Burlington child care centre leaves parents struggling with one week closing notice

In Burlington some parents are frustrated and have been left scrambling to find care for their children after, First Steps Learning and Child Care Centre gave a one week’s notice that the infant room was closing in a letter sent home to some of the parents.

In the letter it says, the centre says they will be unable to offer infant care due to staffing shortages.

Kaitlynd Burns has a 16-month-old daughter in the infant section of the daycare and says she is in “absolute disbelief and shock, then the panic sets in, thinking OMG what am I going to do?, How am I going to take care of my child?, and then I think isn’t this notice a bit short?”

Other parents like Burns are also struggling to figure out what they are going to do.

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The letter says with the shortage of qualified staff the industry is facing and ministry mandates at licensed child care facilities.

One parent said they are not impressed with the one week notice, noting that after looking at the hand book policy, they need to give at least a one month notice before removing their child from the daycare. “I found one week to be paltry to say the least,” they say.

Karina Gould, the Liberal MP for Burlington is currently on parental leave but her office did tell CHCH News that the government is working in collaboration with the province and is committed to building a national early learning and childcare system, including 86-thousand additional spaces in Ontario by 2026.