(Ottawa) The federal Minister of Families still sees a need for the Canada Child Benefit, even in a Canada with a national child care system.
Karina Gould said the Canada Child Benefit was never intended as a child care program, but to help parents defray the costs of raising families and reducing poverty rates.
Since the introduction of the income-tested allowance in 2016, the poverty rate for children under 18 fell to 9.7% in 2019, the most recent year for which data is available. In comparison, the rate was 16.4% in 2015.
Minister Gould said the initiative to build a national child care system also aims to ease cost pressures for parents by reducing child care fees which in some cities can cost more than a payment. monthly mortgage.
But even when average fees hit the government’s target of $ 10 a day by 2026, Minister Gould believes there will still be households that need the Canada Child Benefit to pay the bills.
That is why she does not see the benefit of removing this measure from the federal toolbox for families.
“There will always be families – maybe a single parent or a single income household, or there are reasons the other parent is unable or unable to work – who will continue to need this benefit. Karina Gould said in an interview.
“I think this will continue to be a very important way for us to fight child poverty in Canada. ”
The government’s December economic update predicted spending on family allowances to decline for the second consecutive fiscal year from April, from $ 26.4 billion to $ 25.5 billion, before climbing to $ 28. , $ 2 billion by 2027.
The decrease is the result of the end of a temporary bonus paid to families with young children.
Minister Gould said there had been a reduction in ACE payments because families received Emergency Income Support in 2020, but the decline was nowhere near as dramatic as seen for low-income seniors who receive the Guaranteed Income Supplement.
As spending on benefits increases, the government will increase its annual funding for provincially administered child care systems. The Liberals have signed agreements with 11 provinces and territories, only Nunavut and Ontario remain.
On talks with Canada’s most populous province, Karina Gould said there was political goodwill on both sides of the negotiating table to strike a deal, although she did not specify how much long it might take.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appointed Karina Gould Minister of Families, Children and Social Development in October, after previously serving as Minister of Democratic Institutions and, more recently, International Development.
For Minister Gould, assuming her new position helps to merge her political and personal life: her three-year-old son is in daycare in Ottawa and her constituency is in Burlington, in the western end of the Greater Toronto Area.
A parent during the pandemic herself, Karina Gould said she kept in mind that families, and children in particular, need a little more support than usual “because life is dying. ‘so much more difficult’.
A recent report from the government’s Poverty Advisory Board noted that the pandemic has been traumatic for children through rounds of lockdowns that can have “lasting impacts on general health and on the educational attainment of an entire generation. “.
Minister Gould is responsible for strengthening mental health services for children and has suggested that one way to do this would be to allocate money to the provinces in health transfers.
It also has on its plate the modernization of Service Canada, which is responsible for distributing billions of benefits annually.
The decision to digitize the ministry’s systems includes automatic enrollment of seniors for Old Age Security and Income Supplement payments.
Better work could better identify older people who are still not receiving benefits, she said, and perhaps deliver unemployment benefits to people faster by seeing payroll changes in real time.
“There is a huge opportunity here to serve Canadians and provide support to citizens in a much more effective and efficient manner which will alleviate a lot of stress and really help provide them with these benefits when they need them,” said said Minister Gould.