Ontario providers

[cfred]

APRIL 1ST DEADLINE!!!

For the past year, CICPO representatives attended meetings with the Ministry of Education, agencies and municipality representatives. The end result was swaying the MOE to remove the 1:25 ratio cap (Home Visitor : Provider). This is important as a means to reduce the costs of operating an agency, thereby reducing the costs passed down to the provider. This clears the path for better models from existing agencies and the potential for the creation of cooperative models, such as the one proposed by CICPO. We are aware that not everyone is interested in joining an agency in any form, which we totally understand and respect. However, it is option that would be good to have available to us in the future. All over the country, childcare advocates are holding meetings about a National Childcare Policy/Framework. They have the ears of politicians. It would not be surprising to know that these discussions do not include the Independent Sector. CICPO wants to secure this important regulatory change, that we worked very hard to attain, to ensure that we all will have a place in the new childcare landscape that appears to be developing. We want to secure more affordable licencing options for everyone.

Agencies are currently speaking out against this important change. We must all leave public comment if we wish to be included in the future of childcare under a National Childcare Policy.

Please see pages 10, 11 (section E1 - Home Childcare)to view the regulatory change proposed. http://www.ontariocanada.co m/registry/showAttachment.do?po stingId=20628&attachmentId=30706

Email your comments to: CCGE_modernization@o ntario.ca

Twitter: @kathleen_wynne and @OntLiberal

[bright sparks]

This is ridiculous. It's like they are pretending independent home daycare providers don't exist! Why not include us in this, would it really be so difficult for the ministry to set up some kind of framework similar to the college of trades or similar and send inspectors out 2-4 times a year to make sure we comply? Charge us an annual license fee and have us have some kind of mandatory training and standards to live up to if they are really so concerned about safety. It is a framework which works based on safety of children not profit which is used in many other countries with efficiency.

On another note, I've turned 17 families away in the last 2 weeks for spots for children under two! Yesterday I had a woman in tears over the phone saying that since this change she is being put in a situation where she is being forced to leave her children with a provider she is not happy with. What is her alternative? Quitting her job and staying at home would mean she will lose her home! There are many providers in my area, not to many good ones, and even less infant spots. Two daycare centres with mediocre reputations, high fees and no additional spots to compensate for bill 10. Simply restricting numbers does ABSOLUTLY NOTHING to keep the children safe in fact quite possibly to the contrary when children are being placed in poor quality settings, and the government continue to back us into a corner where home daycare is no longer a viable source of income and providers and parents are in a position where they could lose their homes and/or have the choice to have a family taken away from them. This is utter bullshit!

[cfred]

Thanks Bright Sparks....and welcome back! Glad to hear you're still in school (and loving it) though. And yep...utter bullshit indeed! You're not wrong.

The Ministry has noticed us now, and has lifted the Home Visitor : Provider cap, which was our aim. This will bring about lots more affordable opportunities for providers to affiliate with agencies in the future, IF THEY NEED OR WANT TO. Some ICPs think this doesn't pertain to them, being independent. But it's sure nice to have some options in the event of a national childcare policy. Last night, on Twitter, OCBCC (Ontario Coalition for Better Childcare - aka Carolyn Ferns) and the CRRU (aka Martha Friendly) hosted a 'Twitter Storm' protesting the new regulations (including ours) and calling on the province to participate in a national childcare policy. Hundreds of people turned up, all of them tweeting. This is happening all over the country. And if you don't know who Carolyn Ferns and Martha Friendly are, they are about as high as you can get in childcare advocacy...and politicians listen to them. They have a LOT of influence and media attention.

I can't predict the future, however, I've had a brief foray on the inside of all this stuff now. I can say with certainty that the advocates are continuing to gain momentum. As you tell me that you've turned away 17 people, I can probably list 20 more people with similar stories. We're all experiencing that. This is the shortage CICPO predicted. Parents are furious and now have a vested interested in aligning with childcare advocates, thereby adding more voices. We're seeing a new upswing of negative media attention, which doesn't help us at all.

So, at the end of the day, we need this regulatory change. If a national childcare policy comes into effect, the only way to participate in the industry will be licensing. The only way to keep licensing affordable for providers is to remove the cap so we don't have to pay out so much for the extra 'soft services' that many of us don't need. By the way, Ontario is the only province to have this cap ;) We'll never get the ratios changed. That's completely off the table. But we can at least get this....and we worked damned hard for the past 18 mos to get this far, to help everyone in this field.

We're approaching the media again. Heidi suggests that we all share the video with everyone to get as many eyes on quality independent childcare as possible, as the ECE gurus send out their negativity. This SHOWS everyone what quality childcare looks like. Share it via social media on FB, Twitter, with paper editors, etc....everyone. We need people to see that we ARE high quality.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTo8ZDT3N8o

[bluebirdfollower]

Is there anything I can do in terms of support? Joining an organization or anything!