Human Resources Committee on April 18th, 2023

[Maggie Moser]

Certainly.

Our OAICC members are mostly women who took a risk and opened up a child care centre. They took out loans and mortgages on their houses. It's very expensive. We're talking hundreds of thousands, going into the millions, to open a centre.

Some of these women are recent immigrants who took their life savings and said, “I'm going to open a centre. This is something I know how to do.” They may be people coming from an education background, like me. I was a teacher for 27 years before I opened my centre.

Generally speaking, the women in our organization opened centres for a reason: They needed a centre, or they couldn't find child care for their child. I tried to open a non-profit, and I couldn't, because I couldn't borrow a million dollars. If I had told the bank I wasn't making any money, they wouldn't partner with me or lend me that money.

Realistically, child care has been needed and it has been provided by these women entrepreneurs who took the risk and stepped up. They provided that care and they have been providing that care. They are carrying the loans and the mortgages. There is the unpaid labour and sweat equity. Some of them now, because funding is not recognizing those areas, may possibly lose their centres. They are constantly being—

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Thank you. I hate to cut you off. We have only so much time.

What could we add as an amendment to this bill that would include everyone, that wouldn't exclude people? One of the things I heard is that this is now going to impact the women who have been able to flee domestic violence by opening up child care.

What could we add as an amendment to help include more, to help fill that lack of capacity and shorten that wait-list?

[Maggie Moser]

Certainly, for women who own centres right now, it is to make sure that the funding provided to them through CWELCC will include their facility cost, their loans and their unpaid equity, which is basically what we call profit. That chunk of money that would come from government to put into the building of a centre has really come from the private sector until now, and it has to be recompensed or they will just not continue. They can't operate, because they're non-profit.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

For clarification—because I know you have an economy background—in a not-for-profit or public, the money that is used.... You can't say for profit. The money that comes into a not-for-profit or public centre is put back into the facility to maintain it, operate it and fulfill operating costs. In a private centre, is it not the operators who are putting their own money back into it? There's a misconception that somebody is walking around with bags of money made on the backs of children.

[Maggie Moser]

No, that's right.

In not-for-profit organizations, you have whole layers of administration doing exactly what the owners were doing, managing the build project and overseeing many aspects. They have skin in the game, so they're there more often. There is a higher level of oversight in that particular situation. They're using public funds or different pots of money for buildings, existing buildings.

For instance, it was mentioned that staff costs of a non-profit are around 85%. My facility cost is 15% monthly. If I pay 85% for my staff and 15% for my building, I wouldn't be able to feed the children.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you—

[Maggie Moser]

That's why fees are higher in a for-profit centre. They have to be, because they have to cover all the things government provides to non-profits for free. The facilities, the years of creating it—everything is already there.

That's the difference.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Ms. Moser and Madame Ferreri.

We have Mr. Van Bynen for six minutes.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I, as well, want to thank all the witnesses for their contribution in helping us make some decisions on how to go forward.

It seems we're continuing to hear recurring themes. One is capacity. The other is the quality of the service provided and the differences between profit and not-for-profit, and licensed and not licensed.

My question is for Kim Hiscott.

On this capacity issue, is there anything about Ontario's implementation that is preventing expansion?

[Kim Hiscott]

Thank you. That's an excellent question.

Yes, there are a couple of things preventing it.

First, there is our lack of staff. We know there are a great number of registered early childhood educators in Ontario, where we have the College of ECEs, but they have left the sector. They would welcome returning if compensation were appropriate and reasonable.

The other big reason that not-for-profits would be hesitant right now, or not able to expand, is exactly what Maggie said. Being able to borrow money as a not-for-profit in order to create a centre is complicated. As I said, Andrew Fleck has been around for a long time, and we still find it very complicated, which is why I was urging the federal government to look at a loan opportunity or some supports for not-for-profits. It's because we're ready to expand.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you. That's interesting. As a 30-year banker, I can appreciate some of the hurdles you face.

Is the fact that the agreements prioritize not-for-profit growth a limiting factor in space creation?

[Kim Hiscott]

No, absolutely not. That's not the limiting factor at all. Again, not-for-profits are ready to expand and want to expand.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Is the not-for-profit sector ready to expand, acknowledging some of the limitations we have with respect to the staffing and the training of staff?

