Limits in Your Province/Territory. please

[5 Little Monkeys]

I'm in MB and while I don't agree with the ratio rules, there isn't much I can do about it. I have spoke with head office and I have emailed and I encourage all parents when I can to do the same (to email and ask them to relook at the ratio rules and the age restrictions). With ON looking at decreasing their ratio, I can't see MB increasing theirs anytime soon though. It's unfortunate because I do think that no matter where you live and no matter what the rules are there will always be providers who run illegally. We could be allowed 12 kids and there will still be the ones who take 13 because "what's one more?" So while I appreciate the concept behind the rules, I do agree that they mean nothing. There are some providers who are more than capable of providing quality care for more than they are allowed and there are providers who shouldn't even have one child in their care.

I'm also curious as to what the consequences are for providers who run illegally in other provinces? Here in MB, there really isn't a huge consequence and I believe this is why there are so many who go over their numbers. If reported and caught, they are shut down immediately that day but they can re-open the next day as long as they are following ratio. A friend of mine in another city has a friend who was reported.....twice!! She runs illegally until she's caught, goes down in numbers for a bit and than starts to take on more kids again.

I also don't think it matters where we are or the cost of living.....if any one of us was told we had to immediately go down a child or two, that would be a huge loss of income. Yes of course the cost of living is more in downtown TO than it is here in MB but the loss of income is still the same. That is still a bill or two that now has the potential to not be paid.

Even though I don't like the MB ratio's (for private or licensed) I am grateful I live here because my cost of living is low, my 4 paying spots (at $32/day) bring in more than enough for me to live on and it works for us. I am also extremely lucky to be mortgage free though. However, if I had to drop a child that would annoy and scare me too!! Heck, that is part of the reason why I don't have my own child yet lol. I can't afford to pay my own daycare bill