TORONTO - Privacy concerns shouldn't be used as an excuse to prevent parents from getting a full picture of how safe Ontario's child care centres are, the opposition parties said Monday.
The province expanded its child care website on the weekend so that it now includes up to three years of inspections for licensed centres and home-based daycares.
But it has yet to deliver on a promise to include "serious" incidents such as abuse, mistreatment, injuries and deaths at daycare centres, citing privacy and legal concerns.
"I don't understand how and why people who commit these serious incidents, allow them to happen, or whose facilities aren't up to standard, get a free ride," said New Democrat Michael Prue, noting that there were more than 5,000 cases of serious incidents last year.
Prue said the province could write legislation in such a way that allows it to report the incidents while dealing with any legal concerns and protecting people's privacy.
"You can frame the legislation in such a away so that it's all released except those cases where people apply to keep it private," said Prue.
In 99 per cent of cases, "it could be released and should be," he added.
Progressive Conservative Elizabeth Witmer questioned the government's reasons for not making the data available, saying it has had "ample time to provide this information and to address those concerns."
"I am sure that if this is something that they believed needed to happen they could find a way to post that information," Witmer said.
Questions about whether children had been seriously injured or killed while in care is the most concerning to parents, she added, but that information is not going to be available to help them make the decision.
Education Minister Leona Dombrowsky said the website is the most complete one available anywhere in the country, dismissing claims that the failure to include serious incidents thus far amounts to a broken promise.
"No jurisdiction is providing serious incidents reports on a website," Dombrowsky told the legislature. "Our government has kept our promise to provide parents with the most comprehensive list of information for parents who are about to decide where they might want to have their children in child care."
The government has said it's working to find ways to release the missing information, but has set no deadline to complete the reports.
That, Prue said, was a sign that "they've walked away from it."
The online reports show, among other things, whether a daycare stores food and medication properly, conducts enough fire drills and evaluates the cleanliness and safety of any equipment.
Licensed child care centres were already required to display a hard copy of the reports.
