Childcare concerns

Re: Government monopoly in childcare is not progress, Matthew Lau, Jan. 25

Matthew Lau's synopsis of the new federal childcare program was spot on. The three provinces he referenced have each taken different approaches to implementation, but face the same challenge. There aren't enough qualified staff to keep all existing childcare centres running at full capacity, let alone to staff new spaces.

In Ontario, this has been a problem since the last attempt at a government monopoly on care: the introduction of the so-called full-day kindergarten program in public schools, or FDK. FDK created a mass migration of early childhood educators from licensed childcare centres into the public school system. Childcare centres have faced severe staffing shortages ever since.

FDK also created a two-tier system of care for children 3.8 to five years old. Those whose families can afford to send them to a licensed childcare centre for kindergarten get personalized care in a highly regulated environment, which includes a hot meal and two snacks. Children from families with lower incomes are forced into government-run FDK where they get shorter hours of care, larger group sizes, and are not protected by the Child Care and Early Years Act. They have to bring their own lunch. They may even have a lengthy school bus commute, because of government policies that incentivize the consolidation of more children into fewer public schools.

Soon after its introduction, families in government-run FDK who needed care for their children beyond the abbreviated schedule offered by public schools, were required to pay “wraparound” fees so their children could start earlier and stay later. Often, these fees were close to what the family would have been paying for an extended day of care at their local childcare centre, over 1,000 of which closed in the first five years of the FDK rollout.

The current iteration of the federal childcare program is likely to produce a similar result across the country, including thousands of centre closures. Taxpayers and the families who use the program will wind up paying more and more for it, while all children will wind up getting less and less. Andrea Hannen, executive director, Association of

Day Care Operators of Ontario

Justin Trudeau