Presentation to UBC MSW Class November 2013by Helen Ward, Pres. Kids First

Vision & Data

towards

Social Justice & Optimal Child Well-Being

in

Family & Child Policy

About Kids First Parent Association of Canada

• 1987• Registered charity - DONATIONS!• Independent• No $ from gov’t, union, corporate, faith grp• Volunteer parent-run• International movement for…

– women’s unpaid care work– & all unpaid care work– & equity for parental child care – & children’s optimal well-being

My Background

• Stable middle class educated parents

• FT job mum

• BA, BMus, TESL

• Care-work

• Performing

• teaching

Social Justice

• Anti-racism, inter-faith• Philippines – role of Transnational corporations,

IMF, World Bank in exploitation• NDP• Peace movement• Greenpeace, Wilderness Ctte• Amnesty International• Council of Canadians

My early intro to motherhood

• Friend’s pregnancy – women sharing

• Natural childbirth

• Home birth

• Midwifery

• Breastfeeding

• Bonding (attachment)

Books

• Ina May Gaskin - Spiritual Midwifery

• Joseph Chilton Pierce - Magical Child

My Turn – My Vision for My Motherhood – Do’s

• Build life long foundation for health-Breastfeed on demand-organic food

• Carry and hold, pick him up when crying• Cloth diapers• Attach to earth/nature – forest, ocean, animals• BUILD VILLAGE - Attach to extended family,

neighbourhood, all ages• Attach to music, literature, art, history• Inculcate empathy – love and justice

My Turn – My Vision for My Motherhood - AVOID

• Medicated birth

• Toxins

• Allergies, eczema, asthma

• Screens, TV

• Advertizing, consumerism, commodified culture

• Junk food

La Leche League PARENTAL EMPOWERMENT

• Honour, support, celebrate, and enjoy

motherhood & fatherhood & family

More Books• The Continuum Concept• The Family Bed• The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding• Will & Martha Sears - Night Time Parenting, etc• Ivan Illich - Deschooling Society, Gender, Right to

Useful Unemployment• The Politics of Breastfeeding• Marilyn Waring - If Woman Counted• Mate & Neufeld – Hold on to Your Kids: Why Parents

Need to Matter More than Peers• Sue Gerhardt – Why Love Matters: How Affection

Shapes a Baby’s Brain• Penelope Leach – Children First

CHALLENGES! And COMMITMENT

• LICO

• single parent

• etc

Committed to prioritizing doing the care work

RISING PROBLEMS WITH YOUNG

• Suicide• Self harm, cutting• STDs• sexual exploitation• Substance abuse, addiction• Bullying• Obesity • Violence, riots• Excessive screen use & digital addictions• Prescription drugs for mental health and behaviour modification• Allergies, eczema, asthma• Cheating, lying • Falling academic ability• Non-participation in voting

The issue

• EVERYONE AGREES THAT THE EARLY YEARS ARE IMPORTANT FOR LIFE LONG OUTCOMES

BUT!!!

• COMPETING VISIONS • COMPETING WORLD VIEWS/PHILSOPHIES

• Who should control early learning & care?• Who should control the public funding for children and

their families?

My Intro to Daycare Lobby

• Living under regulated Lic Not Required daycare

• RCMP informs daycare about grow-op

• Special entitlement to info

• 1999 secret “public consultation”

• Building a Better Future for BC’s Kids

Kids First is 100% in favour of early learning and child care

HOW DO WE DEFINE “CHILD CARE”?

WORDS MATTER!

DEFINE CHILD CARE

• Child care means “care of a child”• Includes parental child care• Early learning is the learning that a child

does in any situation • All children need child care 24/7/365• All child care & early learning has high

COSTS• Primary cost is supporting the care

provider

DEFINITIONS & DISCRIMINATION

• Different laws, studies, and statistics use different definitions of “child care”

• BC Child Care Act, Child Support laws, and the Tax Act define child care to specifically exclude parental child care

Human Rights

• This exclusion is a Human Rights issue

• The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child says

- Children have the right to be cared for by their own parents – article 7

- Gov’t must respect the rights and duties of parents to interpret children’s rights – article 5

Human Rights

• BC and Can Human Rights Codes protect us from discrimination based on

- Family status- Marital status

These Human Rights laws can be used to overturn laws which discriminate against parental child care, especially as these laws target single mothers and their children.

