Coming to an American city in the near future.
Via MaCleans
The British Columbia government said on Sunday it expects to be helping parents pay the costs of daycare because the first day of school appears to be delayed indefinitely by an ongoing teachers’ strike.
Education Minister Peter Fassbender said parents who start registering at the government’s website can expect to receive $40 a day as early as late September or early October, although the website says the payments will come after the strike is over.
“The registration process went live,” the minister said. “People are already registering for that $40.”
The Ministry of Education said the website experienced several glitches on Sunday, and investigations are underway to determine the cause.Many parents were concerned daycare bills would become a problem if school did not start on time and in July, the government proposed to give cash to parents with children aged 12 and under if that was the case.
However, Jim Iker of the BC Teachers’ Federation has been critical of the move, calling it an unhelpful bribe during a recent union conference.[…]
The B.C. Supreme Court ruled earlier this year the province had violated the union’s rights by stripping teachers of their ability to bargain for class size and support in 2002, but the government has launched an appeal of that decision.
The ruling prompted teachers to ask the government to set aside $225 million every five years to deal with grievances stemming from the court case, but Fassbender’s proposal would have put negotiations regarding those problems on hold.
Iker has said he is unwilling to back away from dealing with those issues, but after talks collapsed on Saturday, he said teachers were willing to reduce the grievance fund to $100 million.