Quebec wants 40-hour week for childcare workers

The Legault government wants childcare workers to work more.

In the midst of negotiations to renew collective agreements, Treasury Board President Sonia LeBel opened up on Wednesday about her demands: 40-hour weeks, rather than the current 32 to 35 hours.

“I would be very happy if we could reach an agreement on a 40-hour week,” she said during question period.

“That would solve a lot of problems for my colleague,” she added, referring to Family Minister Suzanne Roy, who is grappling with labour shortages in the network.

“If the educators' union says to me, ‘Ms LeBel, we're signing up for 40 hours,’ I think it will go faster.”

“There are some who work a 40-hour week, so it's certainly simpler,” added Roy in an interview with The Canadian Press.

The President of the Treasury Board was responding to a Canadian study that gives Quebec's early childhood education system a less favourable image than that of other provinces.

In this comparative report on early childhood education in the provinces and territories, Quebec is no longer the model to follow, but rather Prince Edward Island, which now pays its educators the best.

LeBel insisted on “correcting the facts,” because, in her opinion, “it's inaccurate” and you have to “compare apples with apples.”

With the current offers on the table, an educator in Quebec would earn more than $32 an hour, compared to $30 in Prince Edward Island, she said.

What's more, educators on the island work 40 hours a week, while workers here work less.

“When you put them all on a 40-hour basis, educators in Quebec make over $4,000 more a year than those in Prince Edward Island,” Lebel said.

Negotiations are proceeding very slowly on a new contract for educators. Pressure tactics are planned by the CSQ and CSN in November.

Waiting list

Even though the number of childcare places in Quebec has fallen recently, Roy said on Wednesday that the government would meet its 2021 target of creating 37,000 new subsidised places by March 2025.

The Parti Québécois (PQ) was concerned about the data in the Ministry of the Family's scorecard at the end of August. It showed that there were 304,084 places in all types of childcare services, both subsidised and non-subsidised, down from 304,359 in May.

The biggest reduction was in subsidised home childcare (853 places), which could not be offset by the 286 new places created in childcare centres and the 281 new places created in subsidised daycare centres.

“It's often in August, before the start of the new school year, that some (family childcare providers) decide to retire, move to a community service or an early childhood centre,” said Roy, trying to be reassuring.

She said the waiting list of children registered for daycare was steadily decreasing for the tenth consecutive month.

However, between March and May, it rose from 28,831 to 31,783, and between June and August, from 33,172 to 34,055, according to data from her department.

As of Aug. 30, the CAQ government had created 18,790 of the 37,000 places it had promised.

No fewer than 18,394 others were “in progress” — a measure that the Opposition finds imprecise because it does not indicate the progress made in opening these places.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Oct. 23, 2024.