Is that $10 a day Child Care in Ontario a pipe dream - Looks that way - no surge in new spaces either

By Pepper Parr and Aria Wilson

December 8^TH,  2025

BURLINGTON, ON

 

Back in November, Carlton University journalism student Aria Wilson interviewed Burlington MP Karina Gould; the biggest issue that came out of the interview was the Canadian Child Care program, which was designed to get the cost down to $10 per day.

Gould was the federal minister assigned the task of getting all the provinces onside. When it came to Ontario Gould said:  ‘They’ve really done the bare minimum.’

The story was spiked for a number of reasons. When the Region of Halton was going through its 2026 budget plans, Child Care was a major issue – that made what Wilson wrote earlier very relevant.

Gould was Chair of the Standing Committee of Finance in the House of Commons, and spoke about the latest of the Ontario Government’s childcare stance, adding that “The province of Ontario has said they’re not planning on dropping childcare fees further, that it’ll be an average of $22 a day… it’s not going to reach the $10 a day that they had agreed to,” Gould said.

There will be a three per cent escalator for early learning and childcare over the next five-year period, mostly to align with inflation.

By maintaining the current childcare funding, the government will risk putting the $10-a-day-childcare on the backburner again.

“The Ontario Government has really dropped the ball when it comes to early learning and childcare and it’s not done their part,” Gould said.

Ontario was the last province to sign onto $10-a-day-childcare and it shows, with some paying over double that amount in Burlington.

“They (the provinces) could put in their own money. We’ve seen that from other provinces, and most other provinces have reached $10 a day,” said Gould.

“They are playing fast and loose with affordability for parents,” she said. “They absolutely could be signing on to a five-year agreement with the federal government.”

Bringing childcare down to $10 a day in Burlington will be a distant dream until the province sets a target on affordability for parents.

“It’s really time for the Ontario government to stop playing with the affordability that people have at home, to stop pretending that this isn’t a really important economic program,” Gould said. “It’s also really good for our kids.”

The closer look Gould wanted took place at the Regional level earlier this week..

Regional Social Services Commissioner Andrew Sarchuk told Council during the budget deliberations that the Canada Wide Early Learning and Child Care (CWELCC) plan will continue to be a budget priority in the coming year. Sarchuk pointed out that this work has fundamentally changed how child care is funded and overseen.

The CWELCC plan is a federal initiative launched in 2021 with a goal to create a high-quality, affordable, and accessible child care system across the country. Key objectives include reducing average licensed child care fees to an average of $10 per day by March 2026, creating approximately 250,000 new licensed spaces by the same date, supporting early childhood educators, and building a stronger, more inclusive system with Indigenous communities. This is being achieved through federal funding to provinces and territories, who then implement their own agreements to meet the plan’s goals.

“The province of Ontario and the federal government have renewed the Canada wide agreement for one year. They’ve essentially punted larger decisions about the levels of funding down the road, would be my description of it” said Sarchuk.

When it gets to the Regional level, the implementation problems come to the surface.

Child Care operates at several levels: Regional, private operators who signed onto the CWELCC program and independent operators that are not part of the federal/Regional program.

Sarchuk explains: “For example, there is an increase of 7500 relief hours, which are required to meet legislated child-to-educator ratios at our three directly run regional child care centers; this is fully offset by provincial funding.”

Burlington Councillor Bentivegna said he was disturbed to learn that CWELCC does not support growth. Do we have statistics on what kind of wait lists we have for child care that is readily available?  I get parents who just cannot find daycare, especially for  the 12 month to two year age; some have told me that they have to quit work because “I just can’t find someone”. Do we have any statistics on those kinds of weaknesses?

Sarchuk: ” We appreciate that there’s significant demand for these more affordable child care spaces across all parts of the region. Each operator in the region maintains their own separate wait lists, and they are not unduplicated, so families can be on multiple wait lists.  It’s difficult for us to aggregate a single unduplicated wait list for child care demand. That said, we know we’re a growth community. We know what families are facing in terms of the costs associated with child care.  I have said very directly to the Ministry of Education, staff to staff, and through position advocacy positions taken by this council, that the level of funding and the level of space allocation to Halton is unacceptable.”

“I share your concern. Councillor, we have been as vocal as we’ve ever been in terms of our engagement with provincial partners around the needs here in this community.”

Bentivegna:  “I know in my ward there’s areas that are more in need than others. Is that common? Are there geographical areas in Halton that are more, I guess, desperate than others, and do we know where they are?”

