Rapid change in child-care costs raises concerns for some

Many families will be able to take advantage of $10-a-day child care in Saskatchewan, but some are raising issues.

The subsidized price, which takes effect at the beginning of April, will apply to parents with children under age six who are attending a regulated centre on a full-time basis.

Nichole Kessel is a child-care centre director from Whitewood. She said there was a lot of panic when the news about the early implementation of the Early Learning and Child Care Agreement was announced.

“They are cutting part-time spaces, hourly spaces, (and) weekly spaces, which means we’re going to have to start cutting families from our child-care centres all across Saskatchewan,” Kessel said.

“Every regulated daycare is going to have to cut families in order to make this work.”

When the agreement between Ottawa and Saskatchewan was first signed in 2021, the goal was to reduce fees to $10 per day by the end of 2025-26. Kessel said moving the start date up by almost three years puts a lot of child-care centres in a tough position.

“What would work for us is to take the next three years to accommodate these types of changes and use those three years to be able to build more child-care centres to support more children who need it,” Kessel added.

The centre where she works opened just seven months ago, and Kessel said its waiting list has grown so quickly that they could easily fill two centres instead of one.

Some parents are also finding problems with the new agreement.

One parent called into Gormley to say her two children attend a centre for 12 days each month. That used to be considered part time, she said, but that benchmark has since been lowered to 10 days. She said her monthly fees are going up from $270 to $440 as a result.

Another challenge some parents face is the lack of space available. That limited space has also created long waiting lists for some families looking to get their kids into regulated centres.

Other listeners claimed their children have been on waiting lists for years, so they aren’t banking on ever being able to take advantage of $10-a-day child care.

Another listener said their spouse stays home with the kids because the cost of sending them to daycare was simply too high.

But others are breathing sighs of relief. One listener said their daughter paid just under $1,000 a month for daycare for her first child, but when she returns from maternity leave she will have to pay just $217.50 for both of her kids.

Parents will begin paying $10 a day for regulated child care on April 1.