Ontario freezes early childhood educator wages at 2026 level

TORONTO · Early childhood educators will not receive an expected $1-per-hour wage increase next year, the Ontario government confirmed in a memo, freezing minimum pay rates at 2026 levels. The wage floor for educators in the Canada-wide Early Learning and Child Care program will remain at $25.86 per hour in 2027. The Ministry of Education memo, released on Oct. 30, came after the province signed a four-year extension to the federal child-care program. Advocates and educators condemned the decision at Queen's Park on Wednesday, calling it a direct wage cut during an affordability crisis.

"To freeze wages in the middle of an affordability crisis is both heartless and foolish," said Carolyn Ferns, policy co-ordinator at the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care. "In real dollars, this is a direct cut for our lowest-paid educators." Ferns said the annual $1 increases were implemented to help alleviate a workforce crisis, starting from an initial wage of $18 per hour when the program began. Amber Straker, executive director of the Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario, said the increases were necessary to meet basic inflation. "Without these increases, ECEs are going to experience what is effectively a wage cut where everything else gets more expensive as wages stay the same," Straker said.

The wage freeze is part of the landscape following Ontario's extension of its child-care agreement with the federal government to 2031. The extension includes about $12 million in new funding, in addition to a portion of $5.4 billion Ottawa has promised over two years to help maintain affordable fees. Under the new agreement, Ontario has committed to maintain its current average child-care fee of $19 per day, capped at $22, until June 30, 2027. The federal program aims to cap child care at $10 a day across the country, but Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia have yet to reach that goal.

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Education Minister Paul Calandra acknowledged more work is needed but highlighted the province's creation of more child-care spaces in recent years. "Because if you expect more people to participate in the economy, then you have to have spaces available," he told reporters. The province was supposed to have created 86,000 affordable spaces by this year under the initial deal but had reached just shy of 60,000 as of September. The ministry memo says it remains committed to the 86,000 target and will hit it by March 31 of next year.

Calandra also placed blame on the previous government. "We took over a situation back in 2018 where child-care fees were through the roof," he said. "Spaces were very limited. ECEs were not being trained. And we've literally turned that around." Advocates, however, said the wage freeze will exacerbate recruitment and retention problems. "It's already a profession that is often undervalued, unrecognized, disrespected," Straker said. "At least that $1 increase provided some hope for what the future would look like." She said educators have been seeking a wage grid with a starting rate of $35 per hour.

New Democrat MPP Chandra Pasma, her party's education critic, said the government is failing both parents and workers. "It's a perfect storm of not delivering for parents, who are desperate for help to make child care more affordable," Pasma said. "You can't deliver child care without workers, and if we keep freezing the wages, we're not going to be able to attract and retain the workers that we need to provide the care." She added that while child care is a provincial responsibility, the federal Liberal government should also follow through on its funding commitments.

Crystal Creamer, a registered early childhood educator, said the quality of child care depends on the quality of life for educators. "How are child-care workers expected to take care of themselves and their families when they don't make a livable wage?" she said. "I'm sick of hearing stories from my colleagues about how they have to choose between affording rent and affording the cost to get back and forth to work." Ferns and other advocates are calling on the province to restore and enhance the annual pay increases and to develop a wage grid similar to those in provinces like Quebec and Manitoba. The four-year extension of the child-care agreement, which includes the wage freeze, was reported by Novello Desserts earlier this month.

With files from The Canadian Press, CBC News and St. Catharines Standard