The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
For the first time in Canadian history, a majority of university and college students in Canada are protected by a tuition fee freeze. Statistics Canada's annual survey on tuition fees, shows that with the newly implemented tuition fee freeze in Ontario, frozen tuition fees are the norm in Canada. However, the federal government is not meeting its funding responsibilities, a fact that threatens tuition fee policies across the country, according to the Canadian Federation of Students. "High tuition fees, even if frozen, are still a barrier to access for many lower- and middle-income Canadians," said George Soule, National Chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students. "Students have worked hard to win protection from tuition fee increases, but fee reductions are the next step to expanding access to Canadian universities and colleges. If kept, Paul Martin's pledge to increase funding for post-secondary education can get us closer to that goal." Prime Minister Paul Martin told students on national television on June 4, 2004 that he would like to see the Canada Social Transfer split so that provinces would receive federal post-secondary education funding in a separate envelop. He added that this transfer should eventually reach "seven to eight billion dollars", an amount that would go a long way to reducing tuition fees while ensuring sufficient university and college revenue. "Accessible post-secondary education is only possible through co-operation between the federal government and provincial governments," said Soule. "The federal government can do more to support and encourage tuition fee reductions by delivering the 8 billion dollars promised by the Prime Minister."
