Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I thank all the committee members for the opportunity to speak today.
My name is Rob Summerby-Murray. I chair the council of the Association of Atlantic Universities. I'm also president and vice-chancellor of Saint Mary's University here in Halifax.
I thought it might be useful to give a bit of context for the AAU. We are a member organization across Atlantic Canada that connects 16 universities across four provinces, and my presence with you this morning is an opportunity to highlight and amplify key components of our written submission made to the committee a few weeks ago.
It's important to note that we are a diverse group of institutions with a number of larger, research-intensive universities across our region; smaller, community-based institutions that may be primarily focused on undergraduate learning; and then specialist institutions across many parts of Atlantic Canada. We are a key part of the fabric of this region, a key driver of economic growth and change and of technology, medical research, health, wellness and social betterment for our region, and a key part of fuelling the region's economic prosperity.
We believe as well that there is opportunity here in Atlantic Canada to advance key agenda items for Canada as a whole. Particularly, those include increasing the Canada's competitiveness in the search for global talent. That's how we see our role. In building that out, we see a much bigger agenda than perhaps may devolve on an individual institution. We see something that is much bigger and much more significant at a national level.
Certainly, in our pre-budget submission—this is a short form of that—the AAU advocated for three key priority areas. I want to present those to you this morning in an abbreviated form.
The first of these is accessible housing, and it builds out very nicely on the previous witness's point about the ongoing need for access to affordable, appropriate and safe housing for Atlantic Canadians and, I would add to that, for a population in Atlantic Canada who are students across our region. In particular, we would call for a revision to the national housing strategy, and particularly the housing accelerator fund, to make universities eligible for funding from this program.
Right now, we are not eligible to apply for support from the Government of Canada to help us resolve the housing crisis. This is a housing crisis, not only for our universities and colleges but also for Canadians. The ability of universities to help to deliver on a resolution would be part of that. At the present time, we are not eligible for that funding. I'm not just seeking more money.... I'm not sure how often this committee would hear someone say that.