All western provinces have now signed on to the national $10-a-day plan, but lack of workers will challenge rural efforts
The federal government’s drive for affordable child care has seen all provinces except Ontario sign deals with Ottawa, but finding qualified workers to fill rural positions will be a challenge, according to those in the industry.
“For $13 an hour, a lot of people don’t want to do it,” said Janie Ferguson, director at Lakeview Children’s Centre in Langruth, Man. “And with COVID, it’s been even harder to find someone who wants a job.”
Alberta is the latest of the western provinces to sign onto Ottawa’s affordable child-care push that has targeted $10-a-day child care for all Canadians signing onto the deal earlier this month.
Read Also
Half million acres of Alberta crops affected by massive hail storm
Late August hail storm catches farmers in prime harvest mode, damaging half million acres of crops in Alberta.
Saskatchewan announced last week its first step in reaching that mark by providing direct funding to child-care facilities that will halve the cost of child care in that province on average.
More than $27 billion has been allocated by the federal government over the next five years to shoot for that goal.
The funding is welcomed by Ferguson, who is still waiting to hear about details of the program in Manitoba. And Lakeview Children’s Centre — part of Manitoba’s Child and Family Access Network (CFAN) established more than 20 years ago — is well versed in the challenges in providing child care options for rural families in five communities in the province.
For the first time in years, Ferguson said the need for child care at the Langruth centre has outstripped supply.
“Parents want their kids in but due to a lack of staff, I can’t take more kids than I can handle,” she said. “I’ve had an ad for over a year looking for someone who wants to work.”
Don Giesbrecht, Canadian Childcare Federation chief executive officer, said it’s important rural communities get their piece of the child-care pie.
And staffing is a recognized issue that will need to be overcome if national child-care targets are to be hit.
“Everyone who works in the sector knows we are in a real crisis when it comes to having enough people and educated early childhood educators to staff all these positions,” said Giesbrecht. “That is one of our challenges.”
Of the billions of dollars on the table, there will need to be a portion that goes toward providing competitive wages and benefits, said Giesbrecht.
He said the first step will be improving the wages of current child-care workers as strategies are developed to encourage new recruits into the industry.
“As we know, by and large, early childhood educators and people in the child-care sector in Canada are not paid competitive salaries,” he said. “This will help in the immediate term, retain the workforce that is there and ideally, it will also help to attract people, recruit people into the sector.”
Providing a process to certify individuals who have an educational background consistent with the ability to provide child care will also be key in filling the gaps.
“Every province has expansion numbers that they have committed to — Alberta is around 42,000 spaces,” said Giesbrecht. “That is a big number and we are going to need a lot of people.”
For rural communities, that means staff willing to provide flexible care as well, whether it’s in the evening, overnight or on the weekend.
For Ferguson, there is no doubt as to the benefits of affordable child care in rural communities but the fiscal realities of today need to be addressed if the future goal of $10 day care is going to be achieved.
“We’re all struggling right now. The cost of everything is going up but our wages don’t seem to be,” she said.
Ontario continues to be the last holdout of the provinces with that province alone estimating it will cost more than $10 billion over the next five years to reach the $10 goal.
