Very few low-income, single mothers are accessing B.C.’s $10-a-day child care spaces, the findings of a new report suggest.
Researchers from the University of British Columbia and the Centre for Family Equity spent six months contacting child care facilities throughout B.C. and working to get in touch with such mothers. In that time, they found just 17 women who fit that description.
“We were shocked,” lead researcher and UBC School of Social Work Director Lea Caragata told Black Press Media. “It’s a troubling finding.”
She said they had hoped to find at least 50 to 60 low-income, single mothers who would be willing to participate in the study. The fact that they found so few suggests to Caragata that the people most in need of affordable child care in B.C. aren’t accessing it.
The study’s determination isn’t entirely surprising, though, Caragata said. B.C. has rolled out 13,200 $10-a-day spots to date, but none of them are prioritized for vulnerable families.
Implementing an equity-based approach is one of the recommendations the researchers have made to the province. Caragata said she spoke with one child care provider during their study who told her the first family who signed up for $10-a-day care at their facility was a two-lawyer household. Everyone deserves affordable, accessible child care, Caragata emphasized, but she said she would like to see a system that aids a single mother with a disability who is working two jobs before a two-income household.
The researchers are also calling on the province to significantly expand $10-a-day child care spaces to up to 50,000, by transitioning all existing programs. They are further recommending that all wait list and registration fees be banned and that supports and spaces for children with special needs be increased. The researchers say child care availability also needs to be expanded to accommodate parents who work outside of 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekday shifts, and that new spaces should be prioritized in regions where little to no child care already exists.
Lastly, the researchers say child care workers need to be paid and supported better to reduce staff turnover and improve quality of care.
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“We know that the government’s roll out of $10-a-day child care has been a lifesaver for many families lucky enough to get a spot. But our research shows the system is only half built and remains inadequate and inaccessible for many lone mother families,” Viveca Ellis, executive director of the Centre for Family Equity and one of the study researchers, said in a statement.
Caragata said many mothers they spoke with were juggling multiple jobs and multiple children, as well as possible mental illness or disabilities. Numerous of them had fled an abusive partner. Affordable child care for them means “the most extraordinary difference,” Caragata said.
It would also benefit the province as a whole, Caragata noted. She said mothers who have child care are more likely to be employed and their children are more likely to be supported developmentally.
“In the long term, the payoff is huge.”
B.C.’s minister of state for child care, Grace Lore, declined an interview but noted in a statement multiple ways beyond $10-a-day child care that the province is reducing child care costs.
She pointed to the Affordable Child Care Benefit, which can provide low- and middle-income families with monthly payments to help with child care. Lore said, if combined with other affordability programs, this benefit could lower daily child care costs to $10 for some families.
She added that B.C. is also set to add another 2,400 $10-a-day spots by early spring of 2024.
On top of recommendations for the province, the study’s researchers are also asking the federal government to increase its funding. They are asking Ottawa to spend $10 billion over the next three years to address existing and increasing demand for child care, and transfer $7 billion over the same period to provinces and territories so they can implement equitable wage grids for child care workers.
Under its current agreement with the federal government, B.C. has agreed to reach an average of $10-a-day child care in regulated spaces for children under six before 2027. It’s meant to have 30,000 such spots in place by 2028.
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