I want to thank the member from London West. You made mention that across Canada, we have the highest tuition. As we work towards reducing the tuition and creating a freeze on it, I would like to ask—both the NDP and Liberals have come out to call the increase in tuition—they both want an increase in tuition. Our government, under the leadership of the Premier, has cut and frozen tuition by 10%. Our government is also following up by regulating—

I certainly thank the member for her comments on this bill and her direct involvement in it. I really like the variety of things that we’re doing here to support post-secondary institutions with the sustainability fund, and also the efficiencies and operations we’ll be working with them on, and the tuition freeze, of course.

But I’m curious, member: You have had direct experience on the mental health front—and just your reflections on how this bill will help that community in our post-secondary institutions. I would appreciate your additional thoughts on that.

I thank you for the question. I fully support the tuition freeze. However, what I want to highlight is that at a time of an unprecedented affordability crisis—we know rents have gone up; this government has abolished rent control, for example; the cost of living has gone up; groceries have gone up—what hasn’t gone up is the amount of student assistance. In fact, as I referenced in my earlier remarks, the amount of OSAP has gone down by 40%. And even if you qualify for OSAP, that OSAP comes largely in the form not of grants, but loans. Again, as I mentioned, those loans no longer have a six-month interest-free grace period.

So our students need substantially more support. The tuition freeze is part of that, but I would be looking for vastly more, specifically in terms of additional financial support and increasing OSAP as well.

I see that you’re encouraging me to think back even further in history. I think something that’s often lost in the narrative is that, once upon a time, there was an NDP government in this province. During that period, post-secondary funding was last of all of the provinces in this country.

Interjection.

What I will tell you is that free speech is sacred here. We know that our post-secondary institutions are a bastion of free speech, and we need to make sure that they are safe places. We’ve seen a wave of various kinds of hatred and racism. We’ve seen anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian racism. We’ve seen hate speech directed to the LGBTQ2S+ community as well, and anti-Asian, anti-Black and towards women as well. So while we fight to ensure that there are safe places for us to speak freely, we do also want to make sure that the protections are in place so that students can study safely and focus on their studies.

If you’re asking will I support increased mental health supports, will I increase initiatives that will provide more funding to university and college students so that they don’t have to live hand-to-mouth, of course I will support initiatives of those types. The main crux of my criticism here is that this bill doesn’t come even close to going far enough to support our post-secondary sector and the students who will be the foundation of our economy going forward.

Thank you to the independent member for his comments. Under the Liberals, students would be paying more for less. The Liberals opposed performance-based funding, opposed a freeze on tuition and supported increasing tuition. So my question is: Will the Liberals again oppose strengthening accountability and student supports?

I thank you for the question because I think it’s particularly prescient. When you talk to international students, they know that they are the piggy bank that is funding colleges and universities. It’s heartbreaking to hear from them that they were sold on a dream and a promise from faraway lands that they would be able to come here, settle and start a new life with hope for prosperity in the future. When they come here and realize that their tuition is orders of magnitude higher than domestic students and that the promise that was made to them can’t be delivered upon, it tells them that their individual dignity does not count; it tells them that they count for nothing more than what’s in their bank accounts.

The only thing that they should be focusing on is their education and how they can settle their roots here and give back to our country and our economy.

Thank you to the member for his question. There are three pillars involved in this act. Financial issues are strongly at the heart of a lot of what we’re doing, including freezing the tuition fees. But not only that, our province is supporting the financial sustainability of the post-secondary sector by creating a Postsecondary Education Sustainability Fund, which will provide for all institutions in the amount of $1.3 billion. This fund will support financial sustainability by providing $700 million in broad base supports to all institutions as well as targeted supports of $203 million for institutions with greater financial need.

This legislation, if passed, will create a standard process for prevention, reporting and addressing matters of hate and discrimination on campus. Getting this in place, we know that it will make a difference. We’ve actually heard from schools, and they have said they do not have the ability to properly intervene with these sorts of situations. Frankly, that’s unacceptable. This pillar will provide them with the methodology—

In the coming weeks, Ontario will determine how to allocate the application cap among institutions that are eligible to enroll with international students, with a focus on in-demand labour markets, and implement a provincial attestation letter.