PARENTS

• Are held legally, socially, morally responsible for children – eg RIOTS, gun violence… “Where are the parents!!?”

• BC Parental responsibility Act• are the people held personally legally criminally liable for

children’s care & supervision.

• Are in the best position to know their children• are diverse – health, $, jobs, schedules, family size,

support, beliefs, etc NO 2 FAMILIES ALIKE• are told by gov’t to closely monitor any non-parental child

care.

PRESSURED PARENTS

• High pressure • NOW - EXTREME EXPECTATIONS

- SAFETY – car seats, PREDATORS- constant supervision - car - drive- monitor screen, TV- can’t play outside- advertizing, porn- lessons & activities Sports, music, swim , etc - - homework- HOUSING COST

POLICY CREATE THE SOCIAL CONTEXT FOR CHILD REARING

CURRENT POLICY HOSTILE TO PARENTS & CHILD REARING

• GDP growth #1 national goal• GDP growth thru’ “professionalization of care” – replace

SOME unwaged care with waged care• Non-GDP activities disvalued – eg cooking, breastfeeding,

unwaged care work• Preferential funding for non-parental care disvalues

parental care• BUT this work is ESSENTIAL TO EXISTENCE OF

SOCIETY• Increase LABOUR SUPPLY = lower wages • FT jobs for all parents BUT do home cooking, monitoring

kids all the time

• 1980s Pres Reagan ended regulations on kids ads

UNWAGED CARE WORK SUBSIDIZES GDP WORK

• Exploitation of unwaged care workers• Unfinanced unwaged care work produces

low-wage care work (nannies, staff, home daycare) – over 95% women

• Need recognition for and adequate financial support for unwaged care work

• BEGIN - THANK PARENTS

FAMILY & CHILD POLICY

• End preferential treatment of non-parental child care/early learning

• Direct funding for children’s care & learning to families eg through a universal refundable tax-credit to age 19

(welfare, EI, UCCB, CTB, CCED, ELCC, K, etc)

• Drop OECD/World Bank policy goal of “shared responsibility” between state and parents for child-rearing

• Explicitly recognize attachment theory & developmental science in policy formation

• Drop GDP growth as primary national goal

• Adopt alternate measures of national well-being and economic growth

• Eliminate toxins affecting children

• Restore restrictions on advertizing to children• Make public transit free to age 13• Ensure daycare regulations do not compromise child development: ratios

BC Child Care Policy Branch Approved Research

• Dr Clyde Hertzman, UBC – HELP- World Bank staff, epidemiologist

• U of T econs Cleveland & Krashinsky- $1 invested=$2 saved-not peer-rev, huge PR, CRRU publication, cited by PM

• Fraser Mustard & Margaret McCain – Early Years Study: Reversing The Real Brain Drain

-not peer-rev, World Bank stressed, blood specialist + billionaire

• High/Scope Perry Preschool Project to age 27-peer-rev: $1= $7 1962, not daycare, mums, pre-welfare reform/workfare, intervention

BASIC FACTS & DEFINITIONS

Check the facts.

Demand truth.

COST:BENEFIT FINDINGS

• Claims that universal daycare/all day K produce long term savings over costs are not peer-reviewed

• published by advocacy orgs

• $1 “invested” saves $1.05 (Fortin – Que daycare)

$2 (Cleveland & Krashinsky) $2.?? (Prentice)

$17 (Perry Pre-school)and even “limitless” (BC Min of Educ)

ACADEMIC MISCONDUCT

- “jaw dropping…gross misrepresentation” of Nobel Laureate economist James Heckman - UBC econ – Kevin Milligan

- UBC’s HELP’s Hertzman and Kershaw claimed Heckman supports these universal programs

ACADEMIC MISCONDUCT & POLICY

- Based on misrepresentation of HECKMAN HELP told business, media, BC & Fed gov’t:

- BC will save $400 BILLION & Canada could save over $3 TRILLION by investing in daycare + all day K + EI to 18 mos

(HELP 15 by 15, submission to Finance Ctte 2009)

HECKMAN & COST:BENEFIT• “none of this evidence supports universal preschool

programs”(The Productivity Argument for Investing in Young Children p 38)• $1 saves $6 long-term for a few mother-intensive programs for very

disadvantaged inner city children (eg Perry Pre-school)

