The participation of local governments is required to implement public childcare that covers children from birth to age 12, and 16 candidates running for mayor or county commissioner have signed letters committing themselves to pushing through needed policies once elected, the Childcare Policy Alliance said yesterday.
Among the 16 candidates who signed the commitment letters were Taipei mayoral candidates Pasuya Yao (姚文智) of the Democratic Progressive Party , Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and incumbent Ko Wen-je (柯文哲).
The alliance presented two line graphs — the rate at which women participate in the workforce and the rate at which children from three months to five years old are cared for outside of the home — with rates listed for Taiwan, Denmark, Germany, Japan and South Korea.
The first graph showed that Taiwanese women aged 25 to 29 had the highest rate of workforce participation among the compared nations, but that from age 30 to 65, the rate steadily dropped off, reflecting the number of women leaving jobs to care for children due to insufficient public childcare, Alliance convener Liu Yu-hsiu (劉毓秀) said.
The second graph showed that, among the compared nations, Taiwan had the lowest rate of childcare outside the home for children under five years old, Liu added.
The alliance said that public childcare coverage was highest in Denmark for all age groups, at nearly 50 percent for children under two years old and 90 percent after two years old, creating an environment friendly to double-income families and encouraging a sustainable level of replacement fertility.
Some couples are unwilling to give birth to more children because the lottery rate for going to public preschools is low and many are worried about the price and quality of private preschools, it said, adding that often the mother or the grandmother must quit their job to care for children.
Awakening Foundation policy director Chyn Yu-rung (覃玉蓉) said she strongly feels that many pregnant women in Taiwan are desperately worried about childcare options, and that having sufficient public childcare would give women the option of continuing to work.
The alliance said that the rate of children under two years old that are enrolled in public nurseries or being cared for by registered babysitters through a subsidy is only about 7 percent, the rate of children aged two to six years old enrolled in public or non-profit preschools is about 19 percent and the rate of elementary-school students enrolled in after-school childcare services is about 14 percent.
The alliance urged local governments to show determination in creating a childcare friendly environment for double-income families, and increasing public and non-profit childcare, with continuous care until the age of 12.
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