Finance Committee on Oct. 6th, 2006

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you.

I want to get into post-secondary education, which I think is a favourite topic of all of us. We have four members here from three universities and a college. It's great to see you. I have had a chance to visit some of your institutions in the last year or so, but not all. I'd like to get to all of them.

I think we all know that how we harness the skills of all Canadians is a really important issue. In fact, in my view it's the number one public policy issue in the country. How do we recommend to the government how we should go about doing it?

We've heard a lot of support for the dedicated transfer. Assumed in that is that we will not only have a dedicated transfer but put more money into post-secondary education through that transfer. The problem is to know whether that is the best way to go about actually hitting the number one challenge. I guess that depends on what the challenge is. To me it's the issue now of access.

We have come a long way in research; there's no question. But I understand there's a $200 million deferred maintenance bill in Manitoba alone. We do need infrastructure, and we need to go to the next level. Indirect costs are probably going to 40%. All those things are part of the mix.

But the question is, how do we get children in Canada who don't have access to university...? Dr. Axworthy, you mentioned aboriginal Canadians; I would also state, generally, low-income Canadians and also persons with disabilities. How do we do that? We've heard about the cuts in transfers in the 1990s, but since that point in time the federal government has put money into research to the tune of some $13 billion, as well as addressed somewhat the issue of access through the millennium scholarship, the Canada learning bond, and things like those.

If the issue is access, and I would ask each of you whether that for you is the number one issue facing Canada.... And if we do this, how do we as a federal government best allocate our money? Is it as a dedicated transfer? Is it direct to students, in the way we've done it with research?

I would ask you not to say both. That's an easy answer. Try to give me some priorities.

[Dr. Emõke Szathmáry]

If I may, I'd like to remind you that the federal government was directly involved. It may have been an experiment that the federal government pulled out of in the early 1990s when something called the access programs was established.

This was a partnership, or it had begun as a partnership, whereby the federal and the provincial governments in Manitoba were supporting access for aboriginal students. We've now graduated more than roughly 1,800 people through the access programs altogether, not just the ones for which the province gives money, because the federal government withdrew and the Province of Manitoba has been pouring money into access.

We also established, from the operating budget of the university, the University of Manitoba's own suite of access programs so that we don't waste any segment of humanity. In other words, we have educated students who come to us from Somalia, Central America, and north of 53°, regardless of ethnicity and ancestry. All of them come in. It's the ideal form of education for people who really require special assistance. They have instructors who know them, counsellors, and a place where they can get together. There's peer support.

I can give you some examples of this. For example, there are about 155 professional engineers of aboriginal ancestry in Canada and we've educated 55 of them. The numbers go on when you're talking about lawyers, doctors, pharmacists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists. Something like this that is dedicated for a specific purpose is an approach that we can show works. But it is labour intensive and it costs money. For some unknown reason, in the early to mid-1980s the federal government pulled out of that, and our province has been carrying the weight.

The dedicated transfer, though, is absolutely necessary, because of course the costs are high, and in order to be able to afford the instructors as well as the support staff and all of those other things that Dr. Visentin mentioned.... Microsoft owns the world. The cost of the kind of cyberspace-type education that our students demand is enormously expensive. and that's on a cycle of having to replace anywhere from three to five years.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

We will let President Axworthy come in here.

[Lloyd Axworthy]

Let me just give a quick response

I think the universities and the colleges no longer are agencies of social mobility in the country. The number of students from low-income families across Canada, proportionately, going to higher education has not changed in 10 years. I think we've really lost that public purpose. The reason for that is partly that the funding framework that was put in place simply doesn't meet those kinds of needs.

The other side of the equation is that the colleges and universities don't have the capacity. For example, we have launched an aboriginal learning centre in downtown Winnipeg, which has a major computer program to help overcome digital divides, but that's all privately funded because there is no public funding for those kinds of outreach initiatives. Yet what we know is that if we can break that barrier where we have 60% of our students not completing their high school, then not only would their personal achievement, personal income, and personal contribution improve, but so would the entire economy.

That is where I say the system is a little bit broken, and you have to fix it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Savage.

We must move to the next questioner.

Mr. St-Cyr, you have four minutes.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Thank you.

My first question is to Ms. Szathmáry.

In your brief, you suggested establishing a dedicated transfer for post-secondary education. A number of educational, student and university organizations have made the same suggestion. The request we frequently hear is a rise in the amount currently set aside for education, although we see nothing in your brief about this.

If we were to keep the same budget, without any increase, and dedicate it to education, nothing would change in practical terms. Would your university support a demand for higher transfer for post-secondary education? If so, how high would you like it to be?

In your brief, you state that the establishment of a dedicated post-secondary education transfer would be to:

...enhance universities' to build and renew institutional and human infrastructure.

Are we to understand that the universities should not use that transfer for other purposes, be it for teaching or any other reason? In your view, the funding should not be used for other ends, is that correct?

[Dr. Emõke Szathmáry]

I would prefer to answer in English. I wasn't able to find the interpretation channel, but if I can understand your question, you're asking what we would use that dedicated transfer for. Is that correct?

