News for Week of October 17, 1999
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Canadian Speech from the Throne Commitment to Children
At the opening of the Second Session of the Thirty-Sixth Parliament of Canada on October 12, 1999, the new Governor-General Adrienne Clarkson announced the governments's "national children's agenda" pledging to work with provinces to support early childhood development, invest further in the National Child Benefit, reduce income taxes to families, extend Employment Insurance parental leave benefits, promote more family-friendly environments in federally regulated workplaces, and to work with provinces to reform family law so that the best interests of children come first in separation or divorce.
The government has also announced a plan called the 21st Century Chairs for Research Excellence which pledges to create 2,000 new faculty positions at Canadian universities over the next three years. See Response to Throne Speech by Prime Minister Jean Chrétien.
The full text of the Throne Speech and related information is available at http://www.pco-bcp.gc.ca/sft-ddt/doc/index_e.htm.
Statistics Canada released another report from the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth, entitled From Home to School - How Canadian Children Cope, which suggests that children who are enrolled in early child programs and day-care centres appear to get a head start in school over youngsters who stay at home with a parent.
The survey monitors children's development and measures incidence of factors that influence this development. The NLSCY continues to collect information on the same youth every two years. The informational release and full text version of the report is available through http://www.statcan.ca:80/Daily/English/991014/d991014a.htm
Updated October 17, 1999