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News Editor: Ethan Cabel Contact: news@themanitoban.com News Editor:Garett Williams Contact: garett@themanitoban.com
NDP pledges to convert student loans to grants Selinger unveils new planks in post-secondary funding platform TOM INGRAM, STAFF, WITH FILES FROM GARETT WILLIAMS AND CRAIG ADOLPHE
If re-elected April 19, the Manitoba NDP will offer non-repayable grants in place of student loans and provide free tuition to students in foster care up to age 25, leader Greg Selinger announced at an on-campus press conference Monday. “We want to make sure people not only have hope but a practical path to a better life and we all know that education is still the single best way to prepare yourself for the future,” Selinger said in an interview with the Manitoban. Selinger said converting student loans to grants builds on the NDP’s history of support for post-secondary education, which includes annual funding increases, caps on tuition increases, and most recently the elimination of interest on student loans. “Because of all these other supports we put in place it was the next logical move to build on that experience and try and keep post-secondary affordable for Manitobans who go to school here,” Selinger said. The grants are set to cost $40 million a year, compared to over $33 million a year for the current slate of student aid programs. The cost has been taken into account in the NDP’s budgeting forecasts, Selinger told the Manitoban. Grant amounts will be deter-
mined by the same criteria currently used for loans, and students who are currently receiving loans will still have to pay them back – though any future provincial student aid those same students receive will come in the form of grants. At the conference, Selinger also announced several more plans for post-secondary funding, including doubling funding for the Manitoba Scholarship and Bursary Initiative from $4.5 million to $9 million, launching a pilot program to prepare adult learners for post-secondary education or apprenticeships, and introducing $12 million for student family housing at Brandon University. The NDP’s plan will leave the tuition fee income tax rebate intact.
Student response
Michael Barkman, chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students-Manitoba, welcomed the announcement. “It’s something that students have been asking for for a long time from all political parties,” he said. Barkman compared the NDP’s promise to the student aid programs in Newfoundland, where the Progressive Conservative government replaced student loans with grants last summer, and Ontario, which
recently announced an initiative to provide non-repayable student aid to students from families earning less than $50,000 a year. “It’s an exciting step forward and it’s something we’re seeing across the country a lot of political parties committing to,” Barkman said.
“We want to make sure people not only have hope but a practical path to a better life” – Greg Selinger, Manitoba NDP leader Allison Kilgour, a U of M student and a senate representative for the Arts Student Body Council, also praised the NDP’s student aid proposal. “We’ve seen the student debt rising higher and higher and we’ve seen other provinces take steps towards lowering the debt and turning it into grants,” said Kilgour. “From a large university perspective, a lot of students have to work full-time just to pay for their educa-
tion, or can’t even attend university based on their income or what they can and can’t afford.”
Other parties’ commitments
The Liberals promised in November to take the $10 million of Manitoba Student Aid money devoted to loans and convert it to non-repayable grants. They also vowed to eliminate the cap on how much money students can earn from working while in school. NDP Education Minister James Allum criticized the Liberal plan in November, saying “if you pull the string on [Liberal leader Rana Bokhari’s] particular commitment, then some of [the current government’s student aid package] is going to collapse and suddenly we’ll have a system that’s not working for students but in fact working against them.” The Manitoba Progressive Conservatives, who are the frontrunners in provincial election polls, have not yet committed to a student aid plan, though they have cited their planned cut to the provincial sales tax as a way of putting money in the pockets of students and their parents. The PCs have criticized student aid initiatives brought forward by the NDP and the Liberals. In a Q&A with the Manitoban March 8, Tory
education critic Wayne Ewasko said that the interest-free student loans introduced by the NDP government last year are “something [...] we’re going to be having conversations about once we get in.” He also criticized the Liberal plan in a November interview, saying he doubts they will be able to follow through. “It sounds like a great promise but to me it’s sounding unrealistic and to me it sounds as if [Bokhari is] doing some vote-buying,” he said. Barkman compared the NDP’s proposal favourably to the Liberals’. “The Liberal promise is an eventual conversion to grants with only $10 million of funding per year, whereas the NDP is an immediate conversion of loans into grants,” he said. “So [the NDP promise is] essentially the same, similar to what we have been proposing for a number of years, whereas the Liberals’ is kind of a slower way to get there.” Barkman said he is awaiting announcements on student aid from the remaining provincial parties. “I’m hoping that other parties, particularly the PCs, will be committing to tangible solutions to reduce the debt load that students face as well as making post-secondary more accessible for all learners.”
