Children, parents and childcare providers in the Sea to Sky corridor will all suffer from the near-termination of a "crucial" childcare resource program due to massive provincial and federal budget cuts, according to Sea to Sky Community Services ECE director Suzie Soman.
"We'll see a lot of unregulated care where care providers will be caring for seven, eight, 12 children instead of the two to seven that they should only be caring for," said Soman.
"There could be very many things impacting the child developmentally. They may not be getting what they need, socially, for school readiness, emotionally."
On Jan. 5, B.C. Minister of State for Child Care Linda Reid announced that the elimination of federal transfer payments for the Early Learning and Child Care agreement means a loss of $455 million to B.C. over the next three years. The federal cuts have led the provincial government to cut 78 per cent of funding to the childcare resource referral program, which provides support to parents and care workers.
"So there's so much that we do to keep the professionalism up with care providers," said Soman. "The program works to bring childcare providers together to help them be like-minded. Without it, the quality of care goes way down. If the care provider's overwhelmed and overworked, the children are not getting that attention that they should. The children will feel the stress of the care provider."
Residents will also see more "latchkey kids" with the termination of after school care programs, she said.
The cuts also mean an end to childcare capital funding, which means no financial support for new spaces. The termination of capital grant funding for new childcare providers will lead to dire circumstances for the thousands of new residents anticipated to fill newdevelopments.
The cuts will also prompt substantially increased parents' fees that will go well beyond the new federal $100 a month family childcare allowance, despite the government's assertion that costs to parents will be offset, said Soman.
"We were expecting cuts. We were not expecting to be gutted," she said.
Soman said she was baffled at the level of cuts because the province last year showed they believed there was a need for the childcare resource and referral program when the Sea to Sky Community budget was given over $100,000 to move into a storefront, to get a car, to have more resources, increase our outreach and broaden staff training.
Thousands of children in the corridor alone receive higher quality care through the activities, toys, and training they provide to more than 70 childcare providers.
Soman said Sea to Sky Community Services will soon approach council, and she hopes to receive the same support seen in other B.C. communities, which are appealing to the Union of B.C. Municipalities (UBCM) to pressure the province.
Childcare support providers throughout the province are coming together to denounce the massive provincial budget cuts, which amounts to a total of $35 to $40 million province-wide over a nine month period beginning April 1. Childcare workers and support staff will rally in Vancouver wearing black armbands on Feb. 6, Stephen Harper's one-year anniversary as Prime Minister. And the campaign to reverse the childcare cuts will ramp up in anticipation of the Feb. 20 provincial budget announcement.
