The Association of Alberta Childcare Entrepreneurs (AACE) has voiced concerns about the provincial government’s ability to implement the $10 per day daycare program in a way respecting the industry. The AACE has made its concerns public following a town hall meeting between the Alberta government and childcare operators, where it announced plans to send a survey to them to understand the cost of running childcare centres. Operators were informed affordability grant payments could be withheld if they did not comply with the order to complete the survey.“Our association has been quiet for the past several months, but we feel the need to speak up following a town hall between industry operators and the government,” said AACE Chair Krystal Churcher in a press release. “Threatening to withhold funding from operators in order for the government to understand the true cost of childcare is not sitting well with the industry.”Churcher pointed out these are the same childcare operators who felt forced to sign this agreement in the first place and are upset the Alberta government is only trying to get this data to ensure equitable funding. Since the town hall, she said her phone has been blowing up with calls from frustrated operators who have had enough. For the past three years, Alberta’s childcare operators have signed agreements to participate in the affordability grant program to make childcare more affordable for families. Because the affordability grant program is tied to staff wages and other support programs operators rely on to remain financially viable, the choice to sign the agreement is seen by most operators as forced. “Alberta’s childcare operators have been all but forced to participate in the affordability grant program and were given the ‘option’ to sign the government’s agreement under duress, with limited information and, in the first few years, with only a few days to sign or risk losing all government support payments,” she said. “To be told now that this contractually agreed to funding could be withheld if we don’t comply with the government’s order to hand over our books and our wait lists is disingenuous and offensive.”She called the agreement “a hostile takeover of the private sector by the government without compensation or even a basic understanding of the industry they are taking over.” While three years too late, the AACE said it appreciates the Alberta government’s need to gather information about the true cost of running childcare and does not intend to get in the way. It urged the Alberta government to reconsider its role in the agreement with the Canadian government, criticizing the announce victory first, sort details later approach to childcare affordability. It called for genuine collaboration to develop a sustainable, made-in-Alberta solution for childcare affordability.Churcher concluded by saying the Alberta government “often declares victory without understanding the implications of their announcements, leading to acceptance of poor past decisions.” However, she said Alberta's childcare industry rejects this approach and will push back on it to preserve childcare quality and parental choice. “The Government of Canada and provincial governments signed agreements without consulting the industry, and we will not allow high-quality childcare to be destroyed,” she said. The AACE said in January it was being strong-armed into accepting a deal for the Canadian government’s $10 per day childcare agreement with the Alberta government. READ MORE: Alberta childcare operators say they will ‘reluctantly’ sign on to Liberal’s $10 daycare agreement Churcher said childcare operators had no choice to sign up to the affordability grant program or face drastic service cuts and insolvency. “This decision should not be considered a win for the Alberta government, Government of Canada, or for the childcare sector,” she said.
