this kind of relates to something Madame Gagnon said as well—could you do a kind of socio-economic breakdown? That is to say, do you have the data to be able to say that people's confidence levels depended on the amount of income they had to some degree, if you follow that? And anything else you may wish to respond to on Madame Gagnon's observation....

• 1635

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: Yes, we have those kinds of subreports underway at present.

The Chair: Can you give us anything on Quebec that would indicate...?

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: I don't have anything on Quebec today.

The only thing I can talk about is differences between mothers and fathers. It's very interesting. You might expect there to be large differences in knowledge between mothers and fathers about child development and in their confidence, but in fact the preliminary findings are that they're very close to one another and they follow each other. It's almost spooky how similar the mothers and fathers are. These mothers and fathers are not from the same households, either, so we're not talking about husbands and wives or partners here. We're talking about 700 fathers who come from different households from the 700 mothers.

That's the only thing I can talk about today. The rest of them are still under development, with researchers working—

The Chair: When will that come out, by the way?

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: Probably in the middle of the fall.

The Chair: Kerry McCuaig, do you want to comment?

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: I concur that our federal government has been neglectful of kids, and also to congratulate the government of Quebec. It's very nice, being in the family policy field, to be able to point to at least a made-in-Canada example of a policy mix that meets the needs of families. I think the Quebec government was quite, for lack of a better word, clever in putting forward a package that included increased maternity and parental benefits, a child care policy, and improvements in income supports.

I'd like to say, Madame Gagnon, that as a Quebecker you have a national government that is addressing these needs on behalf of Quebeckers. I'm an English Canadian and I would like my national government in Ottawa to address the needs of Canadian families. As an English Canadian, I think the well-being of our children is of national importance and therefore needs national involvement and a national solution.

In particular, coming from Ontario, I think I am probably less confident about the ability of provinces to respond to the needs of children.

[Translation]

Ms. Christiane Gagnon: It is true that the Quebec government is doing more than many other provinces as far as family policy is concerned, but even so, not everyone is happy with the $5 daycare policy, because at this time, when you no longer claim the maximum amount in refundable daycare costs, the federal government keeps 50 to $60 million in its coffers. Quebec has made a financial effort with its daycare policy. The money it invests comes from its own treasury, but the federal government, instead of reimbursing Quebec or the families that don't claim the full amount, ensures that the province is penalized for going the extra mile.

Instead of improving upon the daycare policy, instead of thanking the government and offering more support to the families that are unhappy because they can't take advantage of the $5 daycare, they are penalizing them. There are people who go to other daycare networks and others who are just too poor. They don't work and they are on social assistance and they are also penalized because they have the National Child Benefit of which one part is transferred. This year, they decided to let the families have that money.

Therefore, there are grumblings about the $5 daycare. It isn't perfect, but it's better than what they have in other provinces. However, the federal government will have to be more open and more aware of this effort. It could return the money to the Quebec government, which could use it to improve its daycare policy and leave the National Child Benefit. That's one thing that might be done. I'm not saying it should be done, but we should see how we can better help the families. We have to react now. Even if you think that it is better than what the Ontario government is doing, we have also been criticized for the transfers of SME funds to daycare centres.

[English]

The Chair: I know you'd like to come in on this one. My only challenge is.... Can I hold it, for this reason? Madame Davies has to go—

Ms. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP): I have to go.

The Chair: Can you make a quick intervention? Sorry, I don't mean to cut you off. It's simply because I'm trying to balance the needs and I could come back to you.

• 1640

Dr. Mark Genuis: I can make it brief, and if it's of any interest, we can come back to it if I say anything that might possibly be worthwhile.

It sounds to me like the objectives here are very much the same. We're wanting to respect the family and provide dignity to the family, parenting being the greatest concern here for positive child development, and I guess a few questions are coming up. The real challenges seem to be coming from what are the best ways to provide these opportunities for parents to do the job, and certainly there are provincial and federal jurisdictions.

A couple of very quick points. One is with regard to the Quebec suggestions specifically. A couple of professors at the University of Quebec, I might add, are doing an economic analysis on the specific Quebec situation and have found that the Quebec families with the new system are in fact less well off economically than they have been in the past, even with the previous imperfect system. So there are some very interesting challenges around that. One of the things they're recommending—and this specifically comes back to an earlier presentation, part of Ms. McCuaig's presentation—is a universal benefit for all families in Quebec.

Simply running a system of non-parental care on a large scale doesn't appear to provide the support that is needed. In fact, as some Scandinavian countries have really borne out in their experience, it does not provide the support to the families it was initially intended to support.

If I understand Madame Gagnon correctly, one of the things she appears to be concerned with is approaching and supporting every family in a way that that family needs and can best make use of in their own independent situation, because parents love their children more than anybody else will. We know they do a very good job, better than anyone else will, and we know every family has independent and unique choices and circumstances. So how do we best support that?

One of the systems we would recommend considering is.... When we look at the polls, we find that many, many families have said that if they had a bit more economic strength, they'd be able to make choices according to what they want and think is best for their children.

