A senior civil servant is advocating for greater recognition of the heavy financial burden that childcare places on working mothers, often hindering their professional growth and development.

Diann Black-Layne, director of the Department of the Environment, welcomed the government’s recent pledge to establish state-run daycare facilities to help reduce childcare costs.

As a mother of a child with special needs, Black-Layne shared her personal experience of the exorbitant costs involved.

“When my daughter was a baby, once the school agreed to take her, I had to pay the full cost of hiring an additional teacher for her,” she revealed.

Her daughter, who has Down Syndrome, required significant therapy and one-on-one care until age 5.

“At that time, fifty percent of my government salary was used to support her care,” Black-Layne stated.

She expressed that many parents of children with special needs are forced to make the difficult decision not to fully participate in the workforce due to the astronomical care costs.

The issue extends beyond children with special needs, Black-Layne noted,

“It’s the same for many families. If you have an elderly parent or someone who gets in an accident, we don’t really value and calculate how much families have to spend on care in relation to their ability to work.”

She welcomed the Prime Minister’s Labour Day remarks about providing childcare allowances for working parents, noting the common practice of offering food allowances for late shifts.

However, Black-Layne emphasised that direct childcare subsidies are equally crucial to support working mothers’ participation in the labour force.