Your Perspective: B.C. NDP fails to deliver on $10/day child care promise

The NDP’s ideology is getting in the way of delivering affordable, accessible childcare for British Columbia families who need it most.

After spending millions of taxpayer dollars on a childcare model designed to exclude private operators (what the NDP calls “for-profit childcare”)  the cracks in their plan are becoming impossible to ignore.

For decades, across BC, small business childcare providers have delivered more than half of the daycare spaces in the province. These local operators and entrepreneurs provided childcare long before the government got involved. In 2021, BC received federal funding which resulted in the expansion of not-for-profit and public sector childcare providers across the province. That decision negatively impacted private childcare providers, many of whom have been serving families for years, by essentially pushing them out of the system.

Instead of partnering with them, the NDP chose ideology over practicality. We have watched the NDP quietly walk away from its flagship $10-a-day childcare promise. First it was “paused”, then it was “replaced.” The language changes depending on the day, but the outcome is the same: fewer families getting the affordable $10 a day care they were promised.

Recently, British Columbians learned that three not-for-profit daycare centers, are closing because they are not financially sustainable due to the current funding model. These closures expose the government’s inability to run a centralized childcare system that ignores the economic reality of staffing costs under union agreements without corresponding funding provisions.

The NDP’s move away from a market-based childcare system toward a fully government-directed model has made it increasingly cost-prohibitive for many providers to remain in the sector. It is time for the government to appreciate and support the experienced childcare providers who have been serving families for many years in their communities.

We should support parents, not bureaucracies. Funding should follow the child, allowing families to access care where it works best for them, while empowering all qualified providers — public, non-for-profit, and private — to help meet demand.

If the NDP continues down this path, families will keep facing longer waitlists, fewer spaces, and more uncertainty.

Parents need a childcare program that works — not another failed government experiment.