[Kim Hiscott]

It's very much so. The biggest opportunity for a not-for-profit is being responsive to your community. You're sitting with your board of directors, looking at your waiting list, and the board is saying, “Yes, we need to address our community needs.” Then, absolutely, a not-for-profit would be ready to expand.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Okay.

Newfoundland and Labrador recently announced a $25 minimum wage for ECEs. If Ontario did the same, what would that mean for your operations and future expansion?

[Kim Hiscott]

It wouldn't help me. Our early childhood educators already start at $25—a bit more, actually. What I urge us to do is to not throw out numbers. I think throwing out numbers—the wage should be $19, $25 or $30, or match a school board or whatever—is actually doing us a disservice. I really think we need to do job evaluations to see the scopes, depths and responsibilities of the role of early childhood educators, see who is in ratio to them, and then determine the appropriate salary based on other comparators.

Yes, $25 an hour might sound wonderful to somebody who's currently making $19, but to somebody else who's not.... We need to evaluate the job and value the job more appropriately.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Chair, I'll cede the rest of my time to Mr. Collins.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you. That's 36 seconds.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Oh, that's great. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, through you to Ms. Flaherty, with the 30 years of experience you have in the industry, you certainly know the pulse of where we're both from—Hamilton—in terms of some of the issues that seem to be universal across the sector. They've been mentioned here today many times, such as the wage rates and the need to build capacity within the sector to accommodate demand.

When you talked about ensuring accountability on progress, you really caught my attention. Can I ask you to comment on the issues we know our service providers in Hamilton are facing? How does this relate to building capacity and competition with the school board, which was just mentioned by Ms. Hiscott, in terms of wage rates and all those things wrapped up?

My concern is that the province isn't giving this the attention it deserves. Individual organizations have asked for a workforce strategy to deal with all of these issues through a comprehensive plan.

What are your thoughts on that?

[Marni Flaherty]

Absolutely, and it's so wonderful to see you around the table. I'm very proud of spending 30 years in Hamilton, growing today's family.

In Hamilton we were lucky to be part of the Fast Start, and I'm not sure if.... Fifteen years ago, with Fast Start, there was a lot of data in support of smart growth in three different areas of our province, and I think there is a lot of data that we could probably learn a lot from if we could dig that out and find the best way to move forward.

Definitely working with the community is.... Municipalities in Ontario are excellent sources of managing the child care system. Municipalities can leverage relationships with school boards within their cities and help us plan a comprehensive plan for early learning and child care by utilizing schools to capacity, utilizing municipal buildings to their capacity and using other buildings that are taxpayers' buildings that have already been built or can be retrofitted so the investment stays in neighbourhoods.

As for the Canadian Child Care Federation, we do believe in publicly managed and publicly funded. Even with the not-for-profit versus profit factor, if we have strong agreements on how that money is going to be spent on wages, with perhaps a scale for rent or leasing so that we have a really good understanding of what it really costs, and we do that market study to make sure that people aren't taking advantage of public dollars....

There is a lot of work to be done, but we have some great examples in Ontario, in my opinion. I'm speaking for the Canadian Child Care Federation, but I spent my life in Ontario and I know we could make this happen.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Ms. Flaherty and Mr. Collins.

Ms. Bérubé, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Sylvie Bérubé, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here today.

Ms. Hiscott, you spoke earlier about the importance of including certain definitions in Bill C‑35. Could you elaborate on that?

[Kim Hiscott]

Thank you. I do understand French.

I understand a great deal.

However, I want to make sure I completely got your question.

I think right at the very beginning it would make a lot of sense to have a really robust definition of how we're defining early learning and child care. We don't want to mislead people or to imply that when we're talking about early learning and child care, we're meaning those casual relationships with family members or other arrangements that families will make. What we're talking about is licensed early learning and child care delivered by qualified early childhood educators and/or, in the case of home child care, the agency model to support providers who are self-employed.

[Sylvie Bérubé, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Thank you.

Ms. Flaherty, is there anything else you'd like to see added to Bill C‑35?

[Marni Flaherty]

There are two highlights that we need to really look at. One is quality for children and what it means, so I think that should be added. The other is embedding the national advisory council into law so that we have a federal lens on the development of a national child care strategy.

I know it's a three-year thing right now, but it might be a good idea to embed it in law so that whatever happens in the future, we're looking at it through a federal lens and seeing that our early childhood education system in Canada continues to grow and strengthen.