From the Tyee:
http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2014/08/04/Christy-Clark-Zombie-Tactic/
Christy Clark's Forty Bucks a Day Zombie Tactic
We're in the dead of summer, even before the back-to-school sales, and the B.C. teachers' strike has been going on quietly, behind the scenes. So it seemed odd when Finance Minister Mike de Jong announced his subsidy of $40 a day per child to parents of children 13 or younger, if the strike actually carries on into September.
Reportedly the offer could offset the costs of child care, or tutoring, or finding online courses. Or maybe beer and popcorn for the parents as a consolation for spending unpaid quality time with their kids.
Whatever the impromptu baby bonus might be for, it's scant compensation for missed days or weeks of school. It also offers an insight into the way the BC Liberals think about government in general and education in particular.
............
The real purpose of public education is to equip young people with the skills, knowledge, and mindset needed to assume control of the country itself. They are the citizen-proprietors of Canada, not cheaply trained employees. If they are currently alienated from the democratic political process, they are like shareholders bamboozled into letting management run wild while ignoring their best interests.
In immediate political terms, the BC Liberals' bamboozling seems to be based on isolating B.C. teachers. As those with the greatest interest in smoothly running public schools, parents have tended to support the BCTF, and most are aware that the B.C. Supreme Court has twice upheld the teachers' position on their breached contracts of 2002 and 12 years of deliberate underfunding.
But Christy Clark and her finance minister seem to think that 40 bucks a day for babysitting (or popcorn and beer) will pry parents away from the teachers. Hey, when it's ideology, it doesn't have to make sense.
and a Letter to the Penticton Herald:
I have just found out that the BC Liberal Government is going to be offering the parents of school children under 13, $40 per school day in the eventuality of a prolonged strike this autumn. What an amazing thing to do! As a person always looking for a way to assist the good people of this province, allow me to offer to augment this master plan.
I would like to offer all parents the opportunity to have these same children schooling for the cost of $30 per day. The parents will have to get them to the place of instruction, and they will also be responsible to provide a lunch for their child -- just like a regular school. Same hours too; 9 to 3, one hour for lunch. The child will be offered instruction by qualified personnel (retired teachers, unemployed teachers, striking teachers, etc). It is suggested that we will be able to use actual school facilities, since they will be sitting idle anyways. This way the school district will get some dearly needed funds through rentals. We could possibly even use school text materials that are just sitting about. The bonus to all you taxed parents is that you get paid a net $10 per day to have your kids in school. Cool, right?
Now, I'm no math whiz, but at $30 per day a class of 30 students is $900. Given that the highest paid teacher now gets much less than this, I feel that when all is said and done, I'll be getting very rich on the backs of all you inconvenienced parents, not to mention all the other taxpayers that are being bled by this fantastic government 'solution'. My wildest imaginings have my plan offering 5, 6 or even 10 classes of 30 (maybe more in each class, because the government doesn't mind). Even with 30 kidlets per class, ten classes would rake in $9000 per day. That's PER DAY. Yippee! Talk about Gross Revenue. With this sort of money I could give most of it to the BCTF to hand out to their striking members, and I'd still be doing OK. You have to love them Liberals, they sure know how to handle this strike thing.
Did I mention that I think this government plan is simply amazing? Damned right it is. It's amazing in that the people running this province are busy thinking up these amazingly stupid ideas instead of actively solving this dispute with the teachers. Simple. Amazing. Sad.
Is there anyone smart in charge any more?
F. Barton
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