The worst way of convincing people would be to see the money go into less effective forms of assistance, like tax credits, or to see a reduction in the amount of money and see it sent directly to transfers.
A lot of the debate that's happened around it is a result of the political legacy of the program--the fact that it has a strong Liberal brand. I think that has discouraged people from taking a step back and asking whether the program is doing what we want it to do.
I haven't heard a lot of convincing arguments that the research, the displacement issues, or those sorts of things, are so substantive that we shouldn't be talking about ways to mitigate those concerns that are fair and still renew the program, instead of just scrapping it and starting over with something new.
The other way I would try to convince people is by saying that even if you're going to bring in something new next year--if you're going to give it to HRSDC or have a new system of national, needs-based grants--it took the millennium partnership program two years to negotiate effective agreements with the provinces so money coming in would be new money that went to people who needed it, and that's just not where we're at. The decision needs to be made this year if it's going to be available to students in 2010.
The urgency to look at it is really key. I applaud efforts to view the system more holistically, but if I were you I would encourage my colleagues to ask what the alternative is going to be next year. Even in the event that it's not perfect to them, how can we have an interim solution so students aren't going to miss that $350 million, and how can we work to improve the concerns people have?