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It's going take $158 million per year to bring childcare in the Capital Region to an acceptable level, according to a new report by the Regional Child Care Council.
"It's not a quick fix and it's not cheap," said Jan White, a member of the RCCC and a co-ordinator with Partners in Learning and Advocacy for Young Children, the child-care advocacy group that sponsored the report.
"What we're hoping to do (is) inform governments about the complexity of the system and what it would cost our region."
The report, called Building on our Strengths: a Child Care Plan for Victoria, concludes there's a need for 24,446 licensed spaces in Greater Victoria. Only 10,653 currently exist.
The projected figure includes a mix of full-time and part-time care for kids ranging in age from infants to 12 year olds.
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Currently, parents pay about 70 per cent of the cost of child care with government funding the remainder. Those figures should be reversed for childcare to be affordable, the report recommends.
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In its report, RCCC sets the cost of full-time care for a child aged three to five at $8,960 per year. The number is comparable to what B.C. spends per pupil for a 10-month term at school, $8,078.
The cost estimate includes a raise for staff from $18 to $25 per hour -- a change needed to attract and retain adequately trained people, the report argues.
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- reprinted from the Victoria News