Press release

Francophone child care in Alberta: Those left out of the Child Care Capacity Building (Space Creation) Grant

 

Edmonton, April 27th 2021 – The Fédération des parents francophones de l’Alberta (FPFA) wishes to state its disappointment regarding the lack of spaces attributed to Francophones through the Child Care Capacity Building (Space Creation) Grant.

When grants were recently attributed to reinforce the capacity of child care services, the Ministry of Children’s Services created 1,500 new daycare spaces. It is a commendable accomplishment, especially when one considers that the initial goal was to create 300 spaces. However, of those 1,500 spaces, only 19 spaces are for francophone daycare (16 in Brooks and 3 in Calgary), whereas Calgary and Edmonton alone count 50,000 francophone residents.

The FPFA understands that two of the key evaluation measures were demography and the concentration of child care services by region, but a strictly demographic approach is inherently poorly adapted since francophone families are widely dispersed across the province. More appropriate criteria would have prioritized measures based on linguistic transmission, cultural heritage, and the need for specifically francophone daycare spaces. Francophone families have identical needs in terms of child care and should not be put at a disadvantage simply because they are not grouped together in one particular urban or rural region.

“When the Francophones don’t get their share, they don’t have a choice but to go to anglophone services, and that is not acceptable!” declares FPFA’s president, Gillian Anderson.

The FPFA finds that the federal government’s budgetary engagement towards investing massively in child care services is very promising. The FPFA hopes that the Ministry of Children’s Services will rapidly negotiate a transfer agreement with the federal government that recognizes the francophone community and provides better financing to address the shortage of daycare spaces.

The FPFA is delighted to note that child care services and early childhood are priorities for the Albertan and federal governments, and continues to fight so that Fancophones are not left behind and obtain a sufficient amount of new spaces in francophone child care services in Alberta.

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For more information:
Mireille Péloquin, Executive Director
780-468-6934 – direction@fpfa.ab.ca