We would suggest that the federal and provincial governments work together to provide a national children's agenda that would provide significant tax relief in a refundable manner, because that's where you really help people in poverty. That's where you really strengthen them. That's where you put them in an economic position where they can have some choices and be motivated to build on their current situations.

If you can provide refundable tax credits for families that are of some significance, in combination with the provinces, as a team, it can be affordable at both levels. Families will receive the maximum benefit directly into their pockets and then they can make the choices for the best support for their own situations. I believe the research would bear out that they deserve that amount of dignity and respect and opportunity, so I will stop there.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Libby Davies.

Ms. Libby Davies: Thank you. I'm sorry, I have to go at 5 p.m.

The Chair: All of us have to vote. We're going to be summoned by bells at 5:30 p.m. for 6 p.m. Are the witnesses able to stay on past 5 p.m.? Is that possible? Do you have planes to catch, buses or whatever? Some may be able to hang on. That's good.

Ms. Libby Davies: I've unfortunately got to fill in for one of my colleagues at 5 p.m. at the foreign affairs committee, so I'm going to have to dash off, but I wanted to thank the witnesses for coming here today.

I think it's important to remember that this committee was a subcommittee that was established to look at the issues affecting children and the well-being of children.

Listening to the debate, and from what I've heard in other places, I always find it curious that there's still this tug of war going on. I had hoped that we'd passed the place where somehow it's either parents or day care, that somehow it's an either/or situation. So I actually found some of your comments really from some other era. I was hoping we'd gotten to a point in Canadian society where we do recognize that day care is not snatching children away from parents, it's not the state trying to intervene, but that it is about providing parental support.

I think maybe part of that comes from debates that took place years ago where child care was seen more as a labour strategy—and I think Kerry talked about that in terms of Scandinavian countries—but everything I've read, everything I've heard, parents I've talked to, see it more and more as a method by which to support families, and that it should not be offered up as, you know, parents are good, child care is bad, and we have to make that choice.

I found some of your comments, Mark, really out of whatever field, I don't know. Everyone I've talked to on this issue is way beyond that. The debate is about, what are we going to do about supporting families? That's the question I want to focus on. As my colleague Madame Gagnon said, we've now experienced seven years of a social deficit. What is it that the federal government should be doing? That's really the question I want to put to you.

• 1645

It's a very complex area in the social union. I come from B.C., and our provincial government is developing initiatives for child care accessibility and affordability. But without some sort of federal presence, it's very difficult. Then we have places such as Ontario where we seem to be moving backward.

By the way, I thought your survey results were just amazing. It's very good to see the information that's coming from parents.

What is it that we should be saying to the federal government in terms of moving this forward and putting in place some kind of program that is accessible no matter where you live in this country so that parents do have the choice and there is affordability and high-quality care based on the needs of children? This is, I think, what we've been talking about in this committee. How do we move that forward now in terms of the social union? I would be interested in hearing any comments you may have.

Dr. Mark Genuis: I appreciate your comments. You stated that you would hope that we could move on from this. I don't for a moment question your intention for the well-being and care of children, nor do I question your desire to support families and parents in an appropriate way that works best for them.

But I think the era that you might be hearing my comments from would in fact be the future. The reason I say that is because when we study real little people and real families from around the world and when we study the impacts of various lifestyles and decisions, we find that various decisions have impacts on the outcome and development of these people, regardless of whether we do or do not want it to be that way. Regardless of whether we say this model should work, therefore it's going to work, we can find that this model doesn't quite work the way we had intended. That's part of the reason for studying things.

I would like to clarify a couple of things I did say. I never at any point in time said that day care is bad or that every child in day care is going to turn out with three eyes or something. I never said any of that. What I did say was that as a result of studying tens of thousands of children around the world for four decades, the finding, which is consistent over time, is that when we have 20 to 25 hours or more a week on a regular basis of non-parental care, these children run specific risks in certain very important areas. That happens to be reality. No one has said that day care is the demise of the family or that these children are going to die or something.

The point is that, as was said by Ms. McCuaig, parenting is paramount. If we want to take a look at a system that supports the family and parenting, we would not build a system where these children are going to be separated from their parents for a great deal of time on a regular basis because that's not supporting the family. That in fact builds an industry, but it tears down the family. That puts children at risk. That would be the error of the future, because that's reality and that's information.

I have no problem with building proper supports for families, things that are affordable, dignity for parents, and opportunities and methods to give them proper choices. I think that's all very wise, and I couldn't agree with you more. I would probably see—

Ms. Libby Davies: So you support the establishment of policies that would foster licensed child care centres in various communities across the country.

Dr. Mark Genuis: That's an excellent question. Let's talk about the cost of licensed child care. Upon whose determination does that licence come? Again, if we look at the research and the information, we find that all of these determinants that many activists are putting forward with regard to what should be included in licensing in fact do not make the difference that many people hope. Even Cleveland and Krashinsky have admitted that if we could, we should develop a system where we would have parents taking care of kids full time, rather than kids in day care full time. But they don't believe it's possible with the current system of taxation in the country, so they had to come up with this study. They said that on national television.

