Deck 15: Investing in Families and Children: Family Policies in Canada

Question 1

_______ is central for Canadians as it defines families, their forms, which family members are entitled to government support, and the amounts and type of support.

A) Familial strategy
B) A kinship plan
C) Family policy
D) A familial program
E) A kinship policy

Answer 1

Family policy

Question 2

According to Beauvais and Dufour (2003), the governmental "hierarchy of help" prioritizes assistance to the ________ first.

A) educational system
B) family
C) child
D) labour market
E) individual

Answer 2

labour market

Question 3

________ is an employee benefit which includes maternity leave, paternity leave, and adoption leave.

A) Parental leave
B) Relationship leave
C) Kinship leave
D) Dependent leave
E) Family supported leave

Answer 3

Parental leave

Question 4

A concept of government based on the principle of market dominance and private enterprise is better known as ________

A) socialism.
B) communism.
C) conservativism.
D) a liberal welfare state.
E) a free trade state.

Question 5

The majority of Canadian fathers do not take parental leave for all of the following reasons except for ________

A) family choice.
B) difficulty taking time off work.
C) financial issues.
D) cultural expectations of men.
E) additional pressure on their spouse.

Question 6

It was not until ________ that Canada adopted paid maternity leave legislation.

A) 1939
B) 1948
C) 1959
D) 1965
E) 1971

Question 7

In 1984 maternity leave became available to Canadian women who ________

A) fostered a child.
B) adopted a child.
C) babysat a child.
D) were stay-at-home parents.
E) had twins.

Question 8

While the legislation was finally passed for maternity leave, the responsibility for maternity benefits was divided between the ________ and ________ governments.

A) federal; provincial/territorial
B) provincial; territorial
C) provincial; municipal
D) city; provincial
E) federal; territorial

Question 9

By law, in order to be eligible for the maximum amount of parental benefits, parents have to have worked a minimum of ________

A) 600 hours in the past 12 months.
B) 600 hours in the past two years.
C) 400 hours in the past 12 months.
D) 400 hours in the past two years.
E) 80 hours in the past month.

Question 10

Women in Canada are increasingly ineligible for the federal maternity and parental benefits for which of the following reasons?

A) We have more immigrants arriving pregnant than ever before.
B) The number of women working in precarious and low-paying jobs is increasing.
C) More women are in LGBTQI+ relationships.
D) Women are increasingly quitting their jobs rather than seeking a short-term leave.
E) Women with disabilities are increasingly denied access to maternity and parental leave.

Question 11

"________" is a federal pilot project which stipulates that until August 11, 2018, once parents have served the waiting period, they will be able to keep 50 cents of the Employment Insurance benefits for every dollar that they earn (while they are on parental/maternity leave).

A) Working Benefits Program
B) Employment Adjustment Program
C) Working While on Claim
D) Employment and Parental Care Program
E) Employability Claim

Question 12

The following statement regarding Canada's birth benefits is false: ________

A) Eligibility is restricted to employed women who have worked for a minimum of 600 hours. This means that many women are excluded from the program.
B) The majority of fathers do not take parental leave.
C) American birth benefits are superior to those offered in Canada.
D) As of 2015, 30% of Canadian fathers take parental leave or plan to.
E) The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) praised Canada for its enhanced parental leave program in 2004.

Question 13

The introduction of the ________ in 1918 was the first federal financial support program for Canadian families.

A) Child Tax Exemption
B) Working Income Supplement
C) Child Allowance
D) Family Allowance
E) Child Tax Benefit

Question 14

The ________ is a federal advisory board with a mandate devoted exclusively to fight poverty and cutbacks to the welfare system.

A) National Council of Welfare
B) National Poverty Board
C) Canadian Poverty Advisory Board
D) Canadian Welfare Board
E) North American Poverty Committee

Question 15

The Canadian Census began to count foster children in ________

A) 1980.
B) 1995.
C) 2002.
D) 2011.
E) 2016.

Question 16

According to Statistics Canada (2017), the majority of children in the foster care system were ________

A) Newborns.
B) under the age of 2 years.
C) under the age of 5 years.
D) under the age of 10 years.
E) under the age of 14 years.

Question 17

The provinces or territories with the highest proportion of foster children are ________

A) Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
B) Manitoba and the Northwest Territories.
C) Saskatchewan and the Northwest Territories.
D) Alberta and the Yukon.
E) Saskatchewan and Nunavut.

