Ottawa seeks to attract grad students from abroad 

2026/02/19 Leave a comment

Makes sense, focus on graduate students at universities to counter the general impression:

The Immigration Department is conducting a social-media campaign to attract more graduate students from abroad, including broadcasting that their family could apply to come with them.

The initiative aims to bring in more top researchers as figures published Monday show a steep drop in the number of international students who have come to Canada over the past year.

Experts say that the federal government’s crackdown on the number of international students, which started under former prime minister Justin Trudeau and coincided with plunging public support for more immigration, has made Canada a less attractive higher-education destination for foreign nationals overall.

The clampdown was not focused on international students attending top universities or graduate programs. Former immigration minister Marc Miller said the goal was to target colleges and private universities that charged high fees for low-value degrees to students who hoped to stay in Canada. But the changes appear to have had a wider deterrent effect….

Source: Ottawa seeks to attract grad students from abroad

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Asylum seekers to face brunt of IRCC cuts through co-payments of dental and prescription coverage: analysis

2026/02/19 Leave a comment

Of course, the large increase in asylum claimants is reflected in these numbers. Prescription co-payments are relatively small ($4) and it was increasingly untenable to provide asylum claimants better health care coverage that Canadians without an employer health coverage plan. And coverage of medical care at hospitals and by physicians is still covered:

“Almost half of the spending reduction in Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) will come from a single cut to the health coverage of asylum seekers, according to a new analysis from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.”

“In the 2025 budget, the federal government announced that about a quarter of a billion dollars, or $231.9 million, will be cut from the health-care coverage of refugees in the 2027-28 fiscal year with what the government calls a “modest co-payment model” of 30 per cent.

All other cuts from IRCC in 2027-28 are estimated at around $315 million, according to the analysis.

Currently, most refugees are covered under the government’s Interim Federal Health Program, which provides the cost of most medical care until individuals are eligible for provincial or territorial insurance.

However, the federal government will continue to provide full coverage for emergency room visits and visits to a physician.

Dental and prescription co-payments for asylum seekers will begin on May 1 this year.

David Macdonald, author of the analysis and economist at the left-leaning Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, pointed out that costs could rise for the federal government, especially as low-income asylum seekers eschew costly preventative care leading to more emergency room visits.

““Asylum seekers come to Canada with little to nothing, since they’re escaping dangerous conditions. Most won’t be able to pay the extra costs and will simply avoid dental care and filling prescriptions — until an emergency rises,” Macdonald wrote.

Those individuals could “end up in Canada’s emergency rooms, which will also be paid by IRCC, but at 100 per cent of the cost, even though prevention is preferable and less expensive than the emergency room.”” …

Source: “Asylum seekers to face brunt of IRCC cuts through co-payments of dental and prescription coverage: analysis”

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The people who want the temporary migrants to stay permanently

2026/02/19 Leave a comment

The National Post listing organizations opposed to government cuts and supporting regularization for all:

With a record two million temporary migrants set to lose their status in the coming months, a union-championed campaign is emerging to demand that all of them be allowed to stay permanently in Canada.

This week, a new group calling itself the United Immigrant Workers Front announced plans to hold its inaugural rally in Brampton, Ont.

In a Monday video posted to Instagram, group organizers cited the pending expiration of two million visas, and expressed their belief that all should have their permits extended and be given a “path to permanent residency.”

This follows on a wave of demonstrations in Quebec similarly calling for migrants on expiring visas to be kept in the country.

The Quebec government is phasing out its Programme de l’expérience Québécoise, a program which previously fast-tracked international students and foreign workers into permanent residency. It’s being replaced by a much more selective skills-based nominee program.

With many thousands of temporary workers set to lose their legal status as a result of the change, the Union of Quebec Municipalities, along with several businesses and labour unions, is leading a pressure campaign to allow those migrants to “continue their lives here.”

All the while, many of Canada’s largest unions and labour organizations have been publishing literature demanding that Canada’s millions of temporary migrants be allowed to stay.

In late 2024, only a few weeks after Ottawa first signalled its intention to slash temporary migration rates, the Canadian Labour Congress issued a communique entitled “migrant workers in Canada deserve access to permanent residency and citizenship.”

Canada currently has more temporary migrants in the country than at almost any other point in its history, and the government of Prime Minister Mark Carney has been explicit in its goal to bring that figure down.

At the beginning of 2022, Statistics Canada tracked 1.4 million foreign nationals living in Canada as “non-permanent residents.”