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Would you raise it right now, because if you have a transfer in education and you don't raise the amount--

[Dr. Emõke Szathmáry]

But that's the problem, Mr. St-Cyr. We don't know what component of the money that is currently transferred actually does go to post-secondary education. With a dedicated transfer, we would know. And we don't think that enough is going. Whether the problem is at the federal level or whether it's at the provincial level, there's no way we can tell.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Just a moment, Mr. St-Cyr. I apologize.

Apparently we're having technical trouble with the interpretation. Are you now getting some interpretation or not? It's on channel one.

Let's keep going and you won't lose time on this, Thierry. Proceed.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Thank you.

I will continue with Mr. Visentin, from Brandon University. In your brief, you stated that dealing with the deteriorating infrastructure was a priority—

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Thierry, I think we'll defer your question for a moment while they work on the technical difficulties to make sure you get a full response.

Mr. Dykstra, you have seven minutes.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

We certainly appreciate the hospitality that's been provided by the group here in Portage La Prairie. I know we'll have to put it up there as probably the highlight of the week. So thanks very much for having us here.

One of the significant themes in the hearings we've held over the last three weeks that comes up time and time again--and it was mentioned a lot this morning--is the aspect of a dedicated transfer. One of the biggest issues that I think we face is trying to negotiate with the provinces to be able to do that, because as you all know, the provinces would much prefer that the federal government pay its fair share to them--and more where needed and more where wanted. But the fact is that negotiating that and trying to come to an agreement on that is going to be extremely difficult.

I only have seven minutes, so if you could try to keep your response brief it would be appreciated. But the type of...[Technical difficulty--Editor]...universities or the chamber or colleges could provide in terms of pressuring the provinces, specifically here in Manitoba, to agree to that type of arrangement where the funds would be dedicated.

[Lloyd Axworthy]

I'll make one suggestion. I think that because there is already a number of transfer programs--but as Emõke said, they are sort of fragmented--you'd have to consolidate them. And I would tie that to a very clear set of goals and achievements. I think what we're lacking in higher education is real targets that could be properly measured and where the funding could be really tied to a performance test about graduates and whether it's just for low-income students or in certain fields. I think that then would become a basis for developing a national framework for post-secondary education, both for colleges and universities.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Let Mr. Visentin come in here.

Would you like to respond to that dedicated transfer question?

[Dr. Louis Visentin]

The dedicated transfer payment?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Yes. How to make it work, how to get the provinces on side so that the negotiation would actually be successful in terms of doing it.

[Dr. Louis Visentin]

We've been trying to make it work for the last thirty years and it hasn't. I think it's time for the federal government to realize that it has a role to play in post-secondary education, and that is in the area of research and infrastructure. It may be that you're not going to be able to get an agreement, but you're going to have to set a kind of standard--this is what we're going to contribute--and tag it. This is what it is for. Performance is a very difficult thing to measure. I could speak all day on that issue.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Let's go to Red River, Jeff Zabudsky, and give him a chance. Then we'll go to Emõke.

[Jeff Zabudsky]

I would say identifying priorities would be a good start. So rather than it simply being a component of the general transfer, there is a post-secondary component, but it's tagged with some priorities. Those priorities might be infrastructure, those priorities might be aboriginal people, or immigrant populations. So it's a starting point for negotiation, setting some goals and then subsequently some targets associated with that.

[Dr. Emõke Szathmáry]

I think certainly the provinces will kick in when they recognize that it's in their interest to kick in. I'm more concerned about the issue of performance measurement, for this reason: it's not a level playing field, and some of us may be stuck precisely because we've done so much work already--for example, in trying to repair our infrastructure. We had a major capital campaign in a province of 1.2 million people; we raised $237 million, but nevertheless, we still don't have the physical infrastructure that we require if we're going to be able to attract students from out of province and out of country. As I've pointed out to our chamber, for example, 5,700 students coming to the University of Manitoba, as they did last year, at a minimum translates into $144 million flowing into the Winnipeg economy. The point is that certain things need to be addressed in order to be the drivers of the provincial economy, as the post-secondary institutions have the ability to be.

I think the dedicated transfer essentially allows the universities and colleges to do what they're supposed to do.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I agree. I'm not disagreeing with the commitment to dedicated transfer. What I'm looking for is this. If we're going to enter into negotiations, we're going to need support from every level to be able to convince the provinces to come on board.

[Dr. Emõke Szathmáry]

You'll have it.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I have a question with respect to the apprenticeship program. I know it's one of the commitments the government made during the election, and it was in this budget. You spoke a little bit about enhancing it. Could you comment for a couple of seconds on that?

[Jeff Zabudsky]

I meant enhancing in two respects. One is increasing the capacity to address the demand that's currently there. We looked at our skilled trades and technologies programs before the start of this September. We left about 1,000 students who wanted to get into our programs at the doorstep; we didn't have the existing capacity. If a young person from high school doesn't get into post-secondary, all bets are off about where that person is going to end up. Often it's outside of this province.

The second issue of enhancing is the existing infrastructure. The technology is in dire need of modernization. As you know, industry has been on the move, technology has changed, and we've not been able to keep up with those technological changes in many of our skilled trades areas as part of the modernization, both in terms of the technologies and in terms of the physical infrastructures, the leaking buildings and the declining and depreciating spaces.