No one could argue against anti-racism, mental health or fee transparency policies. They all make perfect sense. Everyone deserves a safe and welcoming post-secondary experience. The challenges our students are facing are real, and they deserve real support, real advocacy and strength, funding and respect.

Putting out a piece of paper with policies but no money attached is wrong. This government needs to invest in safety from racism, help to overcome challenges in mental health, and the security of financial transparency.

The money this government has allocated to post-secondary recently is just half of what was recommended by the government’s own experts, and that’s even before the international students were capped.

Speaker, anti-racism and mental health both touch vulnerable and marginalized communities. The fact that this government wants to hand down policies without consultation, not only is awful for academic freedom, but I believe it’s a reckless approach to policies that will have serious consequences on people’s lives. This lack of consultation is completely unprecedented.

When the previous Liberal government asked post-secondary institutions to have sexual harassment policies, there was a defined and rigorous consultation process that led to good policy. That’s what we need. We need good policy.

The Premier himself even said, “Universities and colleges are really good, and it’s up to the dean to govern their universities.” I wonder, what makes it that a minister will know more about how to deliver good programs for students than the people that are on the front lines in those institutions every day. Speaker, all of these institutions already have these policies. They just need proper funding.

Also, the minister has repeatedly refused to state how they plan to penalize non-compliant institutions. Will the minister financially penalize institutions? We can’t say. This is the glimpse in the lack of transparency that we can expect in the future. This bodes poorly for this bill. When the government mandated free speech policies in 2018, it was explicitly with the threat of funding cuts. I’m a little worried that they’re refusing to give the details this time around.

This government’s approach to this bill, with no formal consultation taking place, is not the way forward for dealing with complex social issues that require input from across a broad spectrum of stakeholders. We could end up hurting people if we don’t do this right, so why not take the time to actually listen to those experts, listen to people with experience in mental health and other things? How do we prevent these policies from being hijacked for personal benefit or political gain? What processes are there in place to make sure that that doesn’t happen? I don’t see them, Speaker, and that worries me.

These policies currently exist, and I think that the universities and colleges did a good job of creating the kind of policies they need. Could they be improved? Absolutely. Now, that would have been a bill, to mandate that the policies that are in the universities and colleges need to be reviewed every three years, every two years. Now, that would make sense, because that would make sure that they’re addressing the most current issues that are out there and that things that we’re learning about today that we had not thought about five years ago are included in the policies. That’s something that would make sense, and it would also make sense in terms of funding if we’re funding mental health.

We don’t even know what these policies will look like if they’re handed down from on high. What one college in northern Ontario needs and a university in southern Ontario could be two different things. We don’t know. But I would like to see that whatever money comes into these kinds of policies, which I think—I think they are really important; they’re absolutely essential if we are going to do a better job of making our education system more inclusive and more welcoming and more open and more successful to more people.

I believe that the experts are at the coalface, as we would say in the military. They are on the front lines, are at the colleges and are at the universities, and are at the mental health agencies. We need to listen to the people who know, and I worry that these decisions will be taken up to the minister’s office without that consultation we need in order to make them as good as they could possibly be, in order to make them so that they will serve the greatest number of people and serve them well.

I don’t think that handing down extra policy requirements is addressing the reality of the current situation. The government is happy to tell you that our students are their priority, but I’ll tell you what, Madam Speaker: Show me your budget and I’ll show you what you care about. We’ll say that over and over again. Coming up with policies of this nature that are so instrumental—can be instrumental—in people’s future without transparency, without consultation and without funding is just plain wrong.

In closing, no one could argue against anti-racism, mental health or fee transparency policies. Everyone deserves a safe and welcoming post-secondary experience. The challenges our students are facing are real, and they deserve real support, real advocacy and strength, funding and respect.