This would surge to an October 2024 high of 3.2 million, with temporary residents representing 7.5 per cent of the total Canadian population.

The spike had been enabled by the federal government dropping quotas and restrictions on everything from foreign student visas to Temporary Foreign Worker admissions.

And as of Statistics Canada’s last count, the number of temporary migrants in the country still stands at 2.8 million; higher than at any other point prior to 2024.

This means that roughly one in every 15 people in Canada is here as a non-permanent resident. Just 10 years ago, the figure was closer to one in every 50.

While the Liberals once officially denied that skyrocketing temporary immigration was having negative impacts on civic society, the federal government and Carney himself have now stated that the surge overwhelmed real estate prices, health-care delivery and other public services. In a November speech in Toronto, Carney said that the surge in temporary migration “far exceeded our ability to welcome people and make sure that they had good housing and services.”

The 2025 federal budget similarly said that “unsustainable” immigration had “put pressures on housing demand” and crowded younger Canadians out of the job market. “Managed immigration growth is now helping to stabilise labour-market conditions and is expected to support better outcomes for youth,” it read. The Carney government’s official plan is to curb temporary migration to the point that non-permanent residents represent only five per cent of the total Canadian population; about two million total.

Some of that will indeed be in the form of temporary migrants being fast-tracked into permanent residency, but Ottawa has acknowledged that other visa-holders will be expected to leave “voluntarily.”

One potential problem with this strategy is that Canada is extremely limited in its ability to remove temporary migrants who refuse to leave voluntarily.

Immigration, Citizenship and Refugees Canada has no official tally on when temporary migrants actually leave the country, and the Canada Border Services Agency only has the capacity to remove a limited number of people who overstay their visas.

Last year, CBSA had one of the most active years in its history. Their total removals came to about 22,000, with another 40,000 “inadmissible” people refused entry.

Source: The people who want the temporary migrants to stay permanently

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Immigration Minister defends proposed changes to asylum rules through border bill

2026/02/18 Leave a comment

Of note. Hard for refugee advocates to admit need for limits or the extent of misrepresentation:

…Canada has seen an increase in asylum claims from international students, who have been the target of immigration restrictions, in the last few years. Over the past year, 17 per cent of asylum claims came from students, according to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. 

Ms. Metlege Diab answered questions about the asylum implications of Bill C-12 along with Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree on Feb. 9 at the Senate’s national-security committee.

On Thursday, she was questioned by senators on the social affairs committee, which is also studying the bill. 

Senators also heard unease expressed from a range of witnesses, including the UN Refugee Agency.

One of the concerns is that the proposed one-year cutoff for asylum hearings would be measured from the first time someone entered Canada. The bill specifies that the one-year period “begins on the day after the day of their first entry.”

Refugee advocacy groups warned senators this could mean that someone who came here on holiday as a child with their parents would be barred from a refugee hearing decades later.

They also hit back at suggestions that foreign nationals claiming asylum, including international students who had been here for more than a year, were more likely to lodge fraudulent claims. 

Gauri Sreenivasan, co-executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees, a non-profit advocacy organization for refugee and immigrant rights, was among those who addressed the Senate committee. 

“Suggestions before committees that certain claimants are likely to be fraudulent because they are students or because they have been here more than a year are as unfounded as they are offensive,” Ms. Sreenivasan told senators.

“These blunt measures disproportionately harm the most vulnerable: women fleeing violence, LGBTQIA+ individuals, minors, those with mental health challenges or people from unstable regions.”…

Source: Immigration Minister defends proposed changes to asylum rules through border bill

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Youssif: Canada has a hidden asylum-policy problem

2026/02/18 Leave a comment

Another example of a broken system?

…As I document in a new study for the C.D. Howe Institute, this policy is problematic. Not all asylum claims are truthful, and documents may be forged. But this is impossible to detect without asking questions. The asylum hearing also serves as a screen for national security and program integrity risk, and must be halted if red flags emerge during questioning to allow the relevant minister to be notified. That mechanism cannot be engaged if claimants are never questioned.

More broadly, the IRB’s recognition rate for asylum claims has climbed to 80 per cent of claims decided on their merits, excluding files summarily closed where the claim was withdrawn or abandoned. In comparison, in 2024 Ireland accepted 30 per cent of claims on the merits, Sweden 40 per cent, and Germany 59 per cent. Research suggests that acceptance rates are a significant factor in asylum seekers’ choice of a destination country.

