Families & Community

Child care

Universal Free Child Care Toronto

Child care is essential infrastructure for a working city.

As Mayor, I will work toward universal, $0-a-day licensed child care for Toronto families, beginning with children under six and expanding access as new spaces become available.

Toronto will not build a completely separate child-care bureaucracy. We will build on the billions already invested through the federal, provincial and municipal child-care system and use City resources strategically to eliminate the remaining parent fee.

Phase 1: Make Child Care Free for Families Who Need It Most

We will begin by eliminating remaining child-care fees for lower-income Toronto families and work to eliminate the existing child-care fee-subsidy waiting list.

Phase 2: Expand Toward Universal $0 Child Care

We will progressively expand eligibility to middle-income families and ultimately work toward eliminating base child-care fees for Toronto residents using participating licensed programs.

Our objective will be simple:

$0-a-day child care for Toronto families.

Phase 3: Create the Spaces

Free child care means very little if parents cannot find a space.

Toronto will establish a Child Care Expansion Strategy using:

• City-owned land and buildings;
• community centres and other public facilities;
• partnerships with Toronto school boards;
• new affordable-housing developments;
• partnerships with nonprofit and community organizations; and
• incentives to incorporate child-care centres into appropriate new developments.

New spaces will be prioritized in neighbourhoods with the greatest shortages.

Invest in Early Childhood Educators

Universal child care cannot exist without the people who provide it.

Toronto will develop an ECE workforce strategy focused on recruitment, retention, working conditions and competitive compensation so that new centres have qualified professionals to operate them.

Protect Toronto Taxpayers

Toronto residents already contribute through their federal, provincial and municipal taxes.

My administration will negotiate aggressively with Ontario and the federal government to maximize their contributions before asking Toronto property taxpayers to finance additional costs.

The City will publish annually:

How much child care costs.
How much Ottawa contributes.
How much Ontario contributes.
How much Toronto contributes.
How many children receive care.
How many families are waiting.
How many new spaces are being created.

Universal child care must be universal not only in price, but also in availability.

Our long-term goal is a Toronto where parents do not have to choose between working and caring for their children, and where access to safe, high-quality child care does not depend on a family’s income.

Universal access. Quality care. $0-a-day for Toronto families.

Questions? Email bethechangeno1@gmail.com · Call (647) 785-3729

Hot lunch in every school

No child in Toronto should sit through class hungry.

City Hall delivers: more city funding for student nutrition programs, city kitchens and community partners opened to schools, starting where children are hungriest.

I’ll fight for: full, permanent school-food funding from Queen’s Park, Ottawa and the school boards, so every student gets a hot lunch.

Health care

Health care that reaches everyone

In a city this rich, no one should go without care because they don’t speak English, can’t read a form, can’t afford the bus, or are afraid to ask.

Hospitals and doctors are funded by the province, and I’ll push hard for more of them in the neighbourhoods that have too few. But the city runs services that keep people healthy every day, and I’ll make sure they reach everyone.

Bring services to people

Mobile health and public-health clinics in underserved neighbourhoods, in partnership with hospitals, universities and community health centres. Services in libraries and community hubs, where people already go.

One door, real help

Plain-language information in the languages Torontonians speak, and trained navigators who help people find and access the services they need, not just a phone number.

Care in a crisis

Expand the mental-health crisis response, so a person in distress is met by a trained responder, and keep paramedics properly staffed.

Access for all, without fear

Residents can use city services regardless of immigration status. Seniors and people with disabilities get accessible transit, help to age at home, and quality city-run long-term care. And free transit means no one misses an appointment because they can’t pay the fare.

My pledge is simple: every resident valued equally, regardless of religion, ethnicity, gender or colour. Equal access is how that pledge becomes real.

Students

Invest in students

Students are the future of this city, and right now Toronto is making it too hard for them to stay. This fall, Queen’s Park cut OSAP grants, so students are graduating with more debt than ever. The city can’t set tuition, but it can open doors.

Free training for the jobs Toronto needs

The city will pay tuition for residents who train as transit operators, early childhood educators, paramedics, skilled tradespeople and city engineers, in exchange for working for the city.

A Toronto promise bursary

Support for students from low-income neighbourhoods, and for those OSAP shuts out entirely, like undocumented students and refugee claimants, with colleges, universities and business partners matching the city’s share.

Free learning in every library

Courses, tutoring, language classes and certification prep at Toronto Public Library, open to everyone, whatever their status. Plus late-night study space.

Housing they can afford

Student housing on public land near campuses, and a crackdown on landlords who rent unsafe, overcrowded rooms to students afraid to complain.

Getting around for free

Free transit means students spend money on food and books, not fares.

A first job in Toronto

Paid placements, co-ops and apprenticeships with the city, so graduates build their careers here.

Support when it’s hard

More mental health support, in partnership with campuses and community organizations.

