ASSOCIATION OF EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATORS ONTARIO SUBMISSION TO THE STANDING COMMITTEE ON SOCIAL POLICY
REGARDING Bill 10: An Act to enact the Child Care and Early Years Act, 2014, to repeal the Day Nurseries Act, to amend the Early Childhood Educators Act, 2007, the Education Act and the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities Act and to make consequential and related amendments to other Acts
Submitted November 18, 2014
The Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario (AECEO) commends the government’s actions to improve child care in Ontario with the new child care legislation put forward in Bill 10, the Child Care Modernization Act. The short notice and limited time for formal consultation on the proposed legislation is disappointing, as this is a once in a generation opportunity to fundamentally change the state of early childhood education and care (ECEC) in Ontario. The AECEO is hopeful that the government will engage in a more comprehensive consultation process with the ECEC sector to establish a new regulatory framework for child care programs in Ontario.
The protective measures put forward in Bill 10 are necessary to ensure the basic health and safety of Ontario’s children. These measures, however, do not move away from a complaint based process for monitoring illegal and unsafe unregulated home child care. The AECEO believes that all children should have access to regulated child care and that the government should make immediate plans and investments to create more high quality regulated child care spaces.
New legislation is a necessary component of a high quality child care system. However, legislation alone is not sufficient for the development and sustainability of a high quality child care system. In addition to new legislation, we urge the government to undertake a more robust policy process in order to develop a comprehensive policy framework that lays out the province’s intentions, rationales, short and long-term plans, and funding and evaluation mechanisms for a system of regulated child care.