UMFA, university administration set the bargaining table Faculty union to outline future contract priorities at March 31 general meeting OSHO SAMUEL ADETUNJI, STAFF
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ith the current faculty con- of our type in Canada – we are at tract set to expire at the end the very bottom of that list and we of March, preparations are under- are at the bottom by a considerable way for the next round of collective distance.” bargaining between the University Professors at the U of M were of Manitoba Faculty Association paid a minimum of $101,423 in the (UMFA) and University of Manitoba 2014-15 fiscal year. Associate profesadministration. sors made a minimum of $82,599 and The faculty union – which repre- assistant professors made a minimum sents some 1,250 full-time professors, of $70,370. lecturers, instructors, and academic At the University of Alberta, prolibrarians – circulated a letter to fessors made a minimum of $116,473 membership signed by president annually in 2014-15. Associate proMark Hudson earlier this month fessors made a minimum of $93,944 saying the association will be seek- while assistant professors made a ing a “stronger collective agreement minimum of $75,403. that will protect our ability to teach, Faculty at the University of research, and provide service to the Saskatchewan were also paid more university and community.” than their U of M counterparts. Association membership will Professors made a minimum of convene at a special general meet- $124,618 in 2014-15 while associate ing March 31 to set priorities for the and assistant professors made minubargaining team to pursue in negotia- mum salaries of $106,708 and $88,798 tions. Hudson said salary, which he respectively. claimed is below average at the U of The 2013-16 collective agreement M, is on the table. between UMFA and the university “I don’t know what the member- saw a 6.9 per cent salary increase ship will agree to in terms of the over the contract’s term. The previparameters but they will ask us to ous 2010-13 agreement gave faculty a negotiate,” he said. 4.4 per cent increase. “Both the UMFA and the U of The university’s bargaining M administration recognize that we team will be led by chief negotiator are currently not compensated com- Gregory Juliano, associate vice-prespetitively relative to other universities ident human resources at the U of M.
Juliano successfully reached separate agreements with 2,600 support staff represented by AESES in December and 500 sessional instructors and part-time librarians and counsellors represented by CUPE in January. According to an online statement, the university will be seeking a bargaining process and result that provides stability through a multi-year agreement; places teaching, research and service at the forefront; and contributes to financial sustainability while allowing for responsiveness in a changing fiscal environment. John Danakas, the U of M’s executive director of public affairs, wouldn’t comment on the upcoming negotiations, saying only that administration respects the process. “The University of Manitoba respects the bargaining process and the value of any ongoing discussions remaining confidential,” he said in an email to the Manitoban. Faculty will be represented in negotiations by professors from the economics, English, accounting and finance, biological sciences, and dentistry departments, in addition to a union professional officer. In his letter to members, Hudson noted the bargaining team has held more than 20 consultation meet-
ings and spoken directly with more than 250 faculty members. He added that members voiced concerns about administration initiatives, such as performance indicators, being introduced without union approval and the downloading of administrative duties to faculty, citing the Concur travel and expense tool as an example. Faculty members must use Concur to make travel arrangements, book hotels, and car rentals in order to have access to the university’s preferred vendor rates. Hudson told the Manitoban the Concur software is not user-friendly and has wasted faculty time that should be invested in quality research and teaching. “The university is essentially downloading its administrative work onto faculty members and it really changes the kind of work that our members do,” he said. “Instead of doing research, teaching and service, they are doing administrative work that they were not really hired to do.” Hudson said the union should be ready to present its key priorities to the university in short order and said that while the bargaining team will enter negotiations in good faith, strike action cannot be ruled out if an
agreement cannot be met. “We don’t enter into collective bargaining with an expectation that there will be a strike but we want to come to a very reasonable agreement with the university administration in a way that is efficient,” he said. “At the beginning of collective bargaining, one can never rule out the possibility of some kind of labour action.” Michael Barkman, chairperson of the Canadian Federation StudentsManitoba (CFS-MB), said students and faculty alike benefit from a strong agreement between UMFA and the university, arguing it facilitates an overall better education system. “It is very critical for students and faculties [to be] united in a common struggle for quality post-secondary education,” he said. “The quality of education for students is greatly affected by our access to it and so I think it is both critical that the tuition fees remain low while the university supports good jobs for faculty and this can only be achieved through strong public funding for post-secondary [education] and commitment to these goals.”