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Executive Summary
In 2006, the Government of Canada announced the Universal Child Care Plan. This Plan included two components: the Universal Child Care Benefit, providing direct financial assistance to parents, and the Child Care Spaces Initiative, supporting the creation of new child care spaces. In September 2006, the Minister of Human Resources and Social Development Canada created a Ministerial Advisory Committee to provide advice on the design of the Child Care Spaces Initiative.
The Ministerial Advisory Committee’s terms of reference stated that the Committee was to:
- provide advice on the child care needs of Canadian families and the role and interests of employers, with a focus on improving accessibility to child care for all families;
- advise on the approach and mechanisms required to effectively design and implement the Child Care Spaces Initiative; and,
- provide formal recommendations on creating the Child Care Spaces Initiative.
The Committee has fulfilled its mandate by developing a comprehensive set of recommendations that meet the diverse needs of contemporary Canadian families by improving accessibility to high quality child care by:
- focusing on innovation and partnerships;
- making direct and indirect investment in space development and enhancement;
- involving all stakeholders including employers (small, medium and large, across all sectors);
- providing a variety of tax and investment incentives; and,
- expanding parental leave under employment insurance.
The recommendations are focused on actions that are within Federal jurisdiction. The Committee respects and recognizes the lead role played by provincial, territorial and municipal governments in regulating, funding and in some cases, operating child care.
The recommendations respect the diverse needs, preferences, priorities, and opinions of families living in rural, suburban and urban communities across Canada.
Contemporary Canadian Families Have Diverse Needs for Child Care
Contemporary Canadian families are getting smaller, more mothers with young children are in the paid labour force, more fathers are involved in child care and more grandparents are in the paid labour force. Families are attempting to fulfill their multiple responsibilities at home and at work, while the workplace is becoming more competitive, more diverse, and more stressful, and employment, in many situations, is becoming more precarious.
The Committee recognizes that child care use among families differs. Some families use child care to work, study, or fulfill personal, family or community commitment. While others use child care so their children can have social interaction with other children or prepare for school.
Parental demand for child care is increasing but demand is also increasing from employers who are struggling to fill jobs that are vacant due to the increasing competition for skilled labour and the growing labour shortage.
The Committee remained attentive to the diverse needs of contemporary Canadian families. We endeavoured to develop a set of recommendations that would include families from a variety of geographical, cultural, linguistic and ethnic communities, with a range of special and unique needs, and different opinions, perspectives, and experiences.
Employers’ Role in Child Care Varies
The Committee considered employers’ perspectives. Research shows a link between child care and productivity, with a majority of business leaders indicating that the availability of quality child care is an important factor in hiring and retaining people. Business leaders also strongly believe there is a skilled labour shortage with many already having trouble finding suitable candidates to fill vacant positions. Employers around the globe are looking to immigration and creating family-friendly workplaces to attract women and men. To compete globally, Canada needs to reduce barriers to labour market entry including increasing the supply and quality of child care. Consultations as well as the Committee’s own experience has shown, however, that employers are concerned about getting directly involved in building, operating or directly providing child care and would rather work with existing child care providers.
The Child Care Spaces Recommendations
The Committee engaged in a process to develop the recommendations. The Committee examined the complexities and challenges of finding child care, explored a variety of child care options and examined the evidence from many national and international studies and reports. The result is a set of ten recommendations.
Increase Supply of Child Care Spaces
The 2006 federal Budget committed to invest $250 million per year, beginning in 2007-08, to support the creation of new child care spaces. Studies and consultations demonstrate that demand for high quality child care outstrips supply. In some cases new spaces are needed, in others-existing spaces need investment to update, enhance or expand their space. Because the government has indicated a special interest in involving employers, the Committee recommends a mix of incentives to encourage them to participate in the creation of child care spaces.
2. Encourage child care space creation or enhancement by allowing employers who choose to build an on-site or near-site child care program for their employees to claim the full capital cost incurred in creating those child care spaces in the year the investment is made.
3. Revise current tax regulations to make all employer-supported child care, including the provision of licensed on-site or near-site child care or paying for or subsidizing the cost of their employees regular or supplementary licensed child care, consistently a non-taxable benefit.
Decrease Demand for Child Care Spaces
An important way to address the supply/demand imbalance is to look at how to reduce demand, including exploring ways to better support parents who are at home with their children either on a full-time or part-time basis.
5. To decrease the demand for full-time child care spaces, enhance the provisions for flexible work arrangements in the Canada Labour Code and promote flexible work arrangements within the federal civil service including permanent part-time, job sharing, and alternative career paths.
Increase Parents’ Ability to Pay for High Quality Child Care
To support parents and increase their access to pre-primary education and high quality child care, the Committee considered ways to fairly and equitably support families in managing the cost of high quality child care.
7. Introduce a new child care quality deduction to allow parents to deduct any expenses they incur that improves the quality of their child care, for example the cost of conducting criminal reference checks for any prospective non-relative caregiver or providing first aid or child development training for a nanny, family member or neighbour. To be eligible for a deduction the service or training must be provided by a recognized organization, college or university.
Increase Awareness and Understanding of Child Care Needs
There is a need to ensure that employers are aware of the ways in which they can support child care for their employees and that parents and caregivers are aware of and understand the ways in which they can access federal supports for child care.
Canada currently lacks a regular, comprehensive source of data on child care in Canada either in terms of demand or supply.
Address Child Care Human Resources Challenges
Human resources challenges are consistently raised as a major issue facing the child care sector in Canada. Child care providers and operators face significant challenges in recruiting and retaining staff. While beyond the mandate of this committee, actions are needed to address the HR crisis in order to ensure an effective child care system in Canada.
Success Requires Flexibility, Innovation, Creativity and Collaboration
The Committee considered the diverse opinions, priorities and perspectives of all stakeholders, the broad range of needs in rural, small town, suburban and urban communities from coast to coast to coast, and the complexities of contemporary Canadian families.
To be successful, the Child Care Spaces Initiative must include flexible child care options, build upon the work being done in the field, and facilitate innovation and creativity involving collaborations and partnerships between stakeholders and supporters.
1 Currently Child Care Expense Deductions are $7,000 for children under 7 and $4,000 for children 7-16 years.