It is difficult to isolate the effect of any single policy change on the level of new claims, given multiple factors such as rising global migration pressures and changes to temporary immigration policies. That said, it is worth noting that the number of new asylum claims in Canada has increased since the IRB began rapidly accepting claims. A backlog of 17,000 claims in 2016 has grown to nearly 300,000 in 2025. Policies such as File Review, intended to reduce the backlog, have not only failed to do so, but may have reinforced perceptions of speed, success, and reduced scrutiny, signalling to the world that Canada’s asylum system is easy.

How was it possible for an adjudicative tribunal to implement a policy that dispenses with the act of adjudication?

Perhaps part of the answer is that the institution cannot be seen clearly. Its unique status and structure have rendered it opaque to the rest of government, which otherwise might have corrected an overreach. It may be time to rethink this model and consider options that provide ministers and cabinet with direct visibility and policy oversight, while preserving fair and independent adjudication.

James Yousif is a lawyer, former director of policy at IRCC and former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (IRB).

Source: Canada has a hidden asylum-policy problem

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Immigration: Vers une campagne électorale agitée

2026/02/17 Leave a comment

Not going to be a “vivre ensemble” campaign:

…Mais surtout, politiquement, le chef du PQ risque de se retrouver du mauvais côté du débat public. Vendredi, les porte-parole de plus d’une vingtaine d’organismes de la société civile, des municipalités aux syndicats en passant par les employeurs, les institutions d’enseignement et les producteurs agricoles, ont tenu une conférence de presse.

Tous demandent la même chose. Qu’on ne renvoie pas ailleurs dans le monde des immigrants que le Québec a choisis : des francophones, déjà établis, bien intégrés, et qui, le plus souvent, ont des compétences recherchées, ici et maintenant.

En fait, si certains de nos politiciens font le mauvais choix, c’est beaucoup à cause de vieux réflexes populistes qui sont aujourd’hui dépassés. Ils ont encore de vieilles croyances et voient les immigrants comme des « voleurs de jobs ».

Mais tant les pénuries de main-d’œuvre que le vieillissement de la population sont des phénomènes qu’on ne peut plus ignorer. Il faut aussi dire que certaines perceptions ont beaucoup changé depuis la pandémie, quand notre système de santé a été tenu à bout de bras par ceux qu’on a appelés nos « anges gardiens ».

Par ailleurs, même la question du danger pour l’avenir du français tient de moins en moins la route. Aujourd’hui, parmi les immigrants que le Québec a choisis, ils sont plus de 80 % à parler français avant même d’arriver chez nous.

Alors pourquoi deux de nos partis politiques, la CAQ et le PQ, s’enferment-ils encore dans un discours aussi inquiet – quand ce n’est pas carrément hostile – envers l’immigration ?

Mauvais instincts de la part de la CAQ, certainement. D’ailleurs, le premier ministre a un discours nettement différent de celui de ses collègues plus jeunes. Chose certaine, il n’y a plus personne pour reprendre le mantra de la CAQ quand elle est arrivée au pouvoir : « En prendre moins, mais en prendre soin ».

Au PQ, on choisit plutôt les experts ou les conseillers qui disent ce que l’on veut entendre, en particulier sur la crise du logement, que l’on attribue presque exclusivement à l’immigration.

Mais c’est faire exception de nouveaux phénomènes comme les « rénovictions », les logements offerts sur des plateformes comme Airbnb et la mauvaise performance historique du Québec quant à la construction de nouveaux logements, surtout quand on le compare au reste du Canada.

Rien de tout cela n’annonce une campagne électorale positive sur un enjeu comme l’immigration, qui exige précisément qu’on en discute dans une certaine sérénité.

Source: Immigration: Vers une campagne électorale agitée

… But above all, politically, the leader of the PQ may find himself on the wrong side of the public debate. On Friday, spokespersons for more than twenty civil society organizations, from municipalities to unions to employers, educational institutions and agricultural producers, held a press conference.

They all ask for the same thing. That we do not send elsewhere in the world of immigrants that Quebec has chosen: Francophones, already established, well integrated, and who, most often, have skills sought after, here and now.

In fact, if some of our politicians make the wrong choice, it is much because of old populist reflexes that are now outdated. They still have old beliefs and see immigrants as “job thieves”.

But both labor shortages and an aging population are phenomena that can no longer be ignored. It must also be said that some perceptions have changed a lot since the pandemic, when our health system was held at arm’s length by those we called our “guardian angels”.

Moreover, even the question of the danger to the future of the Frenchman holds less and less. Today, among the immigrants that Quebec has chosen, more than 80% speak French before they even arrive at home.