Question 18

As of 2016, more than ________ (of all Indigenous children) have been removed from their homes across Canada.

A) 2,000
B) 4,000
C) 9.875
D) 14,970
E) 18,280

Question 19

Approximately ______________ children and youth in Canada live in foster care, kindship care, and treatment facilities.

A) 10,000
B) 23,000
C) 33,000
D) 53,000
E) 63,000

Question 20

Although there are 30,000 children and youth in the child welfare system are eligible for adoption in Canada, only ____________ are adopted each year.

A) 500
B) 750
C) 1,200
D) 2,000
E) 5,000

Question 21

Foster children often experience, on average, ________ foster home placements over the course of their childhood.

A) two
B) three
C) five
D) seven
E) nine

Question 22

Under ________, parents who adopt a child who has been a permanent ward of the provincial government will receive the same benefits given to foster parents until the child turns 18 years of age.

A) Bill 20
B) Bill 40
C) Bill 83
D) Bill 101
E) Bill 150

Question 23

According to figures reported in Campaign 2000 (2020)________ Canadian children continue to live in poverty.

A) 1 in 5
B) 1 in 10
C) 2 in 10
D) 2 in 100
E) an unknown number of

Question 24

Canada ranked ________ out of 41 industrialized countries on the Index of Child and Youth Well-Being and Sustainability (UNICEF, 2017).

A) 5
B) 10
C) 15
D) 20
E) 25

Question 25

Governments need to focus on alleviating the factors that aggravate adult poverty such as ________

A) declining welfare incomes.
B) the low wage wall (jobs with long hours and no or few benefits).
C) inadequate minimum wages.
D) reduced access to employment insurance.
E) all of the above.

Question 26

The Canada Child Benefit recently introduced by the Trudeau Liberals promises to reduce child poverty by _______

A) 10 per cent.
B) 20 per cent.
C) 30 per cent.
D) 40 per cent.
E) 50 per cent.

Question 27

According to the Canadian Council for Policy Alternatives (2016), ________ of immigrant children and 22 per cent of racialized children live in poverty.

A) 12 per cent
B) 20 per cent
C) 32 per cent
D) 45 per cent
E) 64 per cent

Question 28

________ has the highest child poverty rate at 31.2 per cent while Yukon and Quebec report the lowest at 11.9 per cent and 15.2 per cent, respectively.

A) British Columbia
B) Saskatchewan
C) Manitoba
D) Ontario
E) Nunavut

Question 29

An analysis of the media covering the child-related federal benefits (UCCB and CCB) found that that only _________ per cent discussed the gendered impact of these policies and what it meant for women.

A) 5
B) 15
C) 20
D) 30
E) 35

Question 30

In ____________the federal government introduced the Poverty Reduction Strategy, a historical landmark in Canadian social policy.

A) 1992
B) 2002
C) 2008
D) 2012
E) 2018

Question 31

Quebec's pro-natal strategy of promoting population growth until 1997 was referred to as "________"

A) la revanche des berceaux.
B) the Quiet Revolution.
C) the work-life balance.
D) the family responsibility policy.
E) none of the above.

Question 32

Quebec's innovative family policies have resulted in the province moving towards a more ________

A) liberal welfare state.
B) social welfare state.
C) state interventionist model.
D) socialist state.
E) new age model.

Question 33

Quebec can no longer be classified as a liberal welfare state because of a universal policy that _______

A) supports only low-income families.
B) excludes recent immigrants.
C) does not aid families in balancing work and family life.
D) supports all families.
E) supports only families with young children.

Question 34

Quebec's pro-natal policies were an outcome of the ________

A) Quiet Revolution.
B) government change of 1978.
C) pro-natal revolution.
D) Child Care Advocacy Association.
E) Family Revolution.

Question 35

Based on its child care and family policy initiatives, ________ is moving towards the more heavily state interventionist model of social democracy.

A) Saskatchewan
B) Ontario
C) Quebec
D) British Columbia
E) Nova Scotia

Question 36

Canadian governments have always influenced families: determining who marries, marital age, and how unions end.

Question 37

The Canadian government has always had a comprehensive national policy with regard to supporting families, particularly children.

Question 38

The "hierarchy of help" refers to the Canadian government's priority in assisting the labour market first rather than the family.

