NDP Leader John Horgan visits with former constituent Fred MacDonald during a weekend visit to Penticton.
See additional coverage of the NDP leader’s visit on Page A3.
Troubling stories from parents struggling to access childcare in Penticton and other parts of B.C. made their way to height of political power in the province Saturday, as NDP Leader John Horgan met with a local advocate during a campaign stop in the city.
Amanda Burnett started the Waitlisted Project in the spring of 2020 after learning her daughter was 75th on the waiting list to get into a local daycare. She began gathering similar stories from parents elsewhere and sharing them on social media.
“I ended the project last year in October or November with 70 testimonials from 20 communities across B.C.,” Burnett told Horgan during a sit-down with a group of local parents at the Safety Village to which media was invited.
“There are so many parents saying the same thing: We need access to affordable, quality childcare, but we need that sustainability. We need that childcare to be there for generations to come.”
Horgan, who was joined by local NDP candidate Toni Boot, told Burnett he’s well aware of the need.
“I’ve got so many stories in my inbox just like you’ve been hearing,” he said.
Just as it was in the 2017 election, $10-a-day childcare remains a key plank in the NDP’s platform. The party claims its work so far has resulted in 32,700 families in B.C. now paying $10-a-day or less for childcare, and created 20,000 new child-care spaces.
In addition, the Horgan government last year committed to training more early childhood educators by adding 314 seats to programs at 12 colleges around B.C., and has made it a priority to have childcare spaces included in new public facilities like schools.
“These are simple things, yet we started from zero, and now we’ve just got to build it out and it will take some time,” said Horgan.
“We’ve made some progress — we’ve got a lot more work to do.”
The NDP platform pledges $1.5 billion in new funding for childcare over the next three years, but doesn’t explain where the money will come from. It also projects a $15-billion deficit for 2021.
After his stop at the Safety Village — next door to which is Kiwanis Park, where a new 114space childcare centre is slated to be built thanks to a $2.9-million commitment from the NDP government — Horgan met with health-care workers at
Slackwater Brewing. From there, he went south to campaign in Oliver in the BoundarySimilkameen riding. Horgan began the day in Kamloops, where he promised a new cancer centre for that region.
Horgan and the NDP rolled into Penticton with a 16-point lead over the Liberals, according to an Angus Reid Institute poll released Friday.
Liberal Leader Andrew Wilkinson also paid a weekend visit to the region with a stop Sunday in Osoyoos, where he spoke at an outdoor rally for Boundary Similkameen candidate Petra Veintimilla.