So why do two of our political parties, the CAQ and the PQ, still lock themselves in such a worried speech – when it is not downright hostile – towards immigration?

Bad instincts on the part of the CAQ, certainly. Moreover, the Prime Minister has a very different speech from that of his younger colleagues. One thing is certain, there is no one left to take up the mantra of the CAQ when it came to power: “Take less, but take care of it”.

In the PQ, we choose instead the experts or advisors who say what we want to hear, especially on the housing crisis, which is attributed almost exclusively to immigration.

But this is an exception to new phenomena such as “renovations”, housing offered on platforms such as Airbnb and Quebec’s poor historical performance in the construction of new housing, especially when compared to the rest of Canada.

None of this announces a positive election campaign on an issue such as immigration, which precisely requires that it be discussed with a certain serenity.

Filed under Immigration, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

People from African, Caribbean countries face harsher treatment by immigration system, study finds

2026/02/17 Leave a comment

Think this study needs more context in understanding the differences as some of this may reflect valid risk factors:

…CBSA data cited in the report and obtained by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch under freedom-of-information laws show that in 2019, the majority of detainees held for a month or longer were from African and Caribbean countries. 

Publicly available data from the CBSA and the Immigration and Refugee Board indicate that the overall number of people held in immigration detention, as well as the length of their detention, has declined in recent years: the vast majority of detainees are released within 30 days, the study notes.

However, over the past decade, nearly 60,000 people – including hundreds of children – have been placed in immigration detention, the study’s analysis of Canada Border Services Agency data found.

The CBSA can detain non-citizens, including permanent residents and foreign nationals, who are believed to be inadmissible to Canada. The factors the border agency considers include whether the person may pose a public-safety risk or is a possible flight risk.

Over that past decade, fewer than 10 per cent of immigration detainees were arrested because they were deemed a danger to the public or because of serious criminality, the data show. 

The same proportion were held because of questions about their identity documents or because a border agent needed more information to complete an immigration examination.

The vast majority – around 80 per cent – were held because border agents deemed them unlikely to appear at future immigration proceedings. 

Source: People from African, Caribbean countries face harsher treatment by immigration system, study finds

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Opinion | Canada’s working-age population is shrinking. Should we keep immigration near zero or rethink the plan?

2026/02/16 2 Comments

Good discussion (I lean towards the BMO assessment):

In this Bridging the Divide conversation, Robert Kavcic, senior economist and director of economics at BMO Capital Markets, argues the slowdown is a responsible course correction. Lisa Lalande, CEO of the Century Initiative, warns that pulling back from population growth without a strategy risks weakening Canada’s long-term prosperity and global standing.

Robert Kavcic: We are in a period of adjustment. Population growth accelerated to three per cent in 2022 and 2023, placing a strain on housing, rental affordability, health care, public services and youth employment. I believe the government’s short-term immigration targets, which will keep population growth just above zero through 2028, are a reasonable and necessary correction.

Lisa Lalande: Population growth itself isn’t the problem. Growth without a plan is. Canada’s working-age population is shrinking, a shift that poses long-term risks to economic growth and public services. The pullback in immigration is too severe and has not been replaced with a national plan.

Kavcic: Immigration levels need to align with Canada’s capacity to provide housing, health care and essential services. If there is one thing that the last couple of years have taught us, it’s that population can grow very quickly. Every person who comes to Canada needs a place to live immediately. They need a doctor. They need services.

But it takes years to build adequate housing and services. So, maintaining a steady and predictable pace of immigration is very important.

Lalande: I don’t disagree, but zero population growth is bad for the economy. While urban centres such as Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary continue to attract newcomers, many small towns and rural areas are experiencing sustained population decline. Provinces such as Newfoundland and Labrador are projected to lose up to 10 per cent of their population by 2043. 

Municipalities have fixed costs, such as water treatment plants, but those costs are spread among fewer people as residents retire or pass away. Affordability will worsen without a national population plan that considers aging and health care.

Kavcic: Another concern is the quality of immigration. We cannot bring in people simply to meet numerical targets if they are not improving per capita economic growth. We need to recruit workers in industries where shortages exist.

But even when we recruit needed workers, such as plumbers, electricians and carpenters for residential construction, they still need a place to live. In that sense, adding workers to build homes can increase pressure on the housing market in the short term because they need housing before they can add to overall output.

