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“This assault on English universities is only the latest and most blatant expression of the (CAQ) government’s efforts” to diminish anglophone institutions.
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Changes to Quebec’s tuition structure are another assault on the province’s English-speaking institutions, a coalition of anglophone groups said Wednesday, urging the minister responsible for the English community to intervene.
“It is now clear (François Legault’s Coalition Avenir Québec) government has concluded the most effective way to support French is to curtail English and English-language institutions to the greatest extent possible,” Sylvia Martin-Laforge, director-general of the Quebec Community Groups Network, said in a statement.
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“This assault on English universities — effectively doubling regular tuition for students from outside Quebec who want to study at McGill, Concordia or Bishop’s — is only the latest and most blatant expression of the government’s efforts.”
The QCGN represents about 40 anglophone groups.
Higher Education Minister Pascale Déry last week announced tuition for new Canadian students from outside Quebec will almost double — to about $17,000 from just under $9,000, starting in fall 2024. Students from other provinces already pay more than three times what Quebec students pay.
Quebec’s three anglophone universities — Bishop’s, Concordia and McGill — have said the changes will scare off many students, devastating the institutions’ finances. Bishop’s has said it could not survive if it loses the 30 per cent of its student body who normally come from the rest of Canada.
Most students from other provinces who study in Quebec do so in English institutions. Déry has said the tuition hike will apply to those studying in French as well but has said the government is looking at giving these students “exemptions.”
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Martin-Laforge said the CAQ “has paid little more than lip service to the English-speaking community” since coming to power in 2018.
“How else can one explain Finance Minister Eric Girard, who is responsible for relations with English-speaking Quebecers, standing by in silence while his cabinet colleagues deny English rights and access to services, penalize English institutions like universities and CEGEPs, and publicly denigrate the very sound, the very presence of English in a cosmopolitan, world-class city?
“We ask Minister Girard to tell us what he intends to do on behalf of the community