Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I want to talk about day care. We have watched many day care centres open and, subsequently, close their doors. We have to ask ourselves why.

We talk about support for families and women in this Legislature, and is there anything more important to a student, or working mother, than knowing that her child or children are in good caring and capable hands? We need standards; we need reporting mechanisms; we need program guidelines; and we need safety and quality control. I don't know how many Members of this House have had the responsibility of caring for someone else's pre-schoolers, but, Mr. Speaker, it is a very demanding job that requires a high degree of commitment.

Day care workers are required to be temporary mom or dad, nurse, teacher, cook, referee and counsellor, and the list goes on. For the owners or managers there is the additional role of business manager, bookkeeper,

accounts payable, account receivable, invoicing, ordering supplies and groceries, and dealing with the challenges of the CCRA, GST remittances, and timely reporting to potential funders such as the GNWT.

As a government, we need to look beyond issuing the edicts of how things shall be done. We need to see if there are ways that we can come along side and offer support; yes, even in a hands-on way to operators who may have an invaluable service to offer to the community, to working or studying parents, but who need a little support to help them meet all the rules and requirements related to their undertaking.

If day care is done right, providing good programming, educational materials and equipment, nutritional snacks and lunches, trained staff and proper staff child ratios, day care is a non-profit business. In order to plan even one month in advance, an operator needs to know how many children will be in their care; they need to know that their sources of revenue are going to be consistent and reliable, and there should be no such thing as a daily rate. There should only be monthly rates for spaces, and this should also include the support from ECE programs. This should be all payable in advance, based on spaces available and the number of children who will be attending.

Mr. Speaker, I think, as a government, we need to recognize the importance of access to quality day care services. We need to recognize that some families may require support to access that service, and we need to recognize that direct financial support may be the only thing that will make the difference between success and/or failure of a facility. We need to think creatively about how we can remove barriers that hold people back from bettering themselves and the lives of their children.

So far, Mr. Speaker, I don't think we have done that. Either we don't believe it's important, or we just need a woman or a mother on the other side of the floor in that Cabinet. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.