Lalande: I agree that we need to have more housing. But the debate of the past two years oversimplified the issue by blaming immigration for the housing crisis. We know from Statistics Canada research that immigration accounted for only about 11 per cent of the rise in median house values and rents across municipalities.

We need to recognize that we need population growth. We have shortages in many areas. In health care, we need to double the number of personal support workers by 2032 to accommodate our aging population. Without population growth, ER wait times will grow and smaller communities will lose access to care.

Kavcic: I don’t think we’re far apart on this. The market speaks pretty clearly about where the balance is. For most of the period after the 2008 financial crisis through the pandemic, housing affordability was not a major issue in Canada. Prices were rising, incomes were rising and interest rates were falling. The market was mostly balanced. The rental market was relatively stable, and population growth averaged about one per cent.

What changed between 2021 and 2023 when population growth tripled was extreme stress in the rental market. Once population caps were introduced in 2024, the rental market peaked and began to cool. As population growth slowed, rents started falling in most major Canadian cities and vacancy rates rose.

This is a strong indication that Canada cannot sustain three per cent population growth. A rate closer to one per cent appears to be what the country can manage — and likely what it needs.

Lalande: I agree there was pressure on the rental market. But we need to address the housing crisis with greater urgency. Housing should not prevent us from bringing a doctor or nurse into a community that needs one.

Population growth also needs to be part of our national security conversation. For the country to remain strong, independent and sovereign, we need a growth-oriented mindset, with smart policy choices, innovation and responsible population planning. If Canada wants to rebuild its defence capacity, secure the Arctic, strengthen domestic supply chains and reduce reliance on allies, that will require people, talent and a healthy tax base to fund major investments.

Kavcic: I agree there is an important role for a well-managed and robust immigration program in Canada. I worry public sentiment is turning against immigration, even though the country will need strong immigration over the long term. That concern may be one reason policymakers moved quickly to reduce immigration levels, to prevent opposition from becoming entrenched.

Lalande: It was a drastic pullback, a political decision rather than a smart policy one, and the consequences are now being felt. Consider the revenue impact on our post-secondary education system, which has fewer foreign students. We are also losing our competitiveness against other countries for the world’s best and brightest.

When you dig into national polling, most Canadians still see the value of immigration. Environics Institute research shows three-quarters say immigrants make their communities better or have no net effect, while only 15 per cent believe newcomers make them worse.

We are facing a looming population cliff. Canada’s demographic outlook is shaped by three forces: an aging population; declining fertility rate; and immigration. Research shows there is only one way to meaningfully influence this trajectory: immigration. Policy should focus on whether immigration serves Canada’s interests within a coherent national strategy.

Kavcic: I think the population targets the federal government is using now are about right. Imposing temporary limits on growth for two or three years is reasonable, given how much population growth was compressed into a short period.

It will likely take two or three years of near-zero growth to bring the long-term trend back to the pace seen before inflows of non-permanent residents such as temporary foreign workers and international students surged. The projected changes from 2026 to 2028 are driven by scaling back flows of these non-permanent-residents to previous. The targets for permanent residents (people granted the right to live, work and study in Canada indefinitely) remain about 380,000 annually

 Lalande: We need to look beyond the next year or two and assess the impact over four, 10, even 30 years. Countries with long-term plans are more likely to succeed and safeguard their independence.

Kavcic: I agree that, over the long term, Canada faces a serious demographic challenge. The baby boom generation is aging into retirement, and the country is nearing a period of negative natural population growth. By 2028, for the first time, more people are expected to die than be born in Canada.

I do not dispute that we need a strong immigration program. We do. The issue is the numbers and the quality of immigration.

Lalande: I see more urgency around the need to plan with a long-term perspective, not anchor the conversation only in numbers and quality.

The focus should be on understanding what communities need. It should be on responding to those needs and supporting people once they are here. Only then can the country grow in a sustainable way into the future.

Source: Opinion | Canada’s working-age population is shrinking. Should we keep immigration near zero or rethink the plan?

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Rempel Garner: Immigration intakes don’t account for the impact of AI. They should.

2026/02/16 Leave a comment

Agree that there needs to be greater consideration of immigration levels and skills in the context of AI and automation in general. Arguably, the current approach, even with recent reductions, understates the potential impact and the associated issue that current policies provide disincentives for companies to invest in AI and automation.

While I still write my posts, and do my number crunching myself, am increasingly using AI for proofreading, excel/numbers formulas and basic research for references. I am also currently exploring AI to generate my personal newsfeed rather than combing individual websites:

…But there’s something else that should be driving the Liberal government to pump the brakes on high levels of new temporary foreign labour and get a handle on expired-visa removals: the potential impact of artificial intelligence on Canada’s jobs market.