So you have to realize that at the basic core, if we're looking at what's good for children, when we say develop a system where there is day care.... Of course we're always going to have day care. No one is saying to get rid of it. But the parents have to be able to choose what sort of care they want for their children. They deserve that respect. They're intelligent enough to make those decisions.

I'll give you another example. One of the points raised by the researchers in Quebec was, what if, for example, a parent wants to have their children in a particular culturally based child care for a few hours a week? What if parents want their children to be in religious-based child care in one denomination or another and to have them learn more about that? If we have specific government-decided licensing, that becomes a great challenge. If our objective is diversity, equity, and integration, that's a very different direction that many parents might choose.

• 1650

We have a timing issue and an equality issue that are critical to this debate. That's why parents have to have that choice, because they are primarily responsible for the development of their children, and they should be supported directly in that.

The Chair: Because Ms. Davies has to go soon, I think she might want to hear from Kerry McCuaig.

Ms. Libby Davies: Yes, Kerry or Carol.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: We now know that child care won't mean that all children will get three eyes but that it will tear apart the family.

Let me go back to answering your question, Libby. What does the federal government need to do? The federal government needs to be proactive and to get a deal with the provinces around a child development program. This is long overdue. It has been on the agenda since the royal commission on women, if not before. What should that deal look like? Why are we looking to the feds and the provinces? We're looking to the feds and the provinces because they have the constitutional responsibility and the financial means. Communities don't. I get really nervous when people start talking about what communities should be doing. Communities do things when they're resourced, and the levels of government that have the opportunity to resource communities are the federal and provincial ones.

The state of the family is important. Children are important. Therefore, it becomes of national importance, and national importance doesn't mean the federal government. National importance means the provinces and the federal government working together to get a deal that provides families with child development support spending, the parenting supports they need, and the labour market supports.

We say that parents need to be with their kids. Let's think about it. If mothers and fathers were with their kids—

Ms. Libby Davies: No one would work.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: —yes, no one would work. So get real. If you want a public policy solution, get real.

One of my fantasies is that every woman of child-bearing age would say one day, “I've had it. I really am going to stay home.” Then we would see the way things operate.

Parents need support. The federal and provincial governments have a responsibility to do it. They have a deadline for December 2000. We hope they have something on the table.

The Chair: Is that okay?

Ms. Libby Davies: Unless Carol wants to say something.

The Chair: Did you want to come in on this?

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: Yes. I'd like to just say that if both of my colleagues here can agree that what we need is some sort of flexible continuum of supports for the family.... I'm still a bit in despair that we're actually going to come up with the kinds of recommendations that will receive the wholehearted support of Parliament, let alone of Canada.

The reason I say that is because of the last statistic I was presenting where the parents were saying, we can't get more than 40% of parents to say that Canada values its young children. When I present that statistic to service providers, they often say that's because of all the recent cutbacks in government programs and so on. But when I present that statistic to parents, what they say to me is, I agree with that.

In fact, I'm surprised it's that high, because when I take my young children to the movies or to the restaurant or if I'm trying to get on the bus with my young children, I feel as if I'm under incredible pressure to keep my kids silent and obedient at all times, that they're not welcomed with me no matter where I go. I feel that behind all of this is a feeling across Canada that we don't really value families with young children. We need to address that issue first if we really want to get the public and Parliament behind any of these types of proposals that we're talking about.

That's part of the reason that Invest in Kids has worked so hard in Ontario around a public awareness campaign on the importance of the early years. I don't think many people understand how important those years are. Some people understand on the surface, but they don't understand the far-reaching impact of those years.

• 1655

We may be rushing a bit by trying to get in this flexible continuum of supports, but honestly, we've been trying to do this for ten years, and we haven't made very much progress. I mean, we've made some progress here and there, but I wonder whether we really are focusing on the right question overall or whether we should be focusing on really making people understand how important these years are.

Ms. Libby Davies: Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you.

Dr. Adams.

Mr. Peter Adams: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Again, I apologize for being slightly late, Mark, and missing a little bit of your presentation.

I've enjoyed this very much. It's obviously a very passionate thing. It's passionate science and it's passionate intellect. It's a key public policy area for us all, we recognize. For our committee, for the main committee, I think you will see, in the report we table tomorrow, that there is great concern about this particular federal government's ability to effect social change and to do social things. You will see some of that tomorrow.

A lot of your stuff is new to me, I have to say. But perhaps I can ask you a question.

There are two pre-industrial societies. One is the longhouse society from time immemorial. No one can remember living any other place. Children brought up in this longhouse have secure bonds and are really quite diverse. They learn, by the way, in very extended relationships and by observation, tremendous observation, in this open society that they live in. This society is completely accepted by the children, by the parents, by the grandparents, by their great-grandparents.

There's another pre-industrial society where the people live in small family units—very isolated, very controlled. They don't know many other people. Only now and again do they meet other people, and so on. They function...and no one can remember anything else. They've been living like that for generations.

