Province, feds expand child-care subsidies

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This article was published 03/02/2022 (1509 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The average Manitoba family will save 30 per cent on their out-of-pocket child-care expenses as part of an expansion of subsidies in the province, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier Heather Stefanson jointly announced Thursday.

That means approximately half of Manitoba’s child-care spaces are now subsidized, and the plan is to increase the cost reduction to families to 50 per cent by the end of the year.

“Up to 12,000 additional children will receive support, particularly in low- and middle-income families,” Trudeau said remotely via Zoom.

The household income threshold to qualify for subsidies has been raised from $23,883 to $37,116 for a full subsidy and from $37,542 to $82,877 for partial subsidies.

These announcements represent a continuation of the agreement signed between both levels of government to provide $10-a-day child care in Manitoba by March 2023.

Neither Stefanson nor Trudeau directly answered a question asking if the $10-a-day figure would have been reached by now if the pandemic hadn’t happened, but they took time to talk about how the pandemic has shown how important child care and cutting down on household expenses are.

They stated this announcement will help Manitobans who benefit from the subsidy to pay for the added cost of living due to the pandemic. They also argued that this program is vital to help keep women in the workforce.

Trudeau and Stefanson were pressed on assistance to address staffing shortages and poor working conditions in the sector alongside the additional funding for child-care spaces.

They said negotiations are ongoing to extend the current general funding agreement for the Canada-Manitoba Early Learning and Care Agreement, and this will include one-time funding to “support the retention and recruitment of the early learning and child-care workforce,” according to a media release.

“This will offer a one-time investment to initiate longer-term planning and supports for the workforce and we look forward to making that announcement soon,” Education Minister Wayne Ewasko explained further during the announcement.

He also promised more news about the child-care sector in the coming months.

“It was a core piece of the agreements we signed across the country,” Trudeau said. “Yes, bringing the price down to $10 a day, yes to creating new spaces for families that need them but also investing in early childhood educators, because we know they are core and key to having a quality system that is doing right by families.”

Speaking to the Sun after the announcement, local daycare executive director Lorraine McConnell of Children’s Den Inc. said it was great news for Manitoba families, but it doesn’t change anything for the sector itself.

“This announcement hasn’t done anything to address a couple of problems that are connected and probably need to be addressed soon,” McConnell said. “Accessibility and quality. We know there aren’t enough spaces in the province. Quality is actually diminishing and that’s because the workforce is not fairly compensated.”

According to McConnell, Children’s Den has lost early childhood educators to the Brandon School Division during the pandemic because the BSD is able to pay better.

She said she believes Thursday’s announcement will make it easier for the people who currently have child care to afford it, but it won’t do anything for the people who don’t have access to child care at all.

The chairperson for Children’s Den, Erika Lesage, is a parent of a child who attends the facility and a former early childhood educator.

She said she doesn’t believe there was anything in Thursday’s announcement that would draw people to the field and doesn’t think a one-time investment to attract new workers will be enough for the long term.

“I don’t want to scoff; any help is help,” she said. “But at the same time, this has been an ongoing problem for a very long time, and unless the government does something to increase child-care centres’ revenues and pay staff a living wage, I don’t know what the future holds. It’s kinda scary.”

Also making things difficult, according to McConnell and Lesage, is the fact that the operating grants for child-care centres have not increased since 2016.

Since the operating grants have been frozen, Lesage said Children’s Den has seen increases in the price of rent, operating expenses and staffing.

“Lots of child-care centres rely on fundraising to even be able to make ends meet, and lots of them end up in a deficit anyway,” Lesage said.

With the operating grants stagnant and centres limited to how much they can charge per student by the provincial government, it’s difficult for centres to meet rising costs of goods let alone the staffing challenges placed on them by COVID-19.

For instance, Children’s Den apparently had to completely close for one day last week because there were not enough staff available.

Ewasko was asked if he was concerned by the frozen operating grants. He referenced his government’s desire to balance the books when taking power in 2016, and moving forward they want to listen to what the sector needs.

In a statement, Manitoba NDP MLA Adrien Sala said the announcement was welcome news but not enough.

“After all the disrespect and hardship the [Progressive Conservatives] have put Manitoba child care centres through, this federal announcement is welcome news,” he stated. “But it’s disappointing to see the province commit to 20 per cent fewer child care spaces than any other province in this agreement. Instead, the PCs are going to take money meant for helping families to backfill their own cuts. This funding should be used to build as many affordable, public spaces as possible and increase wages for all child care workers, not just a few of them.”

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