Territorial rollout of federal child care program marred by funding confusion, controversy

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

28 May, 2024

OTTAWA, ON – The Northwest Territories got off to a problematic start in implementing the first year of its Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care Agreement with the federal government. The territory spent just under $1 million of the $6.3 million allocated for the first year, not counting administrative costs.

Despite moving towards a universal system before signing the agreement, the Northwest Territories has struggled with increasing demand for heavily subsidised spots outstripping the creation of new child care spaces.

The territory’s year-one funding went largely toward reducing parent fees by 50%. No money was spent on creating new spaces in 2021, though the territory is supposed to have created 75 non-profit spaces between year one and year two of its agreement with the federal government. The territorial government allocated* more than $600 thousand for administrative expenses to implement the agreement.

While the Northwest Territories was able to quickly reduce parent fees, the move was not without some controversy. The territory flip-flopped on whether the new federal funding would be tied to existing territorial funding. As the funding application deadline approached, providers learned they would need to join the new Child Care Fee Reduction fund (CCFR) in order to access existing territorial funding. Providers claimed that the territory and the federal government had previously communicated that the funding sources were separate. To participate in the CCFR, providers had to commit to holding fee increases at 2.3% for the fiscal year. Some providers argued that this cap would undermine their ability to operate. The territorial government has since acknowledged it needs to improve communication with child care providers.

“Similar to the story across Canada, the first year of implementing the federal government’s child care program was problematic and slow in the Northwest Territories,” says Peter Jon Mitchell, family program director at Cardus. “And just as we’ve seen with several other regions, reducing child care fees without increasing spaces just creates demand that the system cannot meet.”

The full Cardus report, Child Care Funding Update: Northwest Territories—Year One (2021–22), is freely available online.

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MEDIA INQUIRIES
Daniel Proussalidis
Cardus – Director of Communications
613-899-5174
media@cardus.ca

Cardus – Imagination toward a thriving society
Cardus is a non-partisan think tank dedicated to clarifying and strengthening, through research and dialogue, the ways in which society’s institutions can work together for the common good.

*Corrected on 4 June, 2024: Following the release of the Cardus report, the government of the Northwest Territories clarified via email that it spent $52,684 of its administrative expense allocation in 2021-22.