Absurd salaries and overly high ratios in Quebec day-care centers, says educator

Educators in Quebec's subsidized childcare centres (CPE) have been in an interminable arm wrestling match with the government for almost two years. While CSQ members ratified their contract on December 22, the Ministère de la Famille is refusing to give good pay rises to the workers unionized with the CSN and wants to increase the ratio of children per educator.

The North Star spoke to Félix (a pseudonym), an early childhood educator in the process of obtaining his legal qualification. He is a member of one of the unions that has been without a contract for nearly two years. According to him, Quebec's CAQ government places very little value on the work of educators in educational childcare centres.

“The pay is terrible,” he says. “Unskilled workers are paid $18.50 an hour. I don't know many people who would do that job for $18.50. When you get your qualification, it's $21 an hour. It's a bit of a joke.”

The government's first offer of a 12% wage increase over five years was rejected by the unions. The latter had said they were surprised not to get at least 17.4%, the amount obtained by the Common Front.

A quick search on sites such as Indeed or Glassdoor will turn up several positions without experience in large catering chains with a higher starting salary than unqualified educators. Qualified educators, meanwhile, are paid less than housekeepers or kitchen assistants in nursing homes.

A qualified educator in Prince Edward Island, on the other hand, earns $30 an hour in their second year on the job. This is a 50% increase over their salary in 2021. While Prince Edward Island's entry-level salary is similar to that of Quebec's highest level, 95% of educators in the eastern province are qualified, compared with 78% in Quebec.

To make up for the lack of qualified staff, many educational childcare centres turn to placement agencies, explains Félix. “We're going through a bit of what the healthcare sector is going through, which is that the agencies are taking up a lot of space. For example, if I went to work for a private replacement agency, I'd be paid $22 an hour. So a lot of people are going to replacement agencies. As a result, the kids don't have any stability because they have lots of substitutes.”

For Félix, the agencies are taking advantage of the exodus of skilled workers to make a profit. “They make money on it. For example, they'll send a replacement paid $21 an hour. But they don't charge $21 an hour, they're going to charge the CPE about $26.”

Another of the union members' demands was to lower the ratio of children to educators. At present, the ratio for children under 18 months is one educator for every five children.

The ratio for children aged 18 to 4 (eight children per educator) also needs to be lowered, according to the unions.

But according to Félix, the CAQ is having none of it. “It's one of the hardest demands to get the government to listen to, because there's a huge shortage of spaces in daycare centres. So, the CAQ wants to increase our ratios instead of decreasing them. Because they want to create more childcare spaces, but they won't find anyone to work with higher ratios.”

According to the educator, the CAQ has broken with the educational mission behind CPEs. “For them, the CPE issue is not about early childhood education. It's a question of childcare for working parents.”

“CPEs were created 27 years ago. At the outset, the aim of CPEs was to ensure that all families, especially working-class families who don't have a lot of money, could have access to an educational childcare environment. Because not all daycare centres were educational."

Educators from CPEs unionized with the CSN issued a five-day strike mandate to break the deadlock in negotiations. They also submitted a petition to the National Assembly in support of their demands, which garnered 20,000 signatures.

For their part, home childcare providers unionized with the CSN and CSQ reached agreements in principle with the Ministère de la Famille earlier in December.