Thank you. My name is Louis-Phillipe Savoie, President of the Fédération étudiante universitaire du Québec (Quebec University Students' Federation). With me today is Mathieu Oliny, Vice-President of Socio-political Affairs at the FEUQ.
My presentation will be brief. The FEUQ is the largest university association in Quebec, representing 115,000 students from across Quebec and 14 student associations, both in the francophone and anglophone sectors, as well as university associations in major centres and smaller regions.
Today, we would like to present to you three federal funding proposals, more particularly in the area of post-secondary education. Clearly, the FEUQ believes that university education must be a priority. However, we should also keep in mind that university education is an area of provincial jurisdiction, and act accordingly. The three concerns that are outlined in our brief and that I will briefly present to you today are consistent with those principles.
Our first concern deals with federal transfers for post-secondary education. You are no doubt aware that there were major cuts to the federal transfers for post-secondary education in the early 1990s, and that the funding has still not come back to earlier levels. Taking into account inflation, there is still a gap of approximately $3.5 billion in federal transfers, with some $820 million to be allocated to Quebec. That is according to the estimates done by the Government of Quebec last year. That figure is supported by all Quebec stakeholders. Those cuts had a very significant impact across Canada. In Quebec, funding has still not returned to 1994 levels, essentially owing to the cuts in federal transfers.
We therefore believe that, when the federal government sits down to review federal transfers in 2014, priority should be given to increasing federal transfers for post-secondary education. That will help bring funding back up to 1994 levels. In our opinion, those transfers must be made without any conditions and respect provincial areas of jurisdiction. Above all, the provinces are the ones with the expertise needed to make proper use of the funds allocated for university education.
Another concern of the FEUQ deals with regional access to university education. In developing the university education system, it has become imperative to decentralize certain teaching activities. It has been recognized that the closer a student is to a university, the more likely he or she will enrol. However, even today many students have to leave their regions of origin. In Quebec, 50% to 75% of students living in resource regions, which are the most remote, must leave home in order to pursue their studies. Many of those students never return to their regions of origin. We know that those regions are currently facing problems, including an exodus of young people that is having a very significant impact on the economy of Quebec's regions as well as in regions of Canada as a whole. Ultimately, this will be a heavy burden on the entire economy.
To counter that exodus, the government of Quebec, in the early 2000s, implemented a tax credit for post-secondary graduates who choose to return to their regions. This is an $8,000 tax credit over a three-year period for students who settle in a designated region. Over 15,000 people took advantage of that tax credit in 2007. That is of considerable help to Quebec's regions. We believe that the federal government should follow Quebec's lead and adopt Bill C-288, which is currently being debated in the Senate and was previously passed by the House of Commons. We believe that passage of the bill should be expedited in order to ensure the sustainability of Quebec's regions.
And now, on to our third point. Needless to say, Quebec's students are also concerned by general taxation issues, given that they have major impacts on the funding of post-secondary education and social programs. We have highlighted two issues that are of recent concern. I will not get into the details, but the concerns are regarding adjustments made to equalization in recent years. There is also the issue of the harmonization of Quebec's sales tax. Those two issues have not yet been resolved and are the source of significant shortfalls for the government of Quebec. As a result, the province faces significant challenges because it must adequately fund its various social programs, and post-secondary education in particular.
Therefore, the three priorities that I have presented, i.e., federal transfers, Bill C-288 and the various taxation issues, must be urgently addressed by the federal government in order to ensure Canada's economic future. Investing in university education must be seen as a priority to ensure the future development of society.