Ontario’s $10-a-day child care promise is at a crossroads.
Recent comments from Ontario’s Minister of Education suggesting the province should “bring existing centres into the system” to create more child care spaces have sparked concern across the sector. The remarks, made during a CBC Power & Politics interview, were widely interpreted as signalling a greater reliance on for-profit child care operators that have so far remained outside the low-fee system.
This approach ignores clear evidence, contradicts the experience of other provinces, and risks undermining both quality and affordability for families.
Non-Profit Providers Are Ready to Expand — But Face Provincial Barriers
A new B2C2 report, Willing, But Not Able? Expansion Issues Across Multi-Site Child Care Operators in Ontario (2025), paints a very different picture from the one implied by the Minister’s comments.
Based on responses from 52 multi-site child care operators across Ontario, the findings show that:
64% want to expand, with another 25% open to expansion.
78% say they are likely or very likely to grow over the next five years.
74% have already taken concrete steps, including feasibility studies, site searches, design work, or business planning.
Despite this readiness, more than 70% of operators report barriers that are created or controlled by the province, including:
Lack of access to capital funding
Wages that are too low to recruit and retain qualified staff
Insufficient support to secure appropriate space
This evidence directly challenges the notion that Ontario must turn to for-profit operators in order to expand child care capacity. The issue is not willingness within the non-profit sector — it is policy.
Quebec’s Experience Offers a Clear Warning
Ontario does not have to look far for a cautionary tale. Quebec, home to Canada’s most mature child care system, has conducted repeated quality assessments over the past 25 years. The conclusion has been consistent: for-profit child care centres deliver lower quality care than non-profit providers.
Quebec’s own Minister of Families, Mathieu Lacombe, acknowledged this in 2022, calling the expansion of private daycares “the biggest mistake” made by the Quebec government over the past quarter-century and expressing regret that the province opened expansion to the for-profit sector.
Ontario should learn from this experience rather than repeat it.
Child Care as Long-Term Public Infrastructure
Non-profit child care is built on public purpose and long-term community investment. Andrew Fleck Children’s Services in Ottawa is one such example, having served families since 1911.
As CEO Kim Hiscott explains, the donation that funded the organization’s first building in 1932 came with a legal requirement: the building must always be used for child care, and if ever sold, the proceeds must go toward creating more child care spaces.
“That is what generational public investment looks like,” Hiscott notes. “We must replicate that kind of long-term commitment to children and communities. Ontario should be strengthening not-for-profit child care, not risking quality by expanding for-profit operators.”
A Policy Failure, Not a Market Failure
According to B2C2 Chair Susan Colley, the growing interest in for-profit expansion reflects a deeper issue.
“Non-profit child care providers are ready to build the child care system Ontario needs — but the province has tied their hands,” she says. “Instead of fixing the barriers that nonprofits face, the Minister is looking to for-profit providers. That’s not a strategy; it’s an admission of policy failure.”
The $10-a-Day Promise Is at Risk
Ontario is already behind on its child care space-creation commitments. Without a credible plan to expand non-profit and public child care, the province risks:
Missing its 86,000-space target
Failing to meet federal requirements under the ELCC agreement
Falling short of its promise to deliver $10-a-day child care for families
Temporary fee stabilization at $19 per day may delay the problem, but it does not solve it.
What Needs to Change
B2C2 is calling on the Government of Ontario to take evidence-based action by:
Establishing a dedicated capital fund for non-profit expansion
Implementing a sector-wide wage grid and ensuring pay equity
Providing operational funding guarantees for new non-profit centres
Supporting municipalities and school boards in creating child care space
Committing to a non-profit and public-first expansion strategy aligned with evidence and federal policy
Ontario’s child care system will not be built overnight — but the choices made now will shape its quality, affordability, and stability for generations. The evidence is clear: expanding non-profit child care is not only possible, it is essential.
