Some Alberta parents are paying $0 for child care but that's about to change

There's just over a year left in the Canada-Alberta child-care agreement and it's shaping up to be a rocky one for some parents, who — for this first time in the history of the agreement — will see their fees increase as a new phase of the program rolls out.

Alex Nuspl is one of them.

She's a mother of four who lives in Olds, Alta., and just enrolled her youngest in a daycare program alongside her second-youngest. With two kids in care, her monthly fees are set to jump by $650 on April 1.

"To me and my family, $650 is a ton of money," Nuspl said. "That's more than our grocery bill a month."

It's also a lot more than she has been paying for child care: $0 per month.

The existence of completely free child care may come as a surprise to parents living in Calgary and Edmonton, who are used to paying significant fees, even with the existing government grants and subsidies. But, given the structure of Alberta's child-care system to date, it's been a reality for parents in some rural areas.

That's because the base fees in rural areas tend to be lower and the government funding — in the form of a fixed grant and an income-tested subsidy — sometimes completely covers the cost, especially for lower-income families who receive the maximum subsidy amount. (In more urban settings, the base fees typically exceed the government funding, leaving parents to cover the balance.)

That's about to change, however, as the provincial government rolls out the latest — and final — phase of the program under the terms of its funding agreement with the federal government, which is set to expire in 2026.

As of April 1, the income-tested subsidy component of the program will be eliminated. Instead, parents will pay a flat fee of $326 per month (or roughly $15 per day).

This will mark a reduction in costs for many parents, but it will also mean a significant increase for some parents, primarily in rural areas and smaller cities, and especially those living on lower income.

The provincial government says it's making the change in order to bring parents' costs for child care more in line with one another.

"We had seen some unintended consequences where parents in the same region, with the same aged child, getting care to the same standard, were paying very different amounts," said Matt Jones, Alberta's minister of jobs, economy and trade.

Some child-care providers in a given region were charging up to three times as much as other providers in the same region, Jones added.

"So we heard concerns from parents about the transparency and equality in the system, and we heard the same thing from providers," he said. "And this new funding framework absolutely addresses that, as of April 1."