Three years after Canada announced a historic investment to revolutionize child care, Open Access Government discusses the government’s progress in enabling affordable child care nationwide
The provision of care that provides a supportive and enabling environment is essential for a child’s acquisition of fundamental learning and development skills. In recent years, the provision of child care has faced criticism due to rising costs and a lack of availability, putting more pressure on parents and families and exacerbating socioeconomic disparities. In 2021, the Canadian Government announced a significant investment to make child care more affordable nationwide, but three years later, has this vision become a reality?
The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on care provision
COVID-19 revealed and worsened problems in all areas of care. Canada’s care economy experienced significant strain due to years of insufficient funding, which placed unprecedented pressure on vital care sectors, including child care. The prolonged lockdowns had a major impact on families and unfairly burdened women with heavy unpaid household care duties. Even prior to the pandemic, 42% of women of working age globally reported being unable to engage in paid work due to their unpaid care and domestic duties. (1)
As part of its 2021 Budget, Canada’s government pledged over $27bn over five years to establish a Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care System (ELCC). The goal is to support primarily not-for-profit sector child care providers and, most significantly, increase access to $10-a-day child care services everywhere outside of Quebec, where an affordable care system is already established. The Government also aims to improve wages for early childhood educators and establish a foundation of common, publicly available data to measure the system’s progress.
Canada’s child care system
According to Moving2Canada, child care costs in Canada are influenced by a multitude of factors. These include the province or territory, whether you live in a large city, town, or a more rural area, the type of care required, the child’s age, whether you choose a regulated or unregulated option and the ratio of children to care providers. Understanding these factors is crucial in comprehending the current state of child care in Canada and the potential impact of policy changes.
Any regulated program for children before the age of six falls under the umbrella of the Canada-wide Early Learning and Child Care system. As part of the agreement, each province and territory receives federal funding with the overall aim of reducing fees, increasing the availability of public and not-for-profit child care, and raising wages for staff. To date, eight provinces and territories are delivering regulated child care for an average of $10 a day or less.
According to a Statistics Canada report, in 2023, the average amount Canadian parents paid was $544 per month for full-time child care arrangements, down from $649 in 2022. However, the report also notes that the number of parents who say it’s been difficult to get child care increased from 53 to 62%.
Reflecting on the Government’s efforts to help build more inclusive child care spaces in Nunavut, Minister of Families, Children and Social Development Jenna Sudds said:
“Every family should have access to high-quality, inclusive child care. More child care spaces mean more high-quality spots for kids and more relief for parents as they access affordable child care. The government of Canada remains committed to working with Nunavut so that children in Canada have the best possible start in life. The Early Learning and Child Care Infrastructure Fund will help child care providers across Nunavut so they can continue to provide access to high-quality, affordable, flexible and inclusive early learning and child care to underserved communities.”
According to the Government, the $10-a-day regulated child care is making life more affordable for young families and enabling parents’ labour force participation. (3)
Is Canada’s $10-a-day child care plan sustainable?
Lowering fees has made child care more affordable for many families. However, there’s a severe shortage of available child care spaces and staff to meet the increasing demand. As a result, some daycares have closed their waiting lists or threatened to withdraw from the national child care program altogether. (4) In 2018, the Government said that an additional 12,000 child-care professionals would be needed over the next ten years to expand affordable child care. However, in efforts to achieve the government’s vision, operators have said there is not enough money to cover all their costs, including offering higher wages to ensure they can train and retain early childhood educators. Some say they are finding that the federal-provincial agreements restrict the fees they can charge without providing enough support to cover all of their expenses.
Speaking in May this year, Families Minister Jenna Sudds said almost 100% of providers are now part of the national child care program. Still, the provincial government is not developing a sustainable funding formula: “The provinces and territories entered into these agreements eyes wide open and knowing what the expectations were, knowing how many spaces we expected to be created and what dollars were on the table for them to work with.
“…I fully expect we’ll continue working … with them to ensure that this is successful.” (5)
In May of this year, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that $201.87mn would be provided to Ontario, Canada’s second-largest province. This funding is intended to create child care spaces and support inclusive child care services across the province, particularly in underserved and remote communities. The Prime Minister also emphasized key measures outlined in Budget 2024, aimed at increasing child care spaces and infrastructure, supporting early childhood educators nationwide, and helping more families access affordable child care. These measures include the launch of a new child care expansion loan program, offering student loan forgiveness for rural and remote early childhood educators, increasing training for early childhood educators, and improving child care access for military families. (6)
References
1. https://www.oxfam.ca/project/inclusive-child-care-for-all/