Now, imagine that the longhouse people, say, have to, for some reason, move into the other setting. You know, they're suddenly dispersed and they have to discover how to live, how to bring up their children and so on. That's one direction.

Then imagine the other direction. There's a longhouse somewhere that's empty and these families have to move into it. They have to learn to function in the new environment.

I would suggest to you that the period we're going through is the second of those. What's happened is that, before, there were families that in various ways were isolated. People could read, but there was no radio, no TV. They may have lived in cities but it didn't make any difference. They lived in this very controlled environment, and they're moving into this other place, where children learn in ways we never imagined, where the relationships are different now from what they were in the single-family unit. They're in this longhouse, where people sweep the floor in different ways than they did before and so on.

Don't you think, intellectually and policy-wise, that some of the additional anxiety of parents and parenting at the moment—and I say “additional” because I think some anxiety is a very natural, healthy feature of parenting—is...?

Mark, wouldn't some of the explanation of the fact that child care apparently does not replace parental bonds come from the fact that we're in a period of change? We're going from the single-unit thing to the longhouse thing. There is living memory of these other times, so children sense that their parents are more uncertain than they otherwise would have been. The parents sense that their parents, the grandparents, the “Doctor Spockians” and so on, are not competent. So it's a kind of lack of confidence in where we are.

Isn't the 40 years of research actually the period of change, and in another 20 or 30 we'll have moved to a new situation and the confidence will be there? Parenting will never be simple, but it will be simpler, and the difference between these groups that you describe will disappear, because all the generations will by then have accepted the new reality.

• 1700

The Chair: We hope that bell is a quorum call—anything but the vote. We'll just ignore it.

Mr. Peter Adams: We'll find out.

The Chair: Yes, we'll find out.

Dr. Mark Genuis: First, although I don't want to speak on his behalf, I think Mr. Lowther might argue he's still a bit too young to be in that grandparenting generation yet. But I'll leave that to him.

You're describing a hypothesis. The first submission I would suggest is that because of the diversity in cultures, through which the data has been gathered—and 95% of it was not conducted in the United States, as was stated earlier, so that was an incorrect assumption—one would I think argue reasonably that this is not the case, that there's something deeper than just the general milieu.

You are stating a hypothesis, and if we wish to go through a phenomenal social experiment for three or four generations to test that out and to see if that in fact is reality, then that's a decision that as a society we have to make. But if you ask from the data perspective, I could only suggest that this is a phenomenal risk given the level of knowledge we have today.

That's a decision a society would have to make—that is, whether that's the grand social experiment it wishes to endure. I would recommend against it, based on the information I have, but again, that's a decision that would have to be made.

The Chair: I would intervene to reassure members who are hearing these sounds that this is the 30-minute bell. The single bong is from 30....

Ah! It has ceased bonging. We take it all back; we have no idea what's going on.

Voices: Oh, oh!

The Chair: This is folklore, so you'll be interested. When it bongs once, that means we have between 30 minutes and 15 minutes; when it bongs twice, we have between 15 minutes and 5 minutes; when it bongs three times, you'd better get moving, because there are 5 minutes to go.

But no bongs; life's okay.

Mr. Adams.

Mr. Peter Adams: Carol, what do you think?

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: I am somewhat reluctant to be as optimistic as you are at this point. I don't know that 10 or 20 years from now we'll be better off than we are now. That feels very optimistic to me.

Given the levels of lack of confidence and the lack of knowledge and the lack of support that parents currently feel, I'm not quite sure how their children are going to somehow or another improve on that without additional help of some sort.

Mr. Peter Adams: I wasn't saying without additional help, but okay, thank you.

Kerry.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: I think you've described a revolution that's happening economically, which is of course having an impact on our social structures, primarily our families.

My mother was one of twelve children, I was one of four, I have two children, and they tell me not to hold my breath about being a grandmother. Those are the types of family changes that have taken place in one generation. So, yes, we're in flux.

I think the difference—and maybe this goes back to what Libby was saying earlier—is that we now have a modern family. We don't have the longhouse. We don't have those extended family relationships where mother was around the corner, there were sisters, and there was the farmhouse mother grew up in, where there was always somebody else around to look after the child. We're living in what you described as the second pre-industrial society. It reminds me of my apartment block. You know what most apartment blocks are like, what most family communities are like.

I guess I would concur that in times of flux we are unsure, but within that we do have research, we do have examples, and we do have information. We can support our families through this transition or we can leave them, as traditionally we have, I think I have to say. We can leave them on their own and let the chips fall where they may.

I would concur with Carol that the results of that.... It's not something I'm prepared to support.

Mr. Peter Adams: It seems to me all scientists, even alchemists, have always claimed to be unbiased, at least since science was talked about. But it seems to me it's impossible. There is so such thing as unbiased science.

