Labour shortages causing some March Break camps to close in Quebec

March Break day camps in Quebec this week are being cancelled because of a lack of staff.

Frédéric Ouellet is the director of the Kinéactif Day Camp, and on Tuesday he took part in a Gatineau Job Fair, looking to hire staff for his summer camps.

“We’re still looking for people in Gatineau, but in Ottawa I still have no applications actually,” he says.

He’s focused on summer camps, after skipping March Break day camps altogether.

“It was hard to find staff,” he says. “It was taking too much energy to offer that service, so we concentrate our effort to offer a good summer camp.”

Gatineau’s Altitude Gym cancelled its March Break day camps because finding employees to run them put Altitude Gym between a rock and a hard place.

“Unfortunately, we had to cancel,” says Adrian Das, Altitude Gym Technical Director.

“We’ve had challenges finding staff for such a specialized position, people who can work with children, who have experience,” he tells CTV News Ottawa. “To find somebody who is available during a March Break and now, generally because of general labour shortages, we’re finding it’s additionally more challenging than ever to try and do this.”

They too will focus on summer camps instead of March Break.

Programming with city of Gatineau’s March Break camps has also affected.

“In Hull, we had issues with our camp counsellors. We didn’t have enough to offer our usual programs and the number of places we usually operate for the March Break camps,” says Nicholas Gagnon-Daniel with the city of Gatineau.

According to the city, a spot was found for each child, but some parents are having to drive farther to send their children to the camp.

“Because of the labour shortage, we have to be flexible, we have to be agile; so, we re-distributed the people that we did have for our camps that we did have in Gatineau and Alymer, the two sectors that are in closer to Hull,” says Gagon-Daniel.

Ontario’s March Break is next week, and staffing issues don't affect city of Ottawa-run day camps. According to Dan Chenier, General Manager, Recreation, Cultural and Facility Services with the City of Ottawa, “No March Break camps have been cancelled due to staffing issues. Five were cancelled due to low registration numbers.”

Chenier adds that while there are waiting lists at some locations, the city’s overall camp capacity is at 90 per cent.

“The City of Ottawa is happy to be offering extensive March Break programming across 69 camps with 1,412 registered participants to date. Registration will remain open until the start of programming next week.”