I can answer from my professional experience. There was a time when we at the BACE also received funding. A meeting was held in 2013, I believe, and we were indeed told that funding to 22 community organizations in the area of literacy would be cut. Among them were RESDAC, our anglophone counterpart, Essential Skills Ontario, some organizations in New Brunswick, and COFA. In all, 22 community organizations lost their funding.
Remember that, at the time, we were seeing a number of new directions. The government wanted to invest more and more into developing employment skills. We also heard a lot about social finance, the principle under which organizations partner with the private sector to reap significant benefits, and the results they achieve determine the type of funding they receive.
We have nothing against motherhood and apple pie. Social finance works in some areas and provides wonderful results when there is a critical mass. With our colleague Ronald Bisson, we conducted a study on social finance in small francophone communities. I am sorry, but large corporations like Bombardier that can fund social finance projects to increase essential skills are not at all in the same situation as organizations from small communities in the Yukon, Nunavut or British Columbia. In may not be a viable approach for us. We do not criticize the approach by saying that it is not viable. However, in small communities, it is perhaps not the best solution.