Meeting to focus on child care workers' issues; Attracting and retaining employees becoming more and more difficult, say child care advocates
Courier-Islander - Campbell River 
By: Denise Sharkey
11 Apr 2008

Low pay and lack of benefits for child care workers means finding employees is difficult and keeping them is even harder, say local child care advocates.

They're hoping to try and start finding some answers to the conundrum at a meeting set for April 17 at the Oyster Bay Resort hall. The meeting is being organized by the Campbell River branch of the Early Childhood Educators of B.C. (ECEBC) and the B.C. Government and Service Employees' Union (BCGEU).

Kathy Rae, chair of the Campbell River ECEBC branch, said low wages mean attracting child care workers is troublesome.

"It's getting worse in that many more people are leaving the field," Rae said. "Some programs in Campbell River are not operating at capacity because they can't find enough staff, which means children are staying on waiting lists longer. I've talked to quite a few child care centres in the past year who have advertised positions and have had no one apply for them."

Gwen Bennett, coordinator of Cari's Infant and Toddler Centre, said the public meeting is aimed at child care workers as well as child care centre operators and managers. Bennett said the average wage for a child care worker in Campbell River is $13 per hour. Some are unionized and some are not, but the wages are low either way, she said. Child care workers also rarely receive benefits at all. Bennett said fewer and fewer workers are interested in working in the field and many longtime workers are leaving, finding better-paying jobs with school districts and other employers.

"We can't compete in terms of offering our employees $20 per hour," Bennett said.

She added that working in a child care centre is hard work.

"It's very demanding," she said. "People think you're just playing all day, but child care workers put in hard work keeping children safe and secure in their parents' absence. There's a lot of responsibility involved in the work."

Bennett added that funding is always a problem. Parents already pay $41 per day for an infant or toddler to be at Cari's Centre, she said. The thought of raising those prices to cover higher wages is hard to fathom, she said.

"$41 per day is a lot of money," Bennett said. "How far can you go before creating a system that's only available to the wealthy?"

Rae said something has to change if the child care industry hopes to attract and retain employees.

"Child care workers have been subsidizing the system because of the low wages and lack of benefits," she said.

The public meeting is slated for April 17….