Ottawa says it will hold New Brunswick to terms of child-care agreement

The federal minister overseeing child-care agreements with the provinces says she intends to hold New Brunswick to the promises it made when the province signed on last year.

Families, Children and Social Development Minister Jenna Sudds said in a statement to CBC News that the agreement is clear and she wants the Higgs government to honour it.

"The federal government has provided New Brunswick with almost $492 million to build this system and we will hold the province to these commitments," Sudds said in a statement.

Her office said Sudds was not available for an interview.

The April 2022 agreement commits the province to create 3,400 child-care spaces by 2026 2,400 in not-for-profit centres and 1,000 in private, for-profit centres with early learning designation from the province.

Last week, Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Bill Hogan said he wanted Ottawa to reopen the agreement to let the province fund more spaces in private, for-profit centres.

"The only way that we can do that in New Brunswick is to renegotiate the deal with the federal government and have some co-operation from the Liberals in Ottawa in recognizing our unique situation in New Brunswick," he said.

But in her statement, Sudds saidonly that she would be "happy to share best practices from other jurisdictions that are well on their way to reaching their new space targets in the not for profit child-care sector."

At the time the deal was signed last year, 68 per cent of spaces in the province were in for-profit centres, according to the federal-provincial text.

The province argued before signing its deal that Ottawa's insistence on not-for-profit centres didn't recognize that fact.

Still, the Higgs government agreed to wording that the federal funding would be "predominantly" used for approved spaces in not-for-profit centres.

Another section says New Brunswick committed to "prioritize" not-for-profit centres.

The agreement required child-care fees to be cut in half last year and to an average of $10 per day by 2026.

Former education minister Dominic Cardy, who signed the agreement, said getting Ottawa to allow 1,000 for-profit spaces was difficult but essential in a province where the only daycares in small communities are often local businesses.

"If we had followed the feds' ideological guidance we would have driven a lot of the existing sector in New Brunswick out of existence, and actually reduced access to affordable high quality early childhood education spaces," Cardy said.

But almost all of the funding for the 1,000 spaces in for-profit centres has been allocated, leaving no money for additional spaces in that sector.

Erin Schryer, CEO of the Origins Natural Learning Childcare and the Woods, two for-profit centres, secured funding under the deal but said she is taking a risk with future expansion plans unless Ottawa is willing to allow even more for-profit spaces.

"We need the federal government to take some of those [funds for] non-profit spaces and let them be for-profit providers to open those, or else we're just not going to open those spaces for New Brunswick families," she said.

"Families are the ones who are feeling the crunch of that. I had a nurse from Cape Breton who told me she had to go back because she can't get child care, so she can't work."

The text of agreement says Ottawa would support 1,000 more for-profit spaces "should there be a demonstrated need," as long as New Brunswick brought forward a plan.

That's what Hogan was referring to last week when he said there are discussions happening among federal and provincial officials to expand the scope of the funding.

Cardy said the "for-profit" child-care sector is misnamed because most centresin that category are "social enterprises" that operate for the good of the community with very thin profit margins.

The agreement includes an objective of helping some for-profit centres convert to not-for-profit status.

But Cardy said the requirements of that switch, including establishing a volunteer board of directors, may not be realistic in smaller communities where the need for child care is great.

Hogan made his comments about reopening the deal after Opposition Liberal Leader Susan Holtsaid the 550 spaces promised in the government's recent throne speech were not enough to address a wait list with more than 3,000 families.

She accused the province of dragging its feet on allocating funds to not-for-profit centres.

The text of the agreement envisioned the creation of 500 spaces in the first two years.

Schryer announced Tuesday that Origins Natural Learning Childcare is buying the former Cherry Brook Zoo in Saint John and will turn it into a licensed, early childhood learning centre with about 100 spaces.

She said she hopes the federal government will be flexible but based on her own discussions with officials, "at this point in my experience it felt very unlikely that they would be revising that agreement."

Cardy said however the Trudeau government's recent reversal on carbon taxes suggests it may give in to political pressure, given its current low popularity in polls.

"I hope that we can quickly come to an agreement on squaring this circle because it's one of the biggest impacts on our economy, having access to affordable and high quality early childhood education," he said.