Sarchuk: “It’s an interesting question. Councillor and yes, when we have had spaces to reallocate, and we have had some opportunities over the last couple of years to do that. , Child Care deserts, meaning access is not readily available in the community, which would perhaps favour the community for expansion.”

Oakville Councillor Jeff Knoll:  “I know that there are significant issues with it, not the least of which is the uncertainty and the year-to-year uncertainty around it, which causes a huge amount of problems within the sector itself.  One is the extreme lack of staffing necessary to actually facilitate the child care roles in our community. Is there anything that we’re able to do? I know that they committed to increasing those numbers substantially at the provincial level. Is there anything that we can do locally?”

Sarchuk: “Recruitment, retention of early childhood educators is a challenge across the province. Provincial funding does support initiatives we call workforce development. The region is utilizing some funding, just over $350 million, through the Workforce Innovation Fund. We’re looking to use that funding to support recruitment and retention of Early Childhood Education (ECE) staff,;  we had a recent approval of additional funding of $93,000.  We’re working and will continue to work with neighbouring service managers, particularly Hamilton and Peel and working with community colleges as well that have ECE programs.

“This is a difficult nut to crack, and one of the particular challenges is retention. People do come in and do this work, but  often don’t make a long term career of it. When you think of the staffing model of a child care center, it’s quite flat.

“The retention piece is probably one of the bigger issues. I think in that sector, they’re probably one of the least paid paraprofessionals existing in our society. The people that we put in charge of the most vulnerable time period in the child’s life are the least paid, not much higher than somebody flipping burgers and McDonald’s or popping popcorn at your local cinema. ”

Knoll: “Are there other are there other opportunities down the pipe to actually find ways to enhance that retention through additional wages? I know that we’re topping up a certain number of dollars per hour for wages. I think you mentioned that before, but are there other opportunities to do that? Because, I mean, this is going to become, this is going to become an absolute DEF CON one crisis at some point, if we don’t get a handle on the staffing of these facilities. Because, I mean, aware that some, I don’t know of any in Halton, but I’m aware of some in Ontario, they’ve closed strict because they don’t have the staff to operate.”

Sarchuk:  “I concur. It is worth perhaps a reminder that the Canada Wide program does provide some wage floors for enrolled operators, so that has materially increased compensation for staff, particularly ECEs within Canada.  Compensation is generally trending a little bit higher within the Canada Wide model. Additional funding through a renewed federal-provincial agreement, we hope and anticipate would not only seek to support reduced rates for parents, but also raise that wage floor for employees in the sector.”

Knoll: “With respect to the CWELCC  program itself. I know that a lot of centers have basically said, I’m done, I’m out. ?  Do we have any Halton operators that have basically said, I don’t want to be part of this anymore?”

Sarchuk:  “Yes we certainly have had operators who were participants in the Canada Wide program and have made independent business decisions to exit. Those are relatively low numbers., and it’s worth remembering that the funding model did change in January 2025, so some left on the basis of the previous funding model. Very few have left once the new funding model was established and communicated. And I think I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that operators who do leave the system, those spaces and dollars are reallocated very, very quickly by my team. We have cautioned operators very, very carefully and closely about the decision that they intend to be taking. And unfortunately, we’ve had operators leave and want to come back in, and that can be a point of significant contention. I know councillors have been involved in some of that dialog, and at the end of the day, people have made independent business decisions. And unfortunately, there are consequences.”

Knoll: “Is there any hope of reducing the complexity of complying with this program in the future, making working it more streamlined for some of these are small operators are having difficulties – I know it’s not a regional issue. These are all mandated from on high.  Is there any hope for potentially seeing this become simpler to to operate?”

Sarchuk: “I do agree the funding model for the Canada-wide program has many layers of complexity. We’re quite new to it;  over a couple of budget cycles, we think familiarity and confidence in the model will increase. We’ve needed to quickly pivot our skill set and our job descriptions and our recruitment to get the types of skills that can manage this type of complex funding relationship and the execution agreements with operators that total almost a quarter of a billion dollars a year.”

Knoll:  “When a child care center drops out of the program are the funds reallocated.?    Does that mean that when that happens, there’s no net loss of child care spaces available under the sea? So when they drop out, somebody else picks it up, because the allocation just gets redistributed. So people being able to access the program do not absolutely lose their place?

Sarchuk: “When an operator drops out there is no net loss but the families that were using the service are, unfortunately, disadvantaged. ”

Milton Councillor Best added a piece of information that gave some insight as to just what the Social Services people are looking at.  2026 is the anniversary of the first baby boomers born in 1946;  those numbers will only increase over the next 20 years. We are nowhere near what we need.