If you spent any time on X this week, you would have encountered AI entrepreneur Matt Schumer’s extra-mega viral article entitled “Something Big Is Happening”. Hype or not, Schumer’s article, which warned that many entry level white collar jobs are about to be replaced by AI, struck a chord. That’s probably because most people now have lived experience with AI changing or replacing major parts of their work.

There’s empirical proof of this trend now, too. Stories of law firms choosing to hire fewer new associates in favour of leaning on AI are starting to pop up. Accountancy giant PwC plans to hire a third fewer new grads by 2028. Entry-level hiring at the 15 biggest tech firms dropped 25% from 2023-2024. In Canada, this AI work disruption is coming at a time when the country’s economy is already brittle. Over the past decade, Canada’s per capita GDP has been on a rather steep decline, and the youth unemployment rate is double the national average.

Said differently, there are less jobs for Canadian workers due to an already-weak economy, an overabundance of low-skilled foreign labour, and AI is now disrupting the jobs market even further.

Capturing the spirit of this concern was known-to-senior-Canadian-Liberals Ian Bremmer, President of the global consultancy Eurasia Group, who tweeted: “The fact that this [the replacement of white-collar jobs with AI] is even remotely plausible should be the top issue on most everyone’s agenda.” I’ve shared the same view since the moment I first used ChatGPT in late 2022. My immediate thought was, “My God, they’re going to automate human thought, just as they automated human labour.” A few days later, I became the first legislator in Canada to raise the issue in the House of Commons. And Tiff Macklem, Governor of the Bank of Canada stated in a recent speech that, “Not surprisingly, we are seeing increased demand for workers with AI skills. The flip side is we may be seeing some early evidence that AI is reducing the number of entry-level jobs in some occupations.”

Unfortunately, in spite of these warning signs, there is no evidence that the federal Liberals have factored in the possibility of artificial intelligence disrupting entry-level jobs into their immigration levels plan during the middle of an existing economic downturn. If they had, they probably wouldn’t have quietly lifted a freeze on the permitting process to bring new low-skilled temporary foreign workers to several major cities across Canada last month….

Source: Immigration intakes don’t account for the impact of AI. They should.

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Ontario lifts tuition freeze, unveils OSAP reforms as it boosts university and college funding. Here’s what it will mean for schools and students

2026/02/14 Leave a comment

Partially correcting a problem that they created and was forced by federal government correctly cutting back on the excessive growth in international students, particularly in colleges:

Colleges and universities are getting more funding — an additional $6.4 billion over the next four years — and will be able to charge students slightly higher tuition rates, as the province’s longstanding fee freeze comes to an end. 

The government’s Thursday announcement was based on months of consultations and warnings from the post-secondary sector that stagnant funding from the province — combined with the seven-year ban on tuition hikes and massive cuts to international students imposed by Ottawa — left them on the financial brink.

Schools will now be able to raise fees by two per cent each year for the next three years, with future increases tied to inflation or two per cent, whichever is less. That means university students will pay roughly $170 more a year and college students $66 — which, combined with a move away from non-repayable student aid grants, has critics raising concerns about affordability. …

Source: Ontario lifts tuition freeze, unveils OSAP reforms as it boosts university and college funding. Here’s what it will mean for schools and students

Good commentary by Regg Cohn:

…Belatedly — better late than never — Ford’s Progressive Conservative government is stepping up to shore up postsecondary education. On Thursday it announced a $6.4-billion cash infusion over the next four years to make up for the last seven years of cuts, freezes and shortfalls since Ford took power.

Back in 2019, the premier played Santa Claus by imposing a 10-per-cent tuition cut, but then played Scrooge by freezing those rates in place without making up for the lost cash flow. Instead, the government urged postsecondary institutions to recruit and rely on high-paying foreign students to shore up their balance sheets, which stoked immigration imbalances that ultimately forced Ottawa to scale back student visas.

Those political and fiscal miscalculations created a perfect storm in postsecondary education: Funding shortfalls; tuition cuts frozen in time despite an inflationary spiral; and the sudden loss of foreign windfalls that kept campuses afloat.

None of it added up, least of all the tuition freeze enacted by a populist premier who wouldn’t pony up his share of the funding pie.

Regg Cohn | Doug Ford has learned a hard lesson after starving Ontario’s colleges and universities


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