Alberta child-care centre owners claim they were coerced into signing onto Ottawa’s $10-a-day program. They say the provincial government tied all new and existing child-care subsidies to this program, which would have made their centres uncompetitive if they had not signed on.
“I risked significantly the possibility of losing clientele overnight by not signing,” said Kathryn Babowal, who owns Les Petits Soleils Inc., a French immersion preschool and child-care centre in Sherwood Park, Alta.
Subsidies such as wage top-ups for staff and funding for low-income families were previously managed solely by the province. But Alberta’s approach to the $10-a-day program lumps all subsidies for child-care owners into one contract.
A spokesperson for Matt Jones, Alberta’s minister of jobs, economy and trade, refused to answer questions about the $10-a-day program contract between the province and child-care operators. Instead, the minister’s office referred to a previous statement that said, “Alberta’s government continues to engage with child-care providers as we develop a new funding formula to ensure the child-care system is sustainable and continues to meet the diverse needs of Alberta families.”
Other provinces, including Ontario, have not lumped all subsidies into one contract, keeping provincial subsidies independent of Ottawa’s $10-a-day program.
Alberta’s lump-subsidy approach was a form of “soft coercion,” says Krystal Churcher, a child-care operator and chair of the Association of Alberta Childcare Entrepreneurs, a not-for-profit that advocates for private child-care operators. It left many centres with no choice but to sign on to stay afloat.
Losing access to provincial subsidies would have meant losing thousands in funding that many centres historically relied on, says Babowal.
“Even in my program of only 50 children, my wage top-ups … were over $20,000 a month that I was getting from the government,” said Babowal.
A centre that decided not to join the $10-a-day program would have had to sharply increase parents’ fees to make up for the thousands in lost subsidies. But with most Alberta centres joining the $10-a-day program, such independent centres would have been operating in a sea of subsidized centres, making their prices uncompetitive and unattractive to most parents.
Under Ottawa’s program, the government’s subsidy will increase and parents’ share of child-care fees will decrease over time, until parents pay an average of $10-a-day in 2026.
‘Horrible experience’
Churcher says Alberta child-care owners were also not given adequate time to negotiate the terms of their 2021 contract. This contract, the Affordability Grant Agreement, lumped all subsidies together with the $10-a-day program.
The owners received the contract in mid-December 2020, just before the Christmas season. They were required to make a decision and have the $10-a-day program implemented into their business by Jan. 1.
The manner that the contract was handled made it a “horrible experience,” Churcher said.
Child-care operators struggled to reach lawyers, administrators and even civil servants over the holidays to consult on the contracts. Generally, the civil servants who were available did not know any more about the contacts than the child-care operators, says Babowal.
The operators were left “trying to navigate through these long contracts not properly understanding what it is we’re being asked,” she said. “It was ultimately very much signing under coercion.”
Harsh criticism
The $10-a-day program has been harshly criticized by Alberta child-care operators who say Alberta’s agreement with child-care centres sets the subsidized rate too low, Canadian Affairs recently reported.
“Most of us would be long gone from this $10-a-day program … if we could still access” those other subsidies, said Churcher.
Churcher says she, like many other child-care owners, was excited to join the $10-a-day program when it was first announced.
“I signed into it because I 100 per cent believe that families deserve to have affordable child care … it really was, you know, a huge win for the families that attended my centre,” she said. “But … I don’t feel like [the province] was very transparent when this rolled out.”
In 2020, child-care owners interested in participating in the $10-a-day program were required to disclose their centres’ fees to the province. Many submitted rates that they had lowered during the pandemic to help families facing financial difficulties, says Churcher. The province used those rates to set the subsidy under the $10-a-day program.
The province’s agreement with the centres also prohibits them from raising parents’ fees by more than three per cent a year.
That’s allowed for a nine-per-cent increase since 2021, but inflation over that period has been more than 15 per cent, says Babowal. Many say the $10-a-day program’s low subsidy rate threatens their centres’ survival and the quality of care they can provide.
It is impossible to cover the expenses of running a child-care centre on the income the government structure allows, said Babowal. “The difference between nine [per cent] and 15 [per cent] is really, really impacting my business.”
Ray Lewchuk, co-owner and president of Creekside Creative Academy in Red Deer, Alta., chose to forgo his salary for the past two years to avoid making other cuts to the centre.
“I’ve sacrificed for myself by not taking anything out of my business so that my staff can be properly paid and our programs wouldn’t suffer,” said Lewchuk, who lives on his pension.
“I’m working for free and hoping that the industry does turn around and that we will be properly compensated,” he said.
Tanya Szarko, owner of Bow Valley Child Care Centre in Calgary, has organized a letter-writing campaign with staff, clients and families to request a meeting with the Alberta government.
“We have a pile [of letters] that is … two feet high,” she said. “We have requested ongoing meetings with the minister — all denied.”
The minister “needs to get his boots on and get into the centres and come work with owners like myself — experienced owners — who are passionate about making sure that this Canada-wide agreement is going to help all child-care centres in Alberta,” said Szarko.
“We’re stuck in this contract,” says Babowal. The governments have “a long way to go, provincially and federally, to really gain the trust back of operators from this.”
