Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Feb. 26th, 2009

[Christine Cram]

No, that is not the way it works. A First Nation can also set its own guidelines, but they must comply with national guidelines. Caps are also set. For example, they may decide that $35,000 is the maximum amount that can be paid out for one year.

As Committee members pointed out, there is more demand than there is available funding. Every First Nation or organization has to make choices and set priorities in relation to student demand.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I don't have much time left, but I would like to ask one other question.

Is professional training, such as training programs for plumbers, electricians or construction workers, part of the post-secondary program?

[Christine Cram]

Yes. It includes not only universities, but colleges as well. However, it does not include apprenticeship. I'm sorry, but I don't know the proper term for that in French.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

It's “l'apprentissage”.

[Christine Cram]

The HRSD program covers that sort of thing.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

But the colleges are covered under the program.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Lemay. Unfortunately, your time is up.

Mr. Payne, for five minutes.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'd like to thank you for coming here today and being witnesses.

You have heard some are new members. I'm one, so I'm trying to get up to speed on some of this information. Some of it is a bit confusing in terms of all the dollars being talked about, so my first question is this. Could you confirm for me the number of dollars allocated, either through HRSDC or through aboriginal affairs, or wherever, for post-secondary? Do you have a total number?

[Neil Yeates]

Yes, Member, we do. We quoted the figure. It's approximately, for the Government of Canada, $9.7 billion or $9.8 billion. Of that, about $3.2 billion goes to provinces through the Canada social transfer. That's notionally allocated for post-secondary education, but how provinces and territories allocate that is their affair. And $1.8 billion is through the tax system in terms of education, savings, grants and so on, tuition deductions, all of those kinds of things. And then $2.1 billion is for student assistance: grants, scholarships, loan programs, and so on. And then a further $2.7 billion is for funding for research and development in post-secondary institutions through the granting councils: Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Canada Foundation for Innovation.

So those are the main blocks of federal funding. The INAC portion of that is that we have, as we've said, $314 million for post-secondary education. The bulk of that is for student financial assistance, less this $22 million we've been talking about, that we use to support individual institutions for aboriginal programming of one kind or another.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Does that include that $200 million for HRSDC?

[Neil Yeates]

No. I'm sorry, the capital funding we have is for K to 12 schools.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

No, I was thinking more in terms of the skills training.

[Neil Yeates]

Oh, sorry. Okay, yes, the skills training funding through HRSDC is additional money in budget 2009. So that has just arrived.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Next, in terms of education. I don't think there's anybody who doesn't support the goal that all Canadians should increase their post-secondary education, if that's feasible, but I have some questions about the sixth report of the standing committee, “No Higher Priority”. In there, we talked about the percentage of aboriginals aged 20 to 29 who have either a degree or a diploma. I'm just wondering how that compares to the overall Canadian average, if you have those numbers.

[Neil Yeates]

Yes. Of the general numbers I refer to, the first nation number for university graduation is around 7%, and the non-aboriginal is about 23%; college graduation for the non-aboriginal is around 20%, and for aboriginal or first nations it is around 17%.

So you can see a big gap on university, and a much smaller gap on college.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Right. So in terms of the provincial governments, what is their role in providing post-secondary education overall, and also in terms of aboriginals?

[Neil Yeates]

Provinces and territories have the primary role in providing post-secondary education. They run the post-secondary education systems. The federal government makes financial contributions of various kinds.

So they have the primary role. They provide—and I think, from our perspective, this is a pretty important point—the direct operating costs, the operating budgets to all the post-secondary infrastructure, and our involvement on the operating side is very limited.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

I'm not sure how much time I have left here.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thirty seconds, Mr. Payne.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Oh, that's not much.

Okay, in terms of grants and scholarships, I'm making an assumption here that that those are open to everybody, aboriginals and all Canadians?

[Neil Yeates]

Yes.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

I have one last point. Is it possible to get a copy of the breakdown of the numbers you gave out for all of that funding by the Canadian government?

[Neil Yeates]

Certainly.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Payne.

Now we'll go to Madam Crowder for five minutes.