Children, Families and Social Development Minister Ahmed Hussen says that while he understands the burden working parents have been carrying for months since schools closed due to the pandemic, Ottawa’s ability to help provinces fully reopen their schools this fall is limited.
Listen to the full episode49:33
Children, Families and Social Development Minister Ahmed Hussen says that while he understands the burden working parents have been carrying for months since schools closed due to the pandemic, Ottawa’s ability to help provinces fully reopen their schools this fall is limited.
In an interview with CBC’s The House, airing today, Hussen said that because education falls under provincial jurisdiction, the federal government can only play a supporting role.
But a growing number of newspaper op-eds and online petitions indicate Canadian parents aren’t satisfied with that answer.
“I think all parents have been put in a completely untenable situation. They’ve been asked to home school and be responsible for their kids’ education and they’ve had to parent at the same time as working. Like most parents, I think I’m at the breaking point,” Lauren Dobson-Hughes, an Ottawa-based consultant specializing in gender, health and rights, told CBC Radio’s The House.
“It just feels like we were holding it together, miraculously, but that can’t continue. The issue of reopening of schools has not been a priority for anyone.
“We can open nail salons, restaurants, golf clubs, but we don’t have the political will … to reopen schools properly. It’s an afterthought.”
Dominic Cardy, New Brunswick’s education minister; Russell Copeman, executive director of the Quebec English School Boards Association; and Anna Banerji, a pediatric infectious disease specialist talk about how Canada’s kids can return to school in the fall. Plus, Families, Children and Social Development Minister Ahmed Hussen addresses whether Ottawa can help the provinces tackle that challenge. 21:48
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said he expects the Canadian economy to come roaring back as the virus comes more fully under control — but that can’t happen if parents can’t work, and a lot of them won’t be able to work until schools fully reopen. So while education is the purview of the provinces, the economic recovery is a national challenge.
Women have borne the brunt of trying to balance work with par