Jacqueline Perlin
Assistant News Editor
Tim Hudak has announced the Ontario Progressive Conservative (PC) Party’s stance on post-secondary education, but York’s student union remains critical of what it calls a “narrow platform”.
Hudak’s main platform plank—similar to that of the Ontario Liberal Party—is providing accessibility to post-secondary education, promising to open 60,000 new spaces in Ontario colleges and universities. In addition, the Conservatives also plan to give more Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP) funding to middle-class families. For instance, students coming from households that bring in $65,000 would receive $300 more in OSAP loans.
Raising the threshold for financial support to make OSAP loans more accessible is also on the agenda.
“Dalton McGuinty believes middle-class families are too rich to get fair access to OSAP loans,” said Hudak in a media release. “And for too many families, that puts college or university out of reach.”
But according to Alastair Woods of the York Federation of Students (YFS), not only has the Liberal Party already proposed to open up spaces in universities and colleges, he says the platform contains “a lot of rhetoric.”
“The tone of the [Conservative platform] is more accusatory [towards the Liberal Party] than constructive,” says Woods. Noting the lack of constructive dialogue, he says the Conservative platform does not address the real problem of university underfunding.
“[The platform] leaves a lot to be desired,” he continues. “There’s very little mentioned about post-secondary education and what is said is simply blaming the Liberals for creating the most expensive province for post-secondary education.”
Alongside OSAP increases, the PC Party has also vowed to end Dalton McGuinty’s foreign scholarship program, which aims at bringing top international students to Ontario universities.
Woods finds the negativity toward this program flawed.
“I find it quite hypocritical that Tim Hudak was educated in America [and] American scholarships paid for [it],” says Woods, referring to Hudak’s master’s degree in economics, which he received from the University of Washington on a full academic scholarship.
Nonetheless, Woods maintains that the Conservative party still has time to put forward further initiatives to broaden their post-secondary platform before the October 6 provincial elections.