• 1705

You mentioned some sort of statistical rigour, or whatever it is, for tests you did. But the questions arise: Where did the data come from? What questions were asked? Not just the nature of the question, but who asked it? Had the person had a cup of coffee just before they answered the question? And all sorts of stuff like that.

I once read a study that said 89% of the articles in one year of issues of the New England Journal of Medicine were unsound on statistical grounds alone.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Yes.

Mr. Peter Adams: And this is physical medicine mainly. They simply couldn't control for it.

In this meta-research—

Dr. Mark Genuis: Meta-analysis.

Mr. Peter Adams: —excuse me, meta-analysis—give me some sense of how you cope with that stuff.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Absolutely. Your point is critical and central to the work.

You are absolutely correct that particularly in the social science area we have tremendous challenges in the area of item development, reliability and validity issues, sampling issues, and so on—tremendous challenges. That is why one of the statements I made at the beginning is it's critical for us not to make conclusions based on any individual study, because it will be inherently biased. It's particularly essential for us not to make conclusions based on any literature review, because literature reviews, regardless of good intention or even good efforts on the part of the reviewer, are going to be inherently biased. We also are going to have inherent substantial bias in someone bringing a group of studies and putting them down, because they are going to be choosing particular studies and presenting them a certain way.

This is why meta-analysis is being utilized more and more by scientists around the world in a variety of areas, and it's specifically why, again for the reason you just mentioned, in the physical and medical sciences meta-analysis is used quite a lot. The concept is, take all of the work that's been done—and we would argue take the published work—and bring it together. You include standardized....

Actually Diana Baumrind, a prominent researcher in the United States, is just writing a paper now using some of our work, I'm pleased to say, talking about standardizing the methods for inclusion. I.e., you don't want to use a study that's only had three people in it, because again, for statistical reasons, it's too difficult. So you have minimum levels of rigour for inclusion of particular studies: they're published, they meet minimum standards, and so forth. And then there are standardized ways of going about assessing each study and developing your meta-analysis.

There's no perfect solution. I'll state that right up front. But as for the best we can do at the current time, meta-analysis has been argued aggressively and appropriately as being the most objective and the closest to—

Mr. Peter Adams: But Mark, how is it done? Aggregation—

Dr. Mark Genuis: How is it done? Okay—

Mr. Peter Adams: No, no, just a second. Aggregation is one of the most dangerous—

Dr. Mark Genuis: It's not aggregation.

Mr. Peter Adams: —things to do.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Absolutely.

Mr. Peter Adams: When I say 89% of a set of studies are no good and you take the other 11%—

Dr. Mark Genuis: You're done.

Mr. Peter Adams: —then you add them to the equivalent 11% in other journals, it doesn't strengthen them. Unless you can show me how you do it, it doesn't strengthen them. If anything, it weakens them if you come up with some generalization based on those 11%.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Another thing some people try to do is take different studies and combine the data in those studies, and they end up with absolutely fallacious claims. It just weakens everything; you're exactly right.

Mr. Peter Adams: So it's not combining data.

Dr. Mark Genuis: No, it's not combining data. It's standardizing the results. And each study—

Mr. Peter Adams: But how do you standardize?

Dr. Mark Genuis: You develop.... I'll give you a copy of the analysis right here.

Mr. Peter Adams: Just give me an example.

Dr. Mark Genuis: There are a couple of ways.

Mr. Peter Adams: Say you have one in India and one here.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Right, a study in India and a study in Canada.

Mr. Peter Adams: A study of—

A voice: Parity.

Mr. Peter Adams: Parity.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Whatever—the look of a tie and the influence of ties on the colour blindness of men. We would simply ask, first of all, has it been published? Then we would ask, does it meet minimum levels of rigour? If we pass all of that, then we take the results we are examining—

Mr. Peter Adams: It's been published in what? Referee journals?

Dr. Mark Genuis: Referee journals. We would argue you only include it if it's published in referee journals.

The Chair: Okay, by the standards—

Dr. Mark Genuis: Another critical element of that is there was a study published in Developmental Psychology that was a meta-analysis on the influence of child sexual abuse, the researchers arguing that there is no significant impact, in some cases very positive, particularly for male children. When you look at the actual studies they included, you find almost 50% of the studies were not published, etc. That's why it's critical to examine levels of rigour. That's why they must be refereed and have minimum levels of rigour.

• 1710

Then there are two statistics you can generate. You take the results. Each study becomes one data point, and the result in question.... Generally you try to go after, if possible, only one result per study. Then you take that result, and depending on the specific statistics that were used, you will convert it to either an effect size or a correlation.

Mr. Peter Adams: A which size?

Dr. Mark Genuis: A correlation.

Mr. Peter Adams: I know what correlation is. It's the first word.

Mr. Mark Genuis: An effect size.

Mr. Peter Adams: What does that mean?

Mr. Mark Genuis: It's not too dissimilar to a correlation. All it is is another way of doing a bit of mathematics and standardizing. The most common way to do it is through correlations.

Mr. Peter Adams: Are they multiple correlations or multiple-factor correlations?

