Question Period Note: Early Learning and Child Care

What is the federal government doing to support early learning and child care?

In 2021, the Government of Canada made a transformative investment to create over 250,000 childcare spaces by March 2026. Investing over $30 billion dollars over 5 years to build a Canada-wide early learning and childcare system with provinces, territories, and Indigenous partners to reduce child care costs and empower full economic participation.

In 2025, extension agreements were signed with all provinces and territories, ensuring predictable federal support beyond March 2026.

The Government of Canada remains committed to working with partners to ensure families have access to high-quality and affordable early learning and child care.

IF PRESSED on results achieved to date

Families of approximately 900,000 children are benefitting from affordable child care across the country thanks to the efforts of federal, provincial, and territorial governments.

As of January 2025, provinces and territories have announced more than 209,000 new child care spaces, with over 154,000 spaces created.

Eight provinces and territories have achieved $10-a-day or less average fees as of April 2024 while others have reduced fees by at least 50%.

IF PRESSED on sustainability of the Canada-wide ELCC system

The Canada Early Learning and Child Care Act commits the federal government to maintain long-term funding for ELCC programs and services to provinces and territories, including for Indigenous peoples and official language minority communities.

In 2025, ELCC agreements were extended to support continued access to high-quality, affordable and inclusive early learning and child care programs and services.

The five-year extensions include an annual 3% funding escalator starting in 2027-2028 to help respond to inflationary pressures on early learning and child care operations.

As part of Budget 2016 and Budget 2017, the Government of Canada committed $7.5 billion over 11 years to support and create more high-quality, affordable child care across the country. Since the first ELCC agreements with provinces and territories were signed in 2017, a significant amount of work has been undertaken. The target of 40,000 affordable child care spaces was achieved, and agreements have also increased access to training and professional development for the early childhood workforce.

The 2020 Fall Economic Statement announced key investments to lay the groundwork for a Canada-wide child care system, in partnership with provinces, territories and Indigenous peoples. This includes investments to establish a federal secretariat on early learning and child care; supporting the existing federal Indigenous Early Learning and Child Care Secretariat; making the early learning and child care funding announced in Budget 2017 permanent at 2027-2028 levels; providing $420 million in 2021-2022 for the provinces and territories to support the recruitment and retention of early childhood educators; and an additional $75 million in 2021-2022 to improve the quality and accessibility of Indigenous child care programs.

Building on investments announced in the 2020 Fall Economic Statement, the Government of Canada is making a transformative investment of over $27 billion over five years, as part of Budget 2021, to build a Canada-wide early learning and child care system with provinces and territories. Combined with other investments including in Indigenous early learning and child care, up to $30 billion over five years will be provided in support of early learning and child care. Adding previous investments announced since 2015, this means that as of 2025-2026, a minimum of $9.2 billion will be provided every year – permanently – for early learning and child care and Indigenous early learning and child care.

Canada-wide Early Learning and Child Care Agreements have been signed with all provinces and territories, including an asymmetrical agreement with Quebec, where prices are already affordable through its well-established system. Fee reductions have already been announced in every jurisdiction outside of Quebec and Yukon, where they already had $10/day or lower fees.

To support the implementation of the Canada-wide early learning and child care system, Budget 2022 provided $625 million over four years, beginning in 2023-2024, to Employment and Social Development Canada for an Early Learning and Child Care Infrastructure Fund. This funding enables provinces and territories to make further investments in child care infrastructure that supports greater inclusion for underserved communities, such as those in rural and remote regions, high cost/low-income urban neighbourhoods and communities with barriers to access, such as racialized, Indigenous, official language minority communities, and children, parents, and employees with disabilities. It may also be used to support physical infrastructure for ELCC operators providing care during non-standard hours.

Only not-for-profit and public ELCC providers are eligible for funding under the ELCC Infrastructure Fund. Not-for-profit and public providers often face unique challenges to access the capital funding necessary to build and/or maintain appropriate facilities, especially inclusive spaces. Funding is being provided following the approval of Infrastructure Action Plans. As per the Canada-Quebec asymmetrical agreement, Quebec is not required to submit action plans.

Budget 2024 announced further investments in early learning and child care aimed at increasing the number of affordable child care spaces and supporting early childhood educators. These measures include:

Offering student loan forgiveness for rural and remote early childhood educators. This will encourage educators to work in smaller communities and help families get the child care they need. With a $48 million investment over four years, student loan forgiveness will increase the longer an educator works in a rural or remote area, attracting and retaining the talent, similar to the programs offered to rural doctors and nurses.

Increasing training for early childhood educators. Investing $10 million over two years to train more early childhood educators will help build up the talent needed for the expansion of affordable, high-quality child care.

Improved access to child care for Canadian Armed Forces personnel. $100 million over five years, starting in 2024-25, to help improve child care services for Canadian Armed Forces personnel and their families.

In 2025, ELCC agreements were extended to support continued access to high-quality, affordable and inclusive early learning and child care programs and services. These extensions will provide more than $27 billion in additional federal investments to sustain the progress made from the existing early learning and child care agreements. Funding provided to all provinces and territories that have reached five-year Canada-wide extension agreements will increase by 3% every year, starting in fiscal year 2027-2028 and continuing through 2030-2031, ensuring that the early learning and child care system remains predictable over the duration of the agreements, while also providing flexibility for provinces and territories to respond to inflationary pressures.

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