Mr. Reid, I may regret asking you this because your answers are sometimes long-winded, but the debate is changing even in Quebec now. I'm from Quebec, and there was a resolution passed by the Quebec Liberal Party on the weekend on perhaps having fees for CEGEP. I'm a big believer that CEGEP should be free. For people who are not aware, CEGEP is a junior college. It's a transition period before going to university, and Quebec has always used it as a promotion to maintain students in the educational field.
Now they're promoting that CEGEP should probably charge a fee. Quebec universities charge the lowest tuition fees, but we just heard that McGill is going to increase the cost of its MBA program. The price you now pay for an MBA program is $1,700, and I think McGill is going to increase it to $30,000.
We're seeing some different things going on in reality, and the Federation of Students always has the same demand. So where's the balance? I'm looking at more of a balanced approach. What do we need to do to make sure that students can continue to go to school and receive the right education?
I'm not questioning the fact that students should have debt. You are going to get an education. Is there a problem with having debt? Should there be an amount?
I come from a city where we have a choice of five, six universities. We have four francophone universities and two English universities, and one within an hour and a half. Do we need to go far away to get an education and be in debt after three or four years of education? Is that necessary? What's the balance there?
I don't know if it's an easy question for you to answer, but we need to have more of a balance.