• Vouchers for under-privileged families• “respect” for parents• “we don’t know” what program works best – variety• Not “government bureaucracy” but programs run by community and

faith groupFrom “An Interview with James Heckman” pp 24-29

www.bernardvanleer.org/Family_stress_Safeguarding_young_childrens_care_environment

Work vs Labour Force Participation

• NOT TRUE• “70-80% of mothers are

working”• “in paid workforce”• “full time”• “outside the home”• “including infants and

toddlers”

• 2012 LFP mums youngest child age

0-2 = 69.7%

3-5 = 76.6%

BUT

Children 0-5 with “employed” mothers

= 67%

(CRRU ECEC 2012)

Work vs Labour Force Participation

• “every mother is a working mother”• “work is work” includes unwaged care work• LFP is NOT “work”• 1880s census changed the definition and

suddenly half the women were no longer counted as productive (Politics of Breastfeeding)

• Inflated abused stats distort our perception of reality

• Mothers’ LFP rates are a false proxy measure of daycare demand

Work vs Labour Force Participation

• LFP rate is NOT “work”

• incl

LFP

Employed

Unemployed=

-Looking for work

Not in Labour Force“inactive”

“not working”“leisure”

MISOGYNY

Work vs Labour Force Participation

Employed

Have job & not at it-paid leave

-unpaid leave-EI

Any paid work-Any part time

-with kids present-in home

Unpaid work-farm

- family business

ENROLMENT IN DAYCARE CENTRES

• YOUR ESTIMATE?

ENROLMENT IN DAYCARE CENTRES

• 2000 – 10% 0-5• 2006 – Stats Can – 14.9% 6 mos-5 yrs• Find this stat buried on p 97 of 99 p report• Stats Can media release said “54% in child care”

• MOST PEOPLE GROSSLY OVER-ESTIMATE THIS DUE TO PERVASIVE DIS-INFORMATION

• DISTORTED PERCEPTION=DISTORTED POLICY

False Measures of Daycare Demand

• “waitlists” (3 years etc) – not valid

• “licensed spaces” (for 20%)

• Enrolment

MEASURING TRUE DEMAND REQUIRES DEMOCRACY…

• Full INFORMATION – quality, outcomes, costs

• ASK the right questions

• DEFINITIONS - Clearly defined terms

• REAL CHOICE - Providing full range of options

• DEMOCRACY OR STATISM?

What kind of feminism works for you? The GDP?

• Simone de Beauvoir in The Second Sex 1949

“No woman should be authorized to stay at home with her children….Women should not have that choice precisely because, if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one.”

ARE WOMEN COMPETENT TO MAKE CHOICES? ORSHOULD STATE “PATERNALISTISM” COERCE

WOMEN’S CHOICES?

Neo-liberal Neo-patriarchy

HELP’s Paul Kershaw in “Carefair: Gendering Citizenship ‘Neo-Liberal’ Style”

“utilize the state’s coercive power for the purpose of altering citizenry

decisions”

Strategy model = in neo-lib/-con welfare reform and workfare as in Lawrence Mead 1986 Beyond Entitlement

Women’s Liberation vs Gender Equity

• What happened to “women’s lib”?

• Who invented “gender equity”?

- measures women’s status by comparing us to men

- World Economic Forum measures “gender equity” by % of women in Labour Supply

- What women want, rape, abuse are not counted

POLLS

• 2013 – IMFC -76% parental care best for child under 6

- 61+% say funding to families not daycare system• 2004 – Vanier Inst - 9 of 10 prefer parental care - daycare centres ranked 5th

• 2006 - SWEDEN - 64% gov should fund parents to look after kids to age 4

(9% don’t know)

Sources at www.kidsfirstcanada.org/polls-on-funding.htm

COSTS

MUST INCLUDE “ALL COSTS” – Rand Corp.

CENTRE CARE COSTS ARE THE HIGHEST-operating costs-capital, land-rent-gov’t oversight-training-research, promotion, advocacy-“negative externalities” – infection, behaviour

COSTS

Parental care

Opportunity costs – eg foregone income

SOME DOLLAR COSTS• Quebec - $7/day system – 2010 – per space subsidy paid to non-

profit centres

- $17,913 age 0-17 mos- $12,406 age 18-59 mos

- $9,000 – in family based daycare(Haeck, Lefebvre, Merrigan – “Quebec’s childcare…10 years after” 2012 p.14

• $26,972/yr – 2007 Sweden – average daycare subsidy per child age 1-5

www.kidsfirstcanada.org/SwDaycarecosts.pdf

COMPARE WELFARE RATE

• BC single parent with 1 child

• Youngest must be under 3

• $11,340/yr (12 mos x $954.month)

COSTS ARE NOT FEES

• Daycare is heavily subsidized even for high income families

• 50% centre operating costs are covered by gov’t (CRRU ECEC 1998)

• UBC fees – FT infant care $1100/month

• UBC pays all rent, janitorial, and admin costs. EXCLUDING RENT is $1800/yr/child.

QUALITY - RATIOS

• Peer-reviewed empirical evidence – HARD TO FIND:

• One study:

• -no children under 14 mos in study

• 50% of children do not receive adequate developmental care or physical care at adult:child ratios of…

% children receive inadequate care when ratio is….

BC Quebec

50% - 0[14]-24 mos: 1:3 1:4 1:5,1:8

40% - 25-36 mos: over 1:6 1:4,1:8 1:8

50% - 37mos-4.5yrs: 1:8 1:8 1:8,1:10 K 1:22 4yr K 1:18 5yr K 1:20

• “Thresholds of quality: Implications for the social development of children in center-based care.” Child Development, 63 1992

www.cckm.ca/ChildCare/pdf/Howes1992.pdf

Current Regulations Ensure Low-Quality Care

• Gov’t-regulated care is low quality

• Regulation by gov’t currently ensures low-quality care for majority in centres-ratios-group size

• Parents MUST regulate

• Children’s Charter right to “security of person” is violated by gov-regs

STUDIES ON QUALITY OF CARE

• Peer-rev - US – National Institute for Child Health and Human Development MOST IN DEPTH ‘GOLD STANDARD’ STUDY OF CHILD CARE EFFECTS- NICHD data shows highest quality of non-maternal child care was in father and grandparent care, lowest quality was in centres

• Sweden - Swedish gov & OECD (not peer –rev): Swedish daycare has “problem of quality”: too many children per staff, inadequate staff training, inadequate facilities, negative impact on long-term learning

• Canada - You Bet I Care!1 – HRDC - 2000 (not peer-rev) “majority of licensed daycare in Canada is minimal to mediocre quality” does not meet children language and development needs

• Canada – Quebec - Quality Counts!- IRPP – (not peer-rev): 73% of centre care is “minimal” or worse than minimal

OUTCOMES: H.E.L.P.’S STUDIES VS HELP POLICY

• “Pro-social behaviour scores were lowest for children in licensed day care and highest for children in unregulated home care and relative care.” Statistics Canada “National Data Sets: Sources of Information for Canadian Child Care Data” by Hertzman and 2 other HELP staff, p.14 http://www.statcan.ca/english/research/11F0019MIE/11F0019MIE2006284.pdf

• “participating in early childhood care and education programs and services at the age of 2 and 3 had little direct association with children's home and school outcomes in Kindergarten.”HELP, “The association of early childhood care and education to children’s experiences in Kindergarten” February 2006 by Hertzman, Kohen, Lipps (removed from web)

HELP’s EDI Junk Science• All-day K was implemented in BC and Ont based on HELP’s claim –

cited by both Premiers - that

30+% “at risk”, “stunted”, “vulnerable”, “not ready” – HELP’s interpretation of Early Development Instrument (EDI)

• Over 10% vulnerability is “biologically unnecessary” - Hertzman

• BUT EDI website says ONLY 5% - mostly ESL, boys, younger“1 in 20 children enter kindergarten without the skills they need to

learn”www.offordcentre.com/readiness

HELP 15 by 15, Pascal With a Better Future in Mind

PEER-REVIEWED OUTCOMES

• NICHD to age 15: more time in daycare centre associated with significantly increased “risk” behaviour at age 15

• Duke University – 2010 – all-day K vs half day: produced slight academic advantage that faded by Gr 3, as well as behaviour problems

Peer-reviewed Outcomes

• Baker, Gruber, Milligan – 2010 – Journal of Pol Econ – Que – $5/day daycare had negative impact on child and parent health, parenting, behaviour, children better off before the policy

• Haeck, Lefebvre, Merrigan (2012 – in rev. now) – Que – “Que Childcare…10 years”- social inequity, high cost, lower academic outcomes and worsened behaviour

ILLNESS• Feces, saliva, mucus and kids’ poor hygiene skills make daycares

unsanitary

• Que daycare children - 6 mos URTI cost estimated at $1million

• Many studies have shown increase rates of infections of all types and more serious illness in children in centres

• Sweden: daycare kids are 6.78X more likely to be sick than kids in parental care

• “super-bugs” originating in daycares

• Centre gets funding for sick children who must be cared for elsewhere

CORTISOL=STRESS

• Cortisol is released under stress and is involved in the development of self-regulation and well as immune system

• Studies repeatedly show elevated cortisol levels in children in centre care

• “Centre-based child care is associated with increased reactivity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis.”