Question 39

Ottawa focuses more on income support, emphasizing child protection, while provincial and territorial governments concentrate on welfare assistance and other services.

Question 40

According to the 2016 Census, women account for 50 per cent of lone parents in Canada.

Question 41

According to the 2016 Census, the percentage of children living in common-law households has increased to 11.63 per cent.

Question 42

Stepfamilies were counted for the first time in the 2016 Census.

Question 43

It was not until 1971 that Canada offered paid maternity leave legislation.

Question 44

The responsibility for maternity benefits was divided between the provincial, territorial, and municipal governments.

Question 45

Women adopting a child were finally made eligible to receive parental/adoption leave benefits in 1984.

Question 46

At present, a mother can add the parental leave to her maternity leave giving her 50 weeks of paid leave, or she can take maternity leave of 15 weeks and return to her employment and her spouse or partner could then take the 35-week parent leave.

Question 47

Although the majority of Canadian fathers do not take parental leave, there has been a substantial increase.

Question 48

The federal government has been financially supporting Canadian families in some way or another since 1918, when it introduced the Child Tax Exemption, which allowed breadwinners with dependent children an annual fiscal deduction on their income tax.

Question 49

Throughout the 1980s, child poverty rates in Canada ranged from 30.7 per cent to 50.4 per cent.

Question 50

In 1990, Canada signed the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, a treaty that committed all signatories to protect and ensure children's rights and to hold themselves accountable for this commitment before the international community.

Question 51

According to Statistics Canada (2017), the provinces with the highest proportion of foster children are also the provinces with the largest numbers of Indigenous peoples.

Question 52

Anne Bokma (2008) reports that just over 50 per cent of foster children are adopted by their foster parents.

Question 53

As of 2016, more than 14,000 Indigenous children have been removed from their homes across Canada.

Question 54

According to Anne Bokma (2008), foster children often experience an average of seven foster home placements over the course of their childhood.

Question 55

Many existing foster parents are struggling and even deciding to quit because of the lack of state support.

Question 56

The Ontario government has implemented a progressive plan that is meant to increase the enrolment of foster children in post-secondary education. The province has been investing the $160 monthly Universal Childcare Benefit allocated for foster children under the age of six years into a RESP fund.

Question 57

The Canadian Parliament's 1989 promise to eliminate child poverty by the year 2000 was successfully met.

Question 58

According to Campaign 2000, 1 in every 20 children in Canada continues to live in poverty.

Question 59

Canada ranked 25 out of 41 industrialized countries on the Index of Child and Youth Well Being and Sustainability.

Question 60

Children are poor because parents are poor.

Question 61

The Canada Child Benefit recently introduced by the Trudeau Liberals promises to reduce children poverty by 70 per cent, the largest single drop in decades.

Question 62

British Columbia has the highest child poverty rate whereas Prince Edward Island and Alberta report the lowest.

Question 63

Although being employed offsets poverty to some degree, having only one earner in a family is not adequate for most families.

Question 64

Many people are forced out of the labour market to care for their young children because they cannot afford to pay for child care nor they do not have sufficient guarantees of return to employment.

Question 65

The OECD suggested that Canada quadruple its child care spending to the average of other OECD countries and that the federal and provincial government each pay 40 per cent of daycare costs.

Question 66

Parents across Canada are paying a wide range of fees for child care, from a low of $164 a month in Quebec to a high of $1,649 for infant care in Toronto.
Short

Question 67

What does family policy entail?

Question 68

In 1996, what two changes were made to the Canadian maternity benefits?

Question 69

Discuss how Canada's parental leave benefits can be criticized.

Question 70

What are three main reasons that new fathers cite for not taking parental leave?

Question 71

What was the importance of Bill 40?

Question 72

What has the Ontario government done to increase the enrolment of foster children in post-secondary education?

Question 73

Describe the factors that aggravate adult poverty.

Question 74

Describe the potential effects of the Canada Child Benefit.

Question 75

Identify Canada's four main areas of priority after signing the UN Declaration on "A World Fit for Children."

Question 76

Discuss the challenges faced by working women when trying to balance work and family responsibilities.

Question 77

What are some of the problems that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) found with Canada's child-care system?

Question 78

What have been the two major strategies of Quebec's family policy?

Question 79

The 2016 Census indicates that "Canadian families are in a state of flux" (p. 314). Discuss.

Question 80

Discuss the statistics relating to children in foster care across the country.