Mr. Mark Genuis: No. You're taking one result and developing an r. I would refer to you probably the best book on this specifically, which is by a professor out of Harvard named Rosenthal. He writes a very beautiful, very nice book on the development and specific use of the r as the statistic of preference. You take every result you're using and turn it into an r, and then once you have each data point, you can re-analyse, and you can re-analyse using a number of different analytical methods. That's one. That's your standard first measure.

Then you get into issues such as the ones we talk about: quality, the amount of time in care, family structure, and the age of the child. These are all mediating factors. Then there are a couple of different ways you can analyse to see whether these have particular—

Mr. Peter Adams: A lot of those things you mentioned about quality are qualitative things. They're not quantitative.

Dr. Mark Genuis: No. People are working very, very hard, and they've been examined. The only way you can include them is if they are examined quantitatively.

Mr. Peter Adams: I can understand that, but can you examine, effectively and quantitatively, qualitative things based on studies in all sorts of different countries? I have great difficulty imagining it.

Dr. Mark Genuis: It's a fair point. I guess it depends on how rigorous your methods are. It depends on the types of questionnaires you're developing. It depends whether your questionnaires are standardized and whether they're reliable.

Mr. Peter Adams: But you don't know that. You—

Mr. Mark Genuis: Sure you would. If you were responsible as a researcher, you would test that out. You would do an initial study and test out the statistical properties of your measurement before you went out and published a study using it, I would hope.

Mr. Peter Adams: I'm not sure—

Dr. Mark Genuis: That's one of the important reporting procedures of any study: how rigorous your particular questionnaires and your procedures are. Otherwise you have nothing.

The Chair: Like Dr. Adams, I come from the world of research as well, and I would assume that for meta-analysis, the same rules of the game apply. That is to say, at the end of the day, the validity of a meta-analysis has to stand or fall on the way in which it itself is peer-reviewed and whether it appears in a credible, peer-reviewed scientific journal.

So I guess I'm asking, has your meta-analysis gone through those hoops?

Dr. Mark Genuis: There are two answers to that one. First, it has been accepted and presented at numerous conferences. It's in a book published by Ashgate academic publishers out of England. And the full meta-analysis is currently under review in a psychiatric journal. I'll be able to tell you over the next couple of months whether it's been accepted or not.

The Chair: But if I were playing research academic hardball, I would—

Mr. Peter Adams: [Inaudible—Editor].

The Chair: Yes, that's it, because if I were saying something's been—

Dr. Mark Genuis: You could say it's submitted for publication, and then we could talk about the other four meta-analyses that have been conducted by other researchers that have exactly the same results.

Mr. Eric Lowther: I think what you're really bringing up, John, is whether or not meta-analysis is legitimate. It seems to me every effort we can apply to strip out bias—your very point, Peter—in social-type research is a good thing.

Mr. Peter Adams: Don't get me wrong; I—

Mr. Eric Lowther: We should be embracing it.

The Chair: The only way in which you can strip out bias in any scientific.... If you're submitting it to nature or science or any—

Dr. Mark Genuis: Sure.

Mr. Eric Lowther: You're not going to get it all out.

The Chair: No, no, but the point is it's peer-reviewed by a group of folk who meet a certain standard. Whether it's the New England Journal of Medicine or the Good Housekeeping seal of approval, it has to go through a peer-review process and be published in a really top-ranking journal.

Mr. Eric Lowther: Yes.

The Chair: That's how the game works. Those are the building blocks of the meta-analysis itself.

Dr. Mark Genuis: That's right.

The Chair: Those are the standards that are applied to the material. Therefore the same standards presumably....

I might actually ask our two other researchers to comment.

Carol.

• 1715

Dr. Carol Grill Russell: Our survey has not been submitted to any journal. It may be in the future, but we don't make any great claim beyond what we presented today for it.

The Chair: On the point of research in terms of how one validates...because what is important about this is that we have very interesting competing theories here and it's important to know the extent to which they've been validated by independent authority. You've been very honest about yours.

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: Right.

The Chair: You've been very honest about yours.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Sure.

The Chair: Kerry.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: Maybe I could leave with your research department a copy of the sort of standard for writing meta-analysis reviews, which Dr. Genuis referred to. It's by Robert Rosenthal from Harvard. I'll just leave this with you at the end.

First, I want to make it really clear that this is not my area of expertise, but some logical questions come to mind, such as why, when the research that is used concludes good quality care is valuable socially, emotionally, for children, would a meta-analysis conclude the opposite?

Another logical question I would ask is this. It appears—I'm looking through the report—there are a number of studies that weren't included that I would suppose might challenge the conclusions that came up.

The other question I would have to ask is this. It would appear, from my reading of the article as it was published, that 70% of the studies didn't deal with a child-teacher ratio and 50% of the studies didn't deal with caregiver training, and in any other area that looks at qualities, these are two essential factors in looking at qualities. So it seems hard to make a conclusion that the quality of care doesn't matter when 70% of your studies don't include this.

