Early in April 2008, the Winnipeg Free Press published a story based on information leaked from the legislature, about plans to deregulate tuition fees in fall 2008.

Many students, faculty, staff and community members like you responded with messages of support for accessible education, including the tuition fee freeze policy. Together, we won an important victory. Prior to budget day, the provincial government revised its plan to deregulate fees. But it announced that fee hikes would be allowed starting in fall 2009, and created the Levin Commission to review the tuition fee policy. At its incipience, the commission included a focus on university and college spending priorities and accountability, but this was soon dropped from the plan.

While it is clear that a greater investment in post-secondary education on the part of our federal and provincial governments is needed immediately, it is equally clear that the tuition fee freeze in Manitoba, like in other jurisdictions, has been accompanied by funding increases for education. Fee hikes will do nothing to alleviate funding challenges. In fact, evidence shows they will result in no net funding increase.

Shortly after the release of the 2008-2009 Manitoba Budget, students from across the province gathered at the Selkirk Avenue campus of the University of Manitoba and the University of Winnipeg for a general meeting of the Canadian Federation of Students–Manitoba. It was unanimously resolved to organise a major day of action around the dual themes of quality and accessibility in public post-secondary education. In Ottawa, at a national meeting of the Canadian Federation of Students, hundreds of delegates from across the country affirmed the importance of working together for tuition fee freezes and reductions, as well as more funding for education.

Students rejected the argument from critics of the tuition fee freeze that tuition fee hikes accompanied by targeted bursaries would be accessibility-neutral. Accessible, well-funded education requires governments to demonstrate some political will, not complicate the debate with schemes to justify policies that hurt accessibility and quality.

You may have heard in recent media that the tuition fee freeze constitutes a subsidy by low-income Manitobans to the wealthy and that tuition fees are not an important barrier to participation in university and college of low-income students. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Tuition fees and student loan payments punish those who can least afford to pay. As economist Hugh Mackenzie points out, tuition fees constitute a regressive tax because the less money you have, the bigger proportion of your income tuition fees make up. That’s why, for every $1000 in tuition fees increases, low-income students are 19 percent less likely to complete their post-secondary education.

While it is true that students from high-income backgrounds are more likely to go to university, high-income earners in Canada pay more taxes over their lifetime and therefore contribute more, through the tax system, to the funding of post-secondary education. Mackenzie points out in one study that among those with the highest-income, 25 percent of households with children earn 47 percent of the income, pay 47 percent of the taxes and make up 31 percent of the student population. The bottom 25 percent of households on this income scale earn 8 percent of the income, pay 8 percent of the taxes, and account for 21 percent of the student population.

Contrary to what a vocal minority of critics argue, lower tuitions fees, grants and fair taxation are effective ways to improve low-income participation in university and college.

Related Links:

Fast Facts: Tuition Fees (Hugh MacKenzie, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives)

University Funding Cuts: Shortchanging Ontario Students (Hugh Mackenzie & Mark Rosenfeld, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives)

The Tuition Trap: The Path of Least Resistance (Hugh Mackenzie, Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations)

In the 1990s, tuition fees in Manitoba rose by over 137 percent. During that time, enrolment declined sharply at Manitoba’s universities and colleges, leaving the province with among the lowest participation rates in the country. After a decade of federal and provincial funding cuts, the elimination of bursaries and grants for students, skyrocketing tuition fees, and declining enrolment at Manitoba universities, students finally said enough was enough. During the 1999 provincial election, students mobilized and campaigned hard for a tuition fee freeze, further grants and more bursaries, and increasing the inadequate funding for colleges and universities.

After the election of the new New Democrat Government under Premier Gary Doer, one of its first action was to announce that it would freeze and further reduce tuition fees by ten percent to 1999 levels. A formal tuition freeze has been in place ever since. However, international student fees were deregulated in 2003, programs and faculties were allowed to increase their own tuition rates through flawed election processes, and between 2005 and 2007 universities began to implement massive ancillary fees. Before the 2008 provincial budget, the Doer government leaked plans to allow base tuition fees to increase. In light of this information, the student movement mobilised and pressured the government to backtrack on its decision and maintain the tuition fee freeze.

As a result of the lobbying and action by Federation members, the provincial government postponed its decision in 2008 to lift the tuition fee freeze. In its efforts to justify plans to raise fees starting in fall 2009, the provincial government announced the creation of the one person Commission on Tuition Fees and Accessibility to Post-Secondary Education in Manitoba, composed solely of former Deputy Minister of Education Ben Levin.

The Federation exposed the fact that the Commission never intended to honestly investigate policy options and communicated this through public media releases and discussions with members and government. In fact, dating back as far as 1990, the Commissioner had made his position on tuition fees clear in a paper published in the Canadian Public Policy journal. Levin believes that the average personal gains over a lifetime for a post-secondary graduate negate any restraints high tuition places on students and that low tuition fees constrain institutions and do little to improve accessibility.

At the first stakeholders meeting, serious concerns were raised that Levin had no intentions of holding public consultations with students and the university community. Further concerns were raised about the lack of transparency of the commission, when it was revealed that stakeholders were identified as post-secondary institutions, students, and business organizations.
The Federation submitted a report to the Commission in March, outlining the need to maintain the tuition fee freeze, while also implementing further up front grants, targeted bursaries and improvements to student financial aid coupled with increased funding for post-secondary institutions. On April 2, the Commission released its final report, which included a number of good recommendations but unfortunately called for 5% annual tuition fee increases for the next three years for university students.

