ADVOCACY UPDATE - JUNE 01, 2007
Dear friends of Child Care,
The Code Blue Tour is Well Underway
Code Blue is off and running on its national tour to raise awareness and support for a publicly funded, comprehensive child care system. The tour serves to put pressure on both the federal and provincial governments, put child care on the federal election agenda where it belongs and, most importantly, help to support and inspire the tireless activists fighting for child care on the ground.
On May 11 in Victoria, the Child Care – Let’s Make it Happen! campaign partners – the Coalition of Child Care Advocates of BC and the BC Government and Services Employees Union – joined with the Code Blue for Child Care Campaign, their national advocacy partners, to launch a 2 week tour of BC communities. Young mothers, community activists and early childhood educators participated in a lively evening forum, and then the BC leg of the Code Blue tour moved on to several other communities such as Duncan, Vernon, Castlegar, Prince Rupert, and Richmond.
While in Prince Rupert, for example, Code Blue coordinator Morna Ballantyne spent the day with both local and provincial child care activists. Together they visited child care programs, met with a class of early childhood educators at the First Nations Training and Development Centre, attended a luncheon with community agencies, city councillors, and other community members, and met with local media. To end the day, and in celebration of child care month in BC, more than 100 people attended a community pot luck supper and dance.
“Communities are inspiring” concluded Ballantyne on her completion of the BC tour. “Everywhere we see the evidence of caring, committed early childhood workers. Yet, we’re also seeing evidence of the problems created by the lack of public funding for child care – parents are frustrated because waitlists are growing and fees are increasing, and trained staff are leaving a field that they love but can’t afford to work in”.
Here is a link to a CBC radio story, just one example of the various types of media coverage that the tour has enjoyed thus far.
Code Blue would like to send a huge thank you to the Coalition and BCGEU for organizing the tour as part of their Child Care - Let's Make it Happen! campaign. The events themselves involved an amazing number of local community activists who prove everyday that they are both dedicated and powerful individuals. Please watch the code blue website for more details about when the tour comes to your area. Come out and support the promise of universal child care in Canada.
As part of the tour, Code Blue is collecting photos with messages from activists, children and child care workers to take to the federal government. Take a look and see what they are telling the government about child care services in Canada!