While all students in Canada have faced dramatic fee increases over the last decade, tuition fees for international students have become particularly burdensome.

After a decision by the provincial government in 2002, the differential fees charged to international students began to rise dramatically for the first time since they were allowed in 1995. By September 2008, undergraduate international students in Manitoba were paying 100 to 230 percent more than their Canadian counterparts. These high differential fees are an unfair burden and a barrier to post-secondary education for international students. Ultimately, such fees will threaten Canada’s ability to attract and retain the skills base and ideas needed to prosper in the future.

Governments and post-secondary institutions know that high tuition fees are unpopular with students and their families. However, because international students and their families have limited political influence, governments and institutional decision-makers see them as an easy target for tuition fee increases.

The federal government needs to restore funding for post-secondary education to the provinces to reduce the incentive for universities and colleges to rely on tuition fees as a means of generating revenue. In the meantime, Manitoba must end the practice of charging differential fees and expand the freeze and fee reductions to include international students.

The challenges for international students go beyond tuition fees. Despite the many contributions they make to Manitoba’s tax base, culture and economy, international students also face challenges in accessing health care and work. While students won a recent victory in federal policy when international students were granted the right to work off-campus permanently, they still have to pay more than $425 per year for basic health coverage. The Canadian Federation of Students is campaigning to have the Government of Manitoba implement the same policy as exists in Saskatchewan and Newfoundland and Labrador, where international students have free access to Medicare, just as Canadians do.

Does this sound like equality?

International students pay hundreds of dollars for basic health care, thousands of dollars in tuition fee premiums, are not eligible for student aid in Canada and often face stereotyping, racism, and xenophobia.

While Canadian students in Manitoba have benefited from the tuition fee freeze since 1999, international students have been subjected to massive new tuition fee increases since 2002. In fact, international students in Manitoba now pay up to 215% more than their Canadian counterparts and, in some cases, have seen their tuition fees more than double in one year.

But, in addition to exorbitant tuition fees, international students are also vulnerable to a host of other costs, including student housing prices, study permit costs and financial prerequisites, flights and health-related costs. International students in Manitoba pay an additional $420 a year just to see a doctor, something that most of us will never have to pay for. Health-related costs, when coupled with already sky-high tuition fees, constitute additional barriers to access to Canadian universities for international students. The other option, to study in Canada without basic health protection, is risky, as health emergencies and unanticipated health costs could be devastating.

An Important Part of Manitoba’s Immigration Strategy

Charging international students for basic health coverage ignores not only the social and cultural benefits of welcoming international students to Manitoba, but also the economic and fiscal contributions they make. They contribute by paying taxes, spending in the local economy, providing labour and helping establish or strengthen long-term business relationships between Canada and a student’s home country. Immigration is an important element of Manitoba’s labour market and population growth strategy, making it drastically out of step with the province’s identified immigration goals to increase barriers for international students.

In fact, by 2011, it is estimated that immigration will account for virtually all labour force growth in the country. According to the federal government’s research, immigrants who have previously worked or studied in Canada have the least difficulty integrating into the Canadian workforce and prospering in Canadian society. Differential user fees like tuition and health insurance, as well as massive student debt, create a barrier that will discourage such motivated and skilled people from studying, and possibl  settling, in Canada.

Manitoba a leader?

Manitoba has always been a leader in recognising the important role that international students play in Manitoba. It was the first province to include post-secondary graduates in its Provincial Nominee immigration criteria and introduce the off-campus work programme for international students. Many international students who study in Manitoba hope to pursue a career in Manitoba and set up roots here. However, when it comes to providing universal health coverage for international students, Manitoba has fallen behind.

In 2007, Newfoundland and Labrador announced that it would provide health coverage to international students as an integral part of its immigration strategy. Saskatchewan also provides basic provincial health coverage to international students from the day they arrive in the province and British Columbia provides health insurance to international students at the same rate it is available to all other B.C. residents.

The cost to the Manitoba government to provide basic provincial health coverage to international students enrolled in post-secondary institutions would be under $1.38 million annually—less than 0.04% of the total provincial health budget. Providing basic health care to these students is both affordable and reasonable, especially when one considers that the province already provides free health care to international students who choose to work off campus.

Since the off-campus work pilot programme was expanded into a national programme in 2006, international students who receive a work permit now also receive free provincial health coverage for the duration of their work permit (in most cases four years).

This was an important move, but it has created an unequal playing field for international students in Manitoba: those who choose to work off campus in effect pay only the cost of a work permit ($150 per year) for their health coverage, while those who choose to work on campus or not to work at all must pay $1,680 over the course of a four-year degree for their basic health coverage.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

This is a problem that could easily be rectified by providing free health coverage to all international students.

As part of the campaign for equality for international students, the Canadian Federation of Students is calling on the Government of Manitoba to ensure that all students be able to see a doctor in Manitoba, without paying user fees.