The end of the 1990s, as the federal government shows a surplus, and some provincial economies are healthy, may be a better time financially. At the same time, financial health is a relative and ideological issue, and economic ideologies very much define how much public funding is available to pay for a public service. Whether governments cut taxes instead of reinvesting money in services for children will be important and as a national child care program seems likely to arise only if political agreements can be reached between the federal government and the provinces, how the federal government defines its ability to spend money for children will be a key factor. Past experience with initiating social programs indicates that adequate federal financing can go a long way to ensuring that the provincial players want to play. The backdrop of expert and public opinion As the introduction to this paper described, expert opinion in a wide variety of areas has come to support the urgency of action on child care - for children, for parents, for women, for communities, for productivity, for health, for Canadian society at large, and for the human or citizenship rights of children.
Public opinion endorses government support for child care.
It is for this reason that, however inconvenient it has been for governments, that it has not disappeared from public view, and has come back again and again. The role of social activists Historically, the social activists who loosely comprise the child care movement have had a key role in the Canadian child care debate, influencing its content and, sometimes, even the outcomes. As the introduction to this paper described, the circle of those recommending improved child care has expanded considerably and the rationales have grown and deepened. Whether or not the child care movement will be reinvigorated by new developments like, for example, the Quebec initiative and the opportunities presented by the Children's Agenda, will be critical. The concept of federal leadership is very much imbedded in all these other key issues.