It also makes a statement that babies feel depressed when their moms leave them at the day care centres. If they're there for more than 25 hours a week—that's more than five hours a day—I'm wondering how the baby knows when you drop them off, am I leaving you for five hours or am I leaving you for eight hours? Those are just logical kinds of questions that as a parent I might ask.

Let me be up front. I'm not an expert in this area.

Dr. Mark Genuis: I'd be pleased very briefly to respond to the questions posed.

The Chair: Can I just add into that mix?

Dr. Mark Genuis: Sure.

The Chair: Mind you, I only just received from you a copy of something that you folks submitted, so I haven't had a chance to go through it. This was the article that appeared in the National Post, and it may have been that it was misrepresented and oversimplified, but it seemed to me, very superficially, that it mixed two sorts of arguments. One was one about combining a set of statistics about what works and what doesn't work, 25 and so on. The other was a kind of psychological view of the individual development process for children. That is to say, what do we need to go through on the developmental line that would produce best outcomes? The article was admittedly so limited that I couldn't get the answer to this question.

But the whole notion that little people develop anxiety because they're detached from the parent—what I couldn't figure out from that argument was what was the age-appropriate response. That is to say, I might imagine that a baby might well feel rather confused if mom went away for any length of time, or dad too, I hope. But as a child develops, and I say this as a father of a six-year-old, they socialize; they experiment with new situations. So I assume by the time they get to college they're not suffering from separation anxiety.

There has to be a continuum of where they.... They know first of all they're going to come back. They do. There has to be a point at which—and the article didn't make it clear to me—that's a normal expectation and a point at which that child might be described frankly as “clingy”.

• 1720

Dr. Mark Genuis: If I could respond very briefly, the first one, if everybody says it's good and how can a meta-analysis say otherwise...that's exactly the reason for doing the meta-analysis. If one picks up a stack of studies that say it's good, another person can pick up a stack of studies that say it's bad. Social science research is famous for this. Show me a researcher and I'll show you an opinion. That person will show you the studies they like. Another person will show you the studies they like. And that's exactly the reason for doing a meta-analysis, to examine this. That's what we find. When you bring them all together, standardize them, we find these particular risks.

The second one is criteria for inclusion. I'll just repeat it very quickly. You have to have specific criteria for inclusion. Some studies that may not have met the criteria for inclusion weren't included. If they met the criteria for inclusion, they were included. Again, this study went up to 1995 because that was the time the actual work was going on for it.

Third, some 70% of the studies didn't deal with important quality issues. Not every study is going to deal with everything, so you take all of the published information you have in a particular area and you present the information as it is. Based on all of the information we have, this is the presentation: that, as defined, the quality around day care and so forth doesn't make a substantial impact.

If you want to say it's entirely inconclusive, that's fine, say it's entirely inconclusive. But what you cannot say is that these quality issues make a significant impact, because there's absolutely no evidence to indicate that. So you can say they either don't or you can say it's entirely inconclusive. Either one, I would submit, would be fair. But the one that is not fair is to say that quality makes the difference, because there's absolutely no information that would substantiate that claim overall.

The fourth question was about depression when our mom leaves us alone. I don't recall the question, so I'll move on.

The fifth one was about 20, 25 hours. The 25 hours comes out of Blsky-Rovine in 1988, which has been since substantiated by the NICHD study where they did one of the big beefs of these 17 national and internationally renowned and national researchers, which was that they didn't believe the Ainsworth test was any good and so on. So they tested the Ainsworth test for attachment. It came through, and people on both sides of the fence—Clarke-Stewart and Jay Blsky, who don't agree on anything, literally—did end up finding, and it's stated right in the introduction in their very first paper, that they both did agree and they both have found that this time, about 20 hours a week, turns about to be....

The reason those researchers did about 25 hours a week on this study was because they wanted to make it a little more critical, a little more rigorous. But it's very important to state that the median of time away for these young children is around 37 hours.

So it appears that when children are spending irregular time, they're spending a lot of time away. Further study would have to be done, I would submit, on breaking up the amounts of time—20, 25, 30, 35, that kind of thing—to assess if there is a gradient or not. That is work that is not done and that should be done, I would submit.

The last one is, what is a normal kid? What are age-appropriate responses and all these kinds of things? This is part of the reason why we have school, kindergarten, generally, historically starting around five years of age and then working in. The theory historically has been around physiological developments that occur some time around that age where children are able to understand and hold what we call internal representational models of their parents for longer periods of time. Younger than that, it appears not to last longer. Certainly there is a gradient. This is again one of the reasons why in the studies we try to take a look at whether there are differences, children starting, preschoolers starting, day care or non-parental care before three years of age and after three years of age, and what do we make of it.

The government has said one year maternity or paternity leave. Is one year the only critical time? Is it two years? This an ongoing debate. It would appear, thus far, that it is certainly longer than one year.

There it is in 30 seconds or less.

The Chair: Very good.

[Translation]

Ms. Gagnon.

