FEDERAL GOVERNMENT FUNDING FOR UNIVERITIES AND COLLEGES

Introduction

Since the funding cuts of the mid-1990s, the responsibility for financing post-secondary education has been increasingly downloaded onto students and their families. Government funding as a share of university operating revenue plummeted from 80% to less than 60%. As a direct result, the share of university budgets funded by tuition fees more than doubled between 1985 and 2005 (14% to 30%).

During the same period, average undergraduate tuition fees have more than doubled, an increase approximately four times the rate of inflation. To make matters worse, the average ancillary fees in Canada reached $749 in 2009. As a result, student debt has reached historical highs: average student debt for a four-year program now ranges from $21,000 to $28,000 depending on the province of study (BC = $27,000).

Leadership Wanted: Towards a federal Post-Secondary Education Act

During the 2006 federal election, the Conservative party's platform promised to "remove postsecondary education funding from the Canada Social Transfer and create an independent Canada Education and Training Transfer to ensure that there is dedicated funding for postsecondary education and training." In February 2006, a summit on post-secondary education and research organized by Canada's premiers called for the reinvestment of the $4 billion that has been cut from annual federal transfers to the provinces for post-secondary education and research since 1993.

The Conservative government has failed to implement the dedicated transfer payment that they promised in the 2006 election. As a result, recent increases to federal funding have been misused by several provincial premiers. In 2008, the federal government increased federal transfers to British Columbia for universities and colleges by $110 million. Literally weeks later, Gordon Campbell announced $50 million in cuts to BC's universities and colleges.

Without a federal post-secondary education act, provinces are under no obligation to use federal transfers to reduce tuition fees or hire more instructors.