B.C. budget expands $10-a-day childcare, boosts pay for early childhood educators

The B.C. government is doubling the number of spaces available under its $10-a-day childcare pilot program.

The NDP government’s 2021 budget sees childcare spending climb by $233 million over three years.

Of that funding, $111 million will go to the $10-a-day program, adding 3,750 spaces in 75 additional childcare centres to the ChildcareBC Universal Prototype Sites.

It comes a day after the federal Liberals announced $30 billion over five years to create a national childcare program with $10 a day spaces in their own budget.

The province is also hoping to bolster the childcare workforce by doubling the wage subsidy for early childhood educators to $4 per hour. It says that top up will help raise the median wage of an ECE to just under $25 per hour.

3:12 2021 Budget: Ottawa promises billions in new child-care spending

That move will cost the province about $94 million.

Paul Kershaw, founder of Generation Squeeze and associate professor at UBC’s School of Population and Public Health, said while the initiatives were welcome, they fell short of the $750 million per year the NDP government promised last fall.

“Sure, the NDP has improved childcare substantially by comparison with the previous government,” he said.

“But this big gap between the NDP’s election promise and its actual investments will mean too many BC families continue to be squeezed financially because childcare costs another rent — or mortgage-sized payment on top of skyrocketing home prices.”

The 2021 budget also expands the Seamless Day Pilot, which integrates the delivery of childcare into school districts by delivering care on school grounds.

That program will be expanded to 20 additional school districts from the current four.