Ms. Christiane Gagnon: I understand what you are talking about. I know we were discussing daycare, and the fact that the parental bond is an objective. This bond with the parent must be continuous. For my part, I can't see this bond in the society in which we live, where both parents work. In any case, it will be severed through work. Earlier, someone said that when people used to have 12 children, the father went to work in the forest or was a travelling salesman. The child no longer saw the father, but did see the mother.

• 1725

Therefore, daycare centres are created to support the women who want to go to work, either because they have to, or in order to develop and have access to the labour market.

I know that it isn't always easy for parents to decide to take a job and leave their young children in a daycare centre, but I think this service must be available. We must give support to the families.

Very often, children learn how to make friends in daycare. Today, families only have one or two children; families of three or four are rare. It is good for a child, who is alone, to learn how to play with friends. That is something that today's society has to face. I wonder if it's realistic to think that we will be able to ensure a more continuous parent-child bond in a society where one fifth of the population is poor, where employment is rare and where low-income earners have a hard time making ends meet.

I think we have to go beyond family separation when we deal with daycare services. There are other causes for that. There are other factors that distance the child from the parent during the six hours that the parent spends at work. We must also take into consideration how the child returns to the family. We have to consider the quality of the bond that the child develops with the mother or the father outside the daycare setting. If, for example, the parents have serious problems with their finances or with violence or alcoholism, that will greatly affect the bond they develop with their child. It isn't only because the child is in daycare.

In the case of home daycare, both the mother and the father must work in a location that is removed from the child. The child might feel comfortable in his environment, but if he is alone with a caregiver... We have seen cases where parents had serious doubts about the quality of the care given to their child. We have seen caregivers who did not motivate the children, who didn't play educational games with them. In such cases, the child is left to his own devices and sometimes, it goes even further. The child might be slapped or mistreated or left unattended by the caregiver. I'm not saying that this behaviour is widespread, but we must ensure that quality daycare is available.

We also need stable networks for children. It's a matter of stability. I have noted that in the child care services offered by people who come to the home, very often, the service is not continuous, which means that the child, over a two or three-year period, can have six or seven caregivers. This can really upset a child's continuity. If there is a stable daycare service with good quality caregivers who stimulate the child and if the child returns to a family where there is love from two parents and a certain emotional stability, that has an impact on what you call the quality of the bond that exists between the parents and the child.

I don't know how we can offer the community the possibility of allowing a parent to stay home for five years and to only work 20 hours a week so as to ensure a continuous bond with the child. It affects the child's stability. I find it somewhat difficult to believe that we will be able to offer that.

[English]

The Chair: That will be our last question. We might have last comments.

Dr. Genuis.

Dr. Mark Genuis: Very good, and thank you for your comments. I would wholeheartedly support and agree with you on the vast majority of exactly what you have said.

When you have situations, as you've said, where both parents have to work, how are these relationships maintained?

That is exactly what we're talking about. I believe right at the very top of my presentation I did say that it is not our position to tell people how to live their lives. It's not our position to tell people they have to do one particular thing over another. Parents deserve the dignity and the respect to be able to make the choices in their lives, and our systems should be set up to maximally offer them the opportunity to make the choices that best suit their own situations, their own personal desires.

If a parent feels they have better personal development by being out in the workforce full time after having young children, that is that parent's choice. I would submit that none of us in this room has the right to judge this person, to call this person down or anything. That's their choice.

What I am submitting is that for those parents who decide their own better personal development is being with their children on a full-time basis, that choice should also be respected, and we should work very hard to make that a very realistic opportunity that parents are able to choose.

• 1730

All the rest of the day care information is simply saying, listen, the parents have a critical role to play and should be dignified and respected as such. This should be one of the options available to parents to choose. Nowhere did I or any of my colleagues actually say that we should be telling people how to live their lives, but we should be opening a full range of options to them.

You're right, it's not easy with regard to the socialization. Honestly, we find that children initially socialize better when they learn from parents who are well socialized, and then do better socializing subsequently with peers when they have that base of understanding.

I see the light going. I will stop right there. Feel welcome to call me anytime to....

The Chair: We have 15 minutes, which means we have 10 minutes...well, we have less than that.

So Kerry, Carol, and then we're done.

Ms. Kerry McCuaig: Parents aren't supported in their choices now. You're not supported if you're a parent who chooses to be at home. You're not supported if you're a mother who chooses to be in the workforce.

For parents to have real choice there needs to be public policy. There needs to be a comprehensive family policy, and I would submit that includes income support, parental leave, and community-based children's services. That is the missing part of the link. That's what was committed in the budget. And we hope our governments will take the leadership to ensure a deal is in place by December 2000.

The Chair: Dr. Russell.

Dr. Carol Crill Russell: I would just suggest, once again, that you don't focus totally on a flexible continuum of policy supports for family without considering the public will, because I think that's what's missing. I think as a society, we have to go a long way toward really valuing families with young children, and then I think the public policies would come much more easily.

The Chair: On that note, which I think there would be pretty general agreement on, thank you very much for coming. We most appreciate it. You've been very helpful.

The meeting is adjourned.