• Departmental Reports
• Public Opinion Research
• Research
• Audit
• Evaluation
• Publications
• FAQs

• Ministers
• About Us
• What's New
• Newsroom
• Publications and Resources
• A to Z Index

Child Care in Canada Involves All Orders of Government

In Canada, child care involves a number of different approaches and priorities, with all orders of government having a commitment to children and families and playing a role to differing degrees in the provision of non-parental child care and pre-primary education as summarized in Table One.

Primary responsibility for the provision of child care falls to the provinces and territories. There are significant differences between the types and quality of care available in each jurisdiction. Provincial and territorial responsibilities include: determining the legislative requirements and funding arrangements for the delivery of programs and services; procedures for fee subsidization for eligible families and mechanisms to provide regulated settings with some type of operating funding; and regulating and monitoring child care and pre-primary education. In setting the legislation, provinces and territories have defined full-time and part-time child care and early learning programs and services to target children from 0-5 years of age inclusive, and out-of-school programs to target children 6-10 or 6-12 years of age, depending on the jurisdiction. Typically, responsibility for these activities can be found in any combination of social services, community services and/or education ministries.

Regulated child care includes full and part day care provided in child care centres, family day homes and pre-school/nursery schools. According to the University of Toronto’s Childcare Resources and Research Unit, based on provincial and territorial administrative data, in 2004, there were enough regulated child care spaces for approximately 24% of all children aged 0-5 in Canada. Coverage varies widely across provinces and territories, from 10% in Saskatchewan and 14% in Newfoundland and Labrador, to 54% in Yukon and 41% in Quebec.³

The remainder of child care falls in the unregulated or license-exempt sector. Unregulated means that the child care provider does not have a permit indicating they meet the minimum requirements for the legal operation of a child care centre, a family child care home or a family child care agency. There are some types of child care that are license-exempt where the child care provider does not need to have a permit such as Kin Care, Nanny Care and some Neighbour Care. Also in some jurisdictions, programs such as nursery schools, part-time pre-schools, parent drop-ins, and camps fall outside of licensing requirements and despite the fact that some parents use the programs as part-time or occasional child care, they are not required to be licensed.

Provinces and territories receive support from the federal government in the development and provision of child care through fiscal transfers in the Canada Social Transfer (CST). The federal government also provides income supports to families such as maternity and parental benefits and tax measures such as the Child Care Expense Deduction. In July 2006, the Government of Canada instituted the Universal Child Care Benefit, which provides up to $1,200 per year to families for each child less than 6 years of age. In terms of direct delivery, the federal government has responsibility for the provision of child care services for specific populations including First Nations on reserve, Inuit and military families.

In some provinces, municipal governments also play a role in the provision of child care by entering into purchase of service agreements with child care providers and/or directly delivering centre-based, home-based and parent support programs, which are often provided on a fee-for-service basis (often sliding scale based on income or ability to pay) to parents, in addition to providing subsidies or support for low income families. Municipal governments are also responsible for establishing zoning and parking by laws, enforcing building codes and monitoring compliance with public health and fire safety regulations as it relates to child care spaces development.

³  Calculations using data from Early Childhood Education and Care in Canada 2004. Childcare Resources and Research Unit, University of Toronto.

⁴  See Appendix V for a listing of Government of Canada programs supporting child care.