The provincial Liberals unveiled another pillar of their 2022 election platform on Thursday — a child-care plan that includes lower fees for families, free college tuition for early childhood educators and an increase to the child-care tax credit.
<img class="wp-image-389478 size-medium alignright" src="https://www.qpbriefing.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Screen-Shot-2021-05-06-at-9.21.43-AM-405x207.png" alt="" width="405" height="207" srcset="https://old.qpbriefing.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Screen-Shot-2021-05-06-at-9.21.43-AM-405x207.png 405w, https://old.qpbriefing.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Screen-Shot-2021-05-06-at-9.21.43-AM-843x431.png 843w, https://old.qpbriefing.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Screen-Shot-2021-05-06-at-9.21.43-AM-768x393.png 768w, https://old.qpbriefing.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Screen-Shot-2021-05-06-at-9.21.43-AM-1536x785.png 1536w, https://old.qpbriefing.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Screen-Shot-2021-05-06-at-9.21.43-AM.png 1866w" sizes="(max-width: 405px) 100vw, 405px" />"The quality care that we, working hard with all of you, will provide for the families of this province ... is going to be accessible, it's going to be reliable and it's going to be affordable," said Liberal Leader Steven Del Duca on Thursday morning. He was joined virtually by one current Liberal MPP along with several candidates and their children, who at times took over the introductory remarks being made by their mothers.
Dubbed "Care for Every Child in Ontario," the Liberal plan would "deliver urgent pocketbook relief for Ontario's hard-working families, the families that have been putting the time in and making the sacrifice and feel every year that they're falling further and further behind," said Del Duca.
He said the plan will be a key part of building a province where "every single child has the best possible start in life, regardless of their circumstances, regardless of where they come from or where they live," particularly after the pandemic.
Del Duca promised, if elected, to cut before- and after-school care costs by about 50 per cent within the first 100 days of taking office, or by September 2022, to $10 a day. He said this would amount to annual savings of around $2,300 per child.
He said his party would also work with the federal government to bring down licensed child-care fees to $10 per day. This comes after the Justin Trudeau government unveiled in its April budget a plan to create a national child-care system that would see costs reduced by an average of 50 per cent by 2022 and to an average of $10 per day within five years.
The provincial Liberals said they would take a phased approach to rolling this out based on age as they work to create more child-care spaces and increase staff. This would mean reaching the fee target for children aged two-and-a-half to four by the end of 2022, toddlers aged 18 months and up by 2023 and all children from birth to age four by 2024. Subsidies for low-income families would remain in place, said Del Duca.
The federal government's plan would include an additional $30 billion investment over five years and then an additional $8.3 billion in ongoing funding per year. Del Duca said that if Ontario's share of that new funding is about $3.2 billion, the province would kick in $1 billion for a total of $4.2 billion to accomplish the measures outlined in his plan. The provincial Liberals noted the $1 billion commitment would be new spending.
Del Duca said his party's plan would provide free tuition for early childhood education programs at colleges across the province, boost pay and benefits for these workers, increase the Childcare Access and Relief from Expenses (CARE) tax credit from an average of $1,500 to $2,000 and work on a "top up" for the parental leave program so parents "have the option to stay at home longer with their infants without their EI benefits being reduced." The party said it would also work with federal officials to "fill gaps for those who don’t qualify for EI."
"Overall, the broad strokes of this is great," said Carolyn Ferns, public policy coordinator for the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care, noting that she's glad Del Duca's plan involves co-operation with the federal government.
She said the promise on cutting before- and after-school care costs is "definitely good to see."
"What I like about this is that it really is looking to the future, because child care is going to be so important to our economic and social recovery, and to ensure that those school-aged child-care programs are there, they're affordable for families, I think it's going to make a big difference in the long run," said Ferns.
She said one thing the sector has been calling on for years is a boost to wages and called the promise to introduce a new "wage grid" that aligns with kindergarten classes "significant." This, along with free tuition, will be key in helping to recruit and retain workers in an expanded system, Ferns added.
Ferns said an alternative to keeping subsidies in place would be to implement a fee cap and establish a payment schedule based on income, but added there's still much policy work to be done to turn either provincial or federal plans into a workable system.
As for the phased rollout of lower fees for different ages, Ferns said she understands why the Ontario Liberals' plan starts with preschool-aged children due to demand but argued that infant and toddler care is the most expensive right now and should be a focus.
"They're the parents who are most in need of fee relief, so I think that would be a good idea to do at least something now to help support those parents with more affordable care as well," she said.
Ferns said she hopes Del Duca's announcement will push the Doug Ford government into action.
"I hope that it puts some pressure on the Ford government to get to the table with the federal government on child care, because ... what we've heard the since the federal announcement, what we've heard from parents, from early childhood educators is that they're very excited about this, they want to see quick action," she said, noting there have been calls at the municipal level for this.
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Joined by colleagues, Childcare advocates and parents today calling on Provincial and Federal government to immediately start working with city to implement universal, affordable childcare as announced in the April Federal budget. Here is a clip <a href="https://t.co/Hssy0kaKRf">https://t.co/Hssy0kaKRf</a> <a href="https://t.co/A5C9HG5O9D">pic.twitter.com/A5C9HG5O9D</a>
&mdash; Mike Layton (@m_layton) <a href="https://twitter.com/m_layton/status/1390330094183407620?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 6, 2021</a></blockquote>
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Both the Progressive Conservatives and the NDP slammed the provincial Liberals, saying the party had years to improve the system.
"The Del Duca-Wynne Liberals promise action in the first 100 days, yet, after 15 years in office, they saddled Ontario parents with a legacy of income stagnation, a rising cost of living, and one of the most expensive child-care systems in Canada – for which Ontario moms and dads paid the price," said Education Minister Stephen Lecce.
He pointed to the actions of his own government including the CARE tax credit, which the province increased in its latest budget.
"Last year alone, 16,000 child care spaces opened, in sharp contrast to the 800 centres that closed under the Liberals between 2014-2018," Lecce said, a statement the Ontario Liberals disagreed with. "We believe that parents deserve a government with a record of advancing affordability and flexibility, not a one-size-fits-all system that does not work for every family."
The provincial government wouldn't detail the extent of any conversations with the federal government on Trudeau's child-care proposal or say whether it would provide free tuition for early childhood educators, commit to lowering before and after-school care fees or further boost the CARE credit, just noting that it currently spends $2 billion per year on early learning and child care.
"Steven Del Duca and the Wynne Liberals had 15 years to make child care affordable. They chose not to," said NDP child care critic Bhutila Karpoche in a statement. "I hear from moms and dads every day who can’t afford the child care fees the Liberal government left them with. Families are paying thousands of dollars a month — and some are even putting off growing their family because they can’t afford the Ontario daycare costs. That breaks my heart."
Karpoche said families need "instant relief" from high child-care costs and that the party would work with the federal government to "urgently implement a $10 per day, universal, high-quality and not-for-profit child-care system."

Steven Del Duca says his party’s child-care plan will ‘deliver urgent pocketbook relief’

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