The Federation responded to Levin’s report by calling into question the predetermined nature of the Commission and objecting to the recommendation to allow tuition fee increases.

On April 22,2009 the province officially announced a 4.5% increase in tuition fees province-wide. As post-secondary institutions received notice of government funding levels and tuition fee policy for 2009-10 and prepared to approve institutional budgets, students’ unions across the province called on post-secondary institutions to continue to freeze tuition fees.

Over the past two decades, there has been a marked shift away from public funding for universities in Canada. In 1985, universities received 83 percent of their funding from government sources, and only 13 percent from tuition fees. By 2005, those figures had changed to 64 percent from government and 24 percent from fees. This has meant skyrocketing tuition fees for students, and lower overall funding for universities.

Since 2000, the tuition fee freeze and gradual funding increases have boosted the budgets of Manitoba’s universities and colleges. This year, $800 million in new federal funding has been transferred to the provinces for universities and colleges—Manitoba received a $24 million funding increase. However, when accounting for population growth and inflation, federal cash transfers to Manitoba still lag behind what they were fifteen years ago.

The provincial government has taken gradual steps towards filling this funding gap. Since 1999, universities and colleges have seen a 63 percent, or $180 million, increase in operating funding, not including special operating grants, capital grants, grants for students, annual tuition fee reduction grants provided to institutions, and additional tuition fee revenues due to rising enrolment. Funding and financing for new buildings and renovations has received a significant boost too: $100 million over two years.

Opponents of the tuition fee freeze claim that the quality of post-secondary education in Manitoba has suffered because tuition fees have been frozen at 1999 levels. There is no evidence of this claim; in fact, the quality of education is of equal concern in provinces where tuition fees are high.
In Manitoba, the provincial government has funded the tuition fee freeze and further increased funding for post-secondary education year after year since 2000, providing universities and colleges with much-needed funding. The real reason that quality has declined is fifteen years of inadequate federal funding. There is no new quality crisis: only the legacy of $7 billion in federal funding cuts.

Governments allow tuition fees to rise and cut funding because they fail to prioritise a strong public post-secondary education system. They ignore the fact that post-secondary education provides benefits to society as a whole, not just the individual. Even in narrow economic terms, post-secondary education creates vital social capital, and post-secondary graduates generate most of Canada’s income tax revenue.

More funding is required from both federal and provincial governments, especially because university administrators have increasingly turned to tuition and other user fees to cover operating expenses. However, it is also up to universities and colleges to choose the right priorities for spending. Too often, basic educational improvements like hiring more faculty and staff, offering better student services, and improving labs have been overlooked in favour of flashy projects and bigger bureaucracies. Provincial and federal governments must turn their attention from tax cuts to increased investment in higher education.

Universities and colleges across Canada have suffered through two decades of funding cuts. At the same time, tuition fees skyrocketed and wages for faculty and staff stagnated.

University and college administrators argue that inadequate public funding prevents them from providing fair salary increases to faculty and staff, yet they do not make accessible to the public the facts that would help students judge for themselves.

Universities are publicly-funded, yet they are not held to the same standards as other public institutions. Prior to 2007-2008, universities and colleges were not even required to use Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, and there are very few formal requirements for financial and strategic reporting by the administration to the boards that govern Manitoba’s universities and colleges.

The Canadian Federation of Students has made dozens of requests under the Freedom of Information and Privacy Protection Act (FIPPA) for basic financial and strategic information, including: year-to-date financial data, senior administrators’ travel and meeting costs, contracts with private companies, and new project planning information. Virtually all of these requests have been rejected or denied by the University of Manitoba and the University of Winnipeg. Until the provincial government and the governing boards at the campus level create rules for accountability, these institutions will continue to hide behind information laws to avoid a public debate on their priorities.

If universities and colleges are to serve the public, they must report to the public and be held accountable for spending priorities.

Related Links:

Presidential Perks (Winnipeg Free Press, August 23, 2008)

Our current system of student aid is administered by Manitoba Student Aid (MSA), but is a patchwork of federal and provincial aid programs. Central to Manitoba Student Aid are student loans, provided on a needs-based scale to students—60 percent by the Canada Student Loans Program (CSLP) and 40 percent by Manitoba Student Aid. Manitoba Student Aid also provides a number of non-repayable grants to students and has more generous provisions for certain needs, like higher vehicle allowances for rural commuters.

Rules for aid eligibility are set by the CSLP, and mirrored by MSA. Although provinces should be working together on post-secondary education issues nationally, the out-dated methodology of the Canada Student Loans Program has left students in Manitoba struggling through a maze of ineffective rules and regulations, and ultimately without the aid they need.

Students’ lobbying, however, has been making a difference.

In response to the Grants Not Loans campaign of the Canadian Federation of Students, the federal government has finally announced the creation of a national system of grants for students.

After last year’s campaign for student aid reform, the provincial government in Manitoba has reduced the student loan interest rate by 1 percent and committed to doubling the provincial grants program.

The challenge now is to ensure these gains are not eroded by rising user fees.

In Newfoundland and Labrador, the Canadian Federation of Students-NL and the provincial government announced the elimination of student loans interest rates altogether!