Quebec Auditor General Renaud Lachance :

Dept: It has become an icon of postmodern Quebec, a service that is credited with boosting the province's birthrate, allowing young mothers to go back to work, and creating a level playing field for the children of the rich and the poor alike, according to Montreal Gazette. It was an inauspicious start, and things got worse. The situation has degenerated to the point where Quebec's new anti-corruption body this week announced plans to investigate the program for irregularities in the awarding of contracts. Quebec Auditor General Renaud Lachance, in the final report of his 10-year mandate, had harsh words for the minister responsible for the daycare system, Family Minister Yolande James, saying she has lost control of the network and seven-dollar-a-day daycare in Quebec is not just a $2-billion business whose tab happens to be picked up by taxpayers. But controversy has swirled around the network since its inception in 1997, when Quebecers lined up on a first-come first-served basis for the places that then cost $5 a day. The charge was raised to $7 a day in 2004, as the province struggled to keep up with demand. Right from the beginning, it was obvious that the parents who were benefiting most from this publicly funded system were those who were not in need of state subsidies. The number of spaces created always trailed behind demand, and in any case these spaces generally served parents who held 9-to-5 jobs. Shift workers and weekend workers are still for the most part out in the cold. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.