Monday, September 10, 2007

Childcare is about choice

Conservatives want children to be parented in the home and it should be paid for by the state. Bob McCroskie of Family First put the case in today's NZ Herald.

My response;

Childcare is about choice

Bob McCoskrie argues that full-time parenting is a child's right so no parent should be forced to work to survive financially. The same argument was probably put in the seventies when politicians were considering what to do about the growing number of unpartnered mothers. Then the argument won the day and delivered the domestic purposes benefit - the statutory right for any single parent to be paid a living wage out of the Consolidated Fund.

Now it would appear conservatives want to extend that payment to all parents based on the their belief that childcare is bad for children - childcare being any care other than that provided by the parent. McCoskrie has presented ample research to support his case from United States, Canadian and English institutions but ignored a New Zealand report - Influences of Maternal Employment and Early Childhood Education on Young Children's Cognitive and Behavioural Outcomes. It reviewed both domestic and international studies and concluded that maternal employment in itself had no negative or positive effects on children. Negative impacts for children arose from early, extensive and poor quality non-maternal care combined with poor quality home care. Further studies have shown, unsurprisingly, that children from poor homes can benefit from good quality daycare.

This doesn't concern the big state conservatives because it doesn't fit with their theory that all and any childcare is bad. In fact, to acknowledge that some parenting is poorer than childcare really queers their pitch because it is often the parenting already paid for by the state that falls short of desirable standards. We are not short of recent examples.

In truth it isn't possible to make blanket statements about the effects of childcare because the care - the type and amount of - is as varied as children and their responses. McCoskrie's "A child's place is in the home" is one such statement. It's a 'we know best' approach. Which is somewhat ironic coming from one of the staunchest opponents of nanny state's recent attempts to tell parents how to raise their children by outlawing smacking. Now Mr McCroskie wants to tell parents how best to raise their children by not using childcare.

And worse, he wants the state to furnish his ideology. The cost would run into the billions while simultaneously the workforce would shrink. Treasury hasn't been calling for higher participation in the workforce by women because it wants to damage children. It does so because New Zealand badly needs to lift its productivity. A strong economy has benefits for everybody.

Additionally, now would be a particularly bad time for New Zealand to deplete its workforce because of our ageing population and the demands that will incur. McCroskie would probably argue that the country needs to produce more children but we already produce more children than nearly every other developed country. Those that offer the kind of assistance he wants - Estonia, Germany and the Czech Republic - are struggling with fertility rates.

There are no good economic or sound social reasons to turn our backs on childcare. It's part of the modern economy and makes a positive contribution to people's ability to make choices that suit their individual circumstances. A childs place in not unequivocally in the home and neither is a mother's.

3 comments:

ZenTiger said...

Apparently I'm a conservative and I broadly agree that parenting is best done by the parents. However, rather than look at this as a requirement for the State to fund, I'd suggest the state stop taking so much in tax.

A FLAT TAX rate would allow a Dad to earn enough at the higher ends so that mum could stay at home or work part time to be with the kids (if that's what they want).

Alternatively, a married couple, where the Mum stays home could apply HER tax thresholds to the Dad's income (ie income splitting) is the state taking less to allow more choice, not the state funding parents.

Lindsay Mitchell said...

Your comment isn't conservative Zen. You said "If that's what THEY want". And it certainly isn't big-state conservative because you expect them to fund their choice.

Anonymous said...

Access to quality early childhood education isn't a liberal or conservative, left or right issue.
Or, perhaps, its everyone's issue. From my fairly liberal perspective, its an essential starting point if all children are to have the chance to succeed according to their own abilities.
I've just been reading a new book by David Kirp "The Sandbox INvestment" (Harvard Uni Press). David's a public policy professor at UC Berkeley. This is a good accessible read that combines the research and evaluation evidence on the characteristics and effects of quality ECE, with a discription of how the US childcare movement has risen in both Red and Blue states. Worth a look.