The right to speak

Students have the right to speak, organize and protest peacefully in public spaces, whatever cause they stand for.

And I’ll lead cities, students and colleges in pressing Queen’s Park to restore the grants it cut.

I taught in Ontario’s colleges. I know what students give this city. Toronto will invest in them.

Public health

Protecting Torontonians from Online Gambling Harm

Online gambling is being pushed aggressively at Torontonians, including young people and families already under financial stress. Addiction, debt, and predatory marketing do not stay online. They show up in homes, workplaces, and neighbourhoods across our city.

I will use every lawful municipal power available to protect Toronto residents, particularly children and vulnerable families, from the harms and aggressive promotion of online gambling, while pressing the Province for stronger regulation.

What the City can Deliver

Deliver: Use every lawful municipal tool to limit harmful advertising and promotion of online gambling where the City has authority, including city property, city digital channels, and city-controlled public spaces.

Deliver: Strengthen public-health and community partnerships so families, youth, and people in financial distress can find clear information and support related to gambling harm.

Deliver: Require honest disclosure and cautionary messaging wherever the City permits gambling-related promotion under its control.

Deliver: Direct city agencies and partners to treat gambling harm as a public-health and consumer-protection issue, not just a private problem.

What we will Advocate

Advocate: Press Queen’s Park for stronger regulation of online gambling operators: tighter advertising rules, better age and identity safeguards, and real accountability when companies target vulnerable people.

Advocate: Call for coordinated provincial-municipal action so Toronto is not left alone dealing with the human and social costs of aggressive online gambling promotion.

Advocate: Support evidence-based harm reduction and recovery supports, and reject approaches that normalize constant gambling advertising as ordinary city life.

Toronto should not be a marketing playground for industries that profit from addiction. Residents, especially children and vulnerable families, deserve a City that uses its power to protect them.

Creativity

Creativity Across Toronto

Creativity is how Toronto invents and grows. If elected Mayor, I will make creativity a city priority: backing artists, makers, and innovators in every neighbourhood, and growing innovation hubs and incubators so new ideas have room to launch and scale.

What we’ll do

• grow affordable space for studios, makers, and community creative hubs
• expand innovation hubs and incubators for startups, inventors, and social enterprises
• cut red tape on murals and creative pop-ups: clearer rules, faster approvals
• put local creators into city projects and main-street revitalization
• fair supports beyond downtown: creativity in every district

What a mayor can deliver

Deliver: Year-one creativity and innovation-hub action: space, permits, neighbourhood fairness; publish where dollars go.

What I’ll fight for

Advocate: Provincial and federal cultural and innovation funds.

Questions? Email bethechangeno1@gmail.com · Call (647) 785-3729

Families and neighbourhoods

Families can thrive here [City Hall delivers]

Toronto should be a city where families can afford to live and thrive. That means affordable child care and shorter subsidy waitlists, homes families can afford, family recreation, libraries and safe parks, safe routes to school, and parents treated as real partners in the city’s own children’s programs. I respect and support families of every kind.

Education is the heart of a community [City Hall delivers]

Expand affordable child care and cut the subsidy waitlist, fund youth programs, and keep safe routes to school, with parents as real partners in the city’s own children’s programs.

School buildings and curriculum are provincial and school-board. I’ll use my engineer’s voice to press the province to fix crumbling schools.

A library that serves families, openly. [City Hall delivers]

The Toronto Public Library is Toronto’s great equalizer, and I will protect it, from cuts, with extended hours, and with strong children’s and newcomer programming that closes the digital divide. I will also make it work better for parents:

Deliver: Give parents real, easy-to-use tools: clear parental access to their own child’s library account and age-appropriate settings on children’s cards, and I will protect and strengthen the filtering already in place on children’s-area computers.

Deliver: Make the library open and accountable to the families it serves: a published, plain-language collection policy, open board meetings, and a clear public process for any parent to raise a concern about a title and get a fair, transparent answer.

Deliver: Appoint and support library board members who value two things at once, the public’s freedom to read, and a library that is transparent and responsive to parents.

Community centres for neighbourhoods without one [City Hall delivers]

Too many Toronto neighbourhoods (especially in the inner suburbs) still don’t have a proper community centre. That’s not fair. I’ll map the gaps and build or expand recreation and community centres where people actually live: gyms, pools, youth space, seniors’ programs, and after-school places kids can go. Every neighbourhood deserves a hub, not just the ones that already have one.

A city for everyone, whatever their status [City Hall delivers]

Strengthen Access T.O. so every resident can use city services without fear.

An accessible, age-friendly city [City Hall delivers]

Finish TTC accessibility, keep elevators working and fix Wheel-Trans; clear sidewalks and curb cuts; invest in the city’s long-term-care homes; and expand tax and utility relief for low-income seniors and people with disabilities.