The B.C. government is introducing a new bill to extend the allowable hours of child care centres located on school grounds and expand the eligible age range of children able to use those spaces.
The School Amendment Act, if passed, would permit school districts to offer infant and toddler care on school grounds and allow districts to continue offering child care on non-school days.
Premier David Eby announced the legislation on Tuesday, Oct. 7, explaining the challenges parents who work outside of school hours can face.
"Our days don't start at nine and end at three," he said. "Life is much more complicated than that."
The province had already piloted this program in districts in Chilliwack, Nanaimo-Ladysmith and Nechako Lakes.
B.C. is working toward the goal of universal $10-per-day child care — something the NDP government ran on multiple times — but has so far fallen far short. A July report by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives found that only 10 per cent of B.C.'s child care spaces in 2025 are being offered at $10 per day.
The centre's yearly fee survey found that the five most expensive cities in Canada for median child care fees per day for infants were all in B.C., with Richmond leading the way, followed by Surrey, Vancouver, Burnaby and Kelowna. The statistics for preschoolers were similar.
B.C. and Nova Scotia are the only provinces to retain market-based fee systems for child care. B.C. uses several systems to make care more affordable, including the $10-per-day spaces, which are funded in part by the federal government, along with the affordable child care benefit for low-income parents, and the child care fee reduction initiative, aimed at specific, participating providers.
But when fees continue to rise in places such as Richmond, it creates a "worst-case scenario" of fees outpacing provincial contributions.
The centre blamed the issue, at least partially, on low wages for the child-care workforce, resulting in fewer spaces and demand outpacing supply.
The Coalition of Child Care Advocates of B.C., an advocacy group focused on universal $10-per-day child care, blamed low pay and the resulting inability to retain staff for the recent closures of child care programs on the Sunshine Coast that serve infants and toddlers.
"The B.C. government has allowed the provincial median wage for [Early Childhood Educators] to stagnate at just $29/hour," the advocacy organization said in a news release following the announcement of the closures. "The result, especially in communities with a housing crisis, is child care programs with reduced hours of operation or complete closure."
This new legislation will result in more spots for infants and toddlers, which should have an impact on the province's poor performance in keeping costs down for parents of young children by increasing supply.
"It's a step forward in our plan to increase spaces all across this province," Education and Child Care Minister Lisa Beare said. "Public schools are trusted spaces, spaces that are community hubs, places where children go to learn."
Heather Maahs, the B.C. Conservative critic for child care and early childhood education is worried that the increased use of schools for child care could squeeze already cramped spaces and services.
"My experience as a school board trustee for 16 years tells me that the education system has enough to deal with already without expanding services for daycare," she said.
Maahs called $10 per day "unrealistic," but also said rate caps go against her belief in free enterprise.
"Some parents can and will pay for more expensive day care, and some parents will and can pay for other day care that's provided," she said. "And that's just the way it goes."