• Watamura et al Child Development 2003, 2012, etcwww.pubmedcentralcanada.ca/pmcc/articles/PMC3295236/

Cortisol and Attachment

• ATTACHMENT to teacher reduces this problem

Which Kind of Attachment?

• Labour Force Attachment

• VS

• PARENT-CHILD ATTACHMENT

DAYCARE & ATTACHMENT• Poor staff:child ratios

+

large group size

+

Lack of long-term consist care-provider

+

ECEC approaches that reject developmental science & attachment theory

=

widespread attachment problems

WHAT CHILDREN NEEDDr Gordon Neufeld

• To be ATTACHED to the adults responsible for them

• To be VULNERABLE

- soft hearts

- Able to cry

ATTACHMENT

• Most powerful human INSTINCT

• “Attachment is always comes first” - Neufeld

• PURPOSE

• Drives children to seek to be cared for

• Drives adults to care for children

ATTACHMENT is US

• Adult-attached children are MUCH EASIER to care for

• They are INSTINCTUALLY ORIENTED to• be with us• copy us• please us• accept our direction• share their secrets with us

GOAL OF ATTACHMENT

• Satiate attachment needs

• SO child can be free of these needs for a while

• When attachment needs are satiated the child is AT REST and freed for optimal development, learning, growth

VITAL VULNERABILITY VS ALARM

• VULNERABILITY is required for exploration

• Curiosity

• Emergence

• Love

• learning, empathy, individuation, true friendship, resilience, adaptation

CONFLICTING ATTACHMENTS

• Children are designed to attach PRIMARILY to parents

• Attachments to other children, people, things, ideas are all fine, unless…

• ATTACHMENTS CONFLCIT

PEER ORIENTATION

• Children MUST attach

• They are meant to be attached to and oriented to the adults responsible for them

• If they cannot attach to the adults responsible for them they may attach to PEERS

• PEER ORIENTATION undermines vulnerability and development

PEER ORIENTATION

• When PEERS REPLACE ADULTS children are INSTINCTUALLY DRIVEN to

• Be with

• Copy

• Please

PEERS

SUPERFICALITY OF PEER ATTACHMENTS

• Peers attach at the most SUPERFICIAL LEAST VULNERABLE levels of attachment:

• Be with, be like, belong

• children are not meant to be responsible for each other

• TOO IMMATURE:• to foster emergence and differences• To value and protect individuality & vulnerability

MORE PEER-REV STUDIES• US Ad Health - $25 million – 90,000 adolescents

“Protecting Adolescents from Harm: Findings form the National Longitudinal Study on Adolescent Health”

• Study to find protective and risk factors for health: suicide, drinking, drugs, violence, early sexual debut, pregnancy, unprotected sex, smoking

• “Across all the health outcomes examined, the results point to the importance of family and the home environment for protecting children from harm. What emerges most consistently is the teenager's feeling of connectedness with parents and family.”

• Independent of race, ethnicity, family structure and poverty status, adolescents who are connected to their parents, to their families, and to their school community are healthier than those who are not.”

Journal of the American Medical Assoc., Sept. 10, 1997

ANIMAL STUDIES• “Maternal separation produces lasting changes in cortisol

and behaviour in rhesus monkeys” -PNAS 2011www.pnas.org/content/early/2011/08/12/1010943108.abstract

• RATS & maternal separation - Many studies show increased addiction, brain chemistry alterations, aggression, etc

• Rat pups who were licked more by mothers cope better with stress later in life, produce fewer stress hormones. – Dr Michael Meany McGillwww.news.sciencemag.org/1997/09/extra-licking-makes-relaxed-rats

CONCLUSIONfund families

• Social Justice - Human Rights- women’s equality

• Nature/Science- children’s well-being = adult well-being

• Democracy-respect for diversity-“real choice”

• Economics - cost:benefit - GDP growth?