The provincial government is being called on this week to make childcare more accessible.
Child Care Now Nova Scotia (CCN-NS) published a blog post on Wednesday after the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives Nova Scotia (CCPA-NS) released its annual 2023 Report Card on Child and Family Poverty in Nova Scotia: Families Deserve Action, Not Excuses.
The report shows that in 2021, child poverty rates in Nova Scotia increased by 11.4 per cent, the highest single-year increase since 1989. Low-income families in the province are struggling to have access to services such as daycare, Kenya Thompson from CCN-NS says.
Through funding from the Canada-wide early learning and child care agreement, Nova Scotia has committed to providing $10 a day childcare services by 2026.
“$10 per day is still a really steep investment for a lot of low income families that are living off of social assistance,” Thompson says. “It represents 11 per cent of their income.”
CCN-NS and CCPA-NS are calling on the provincial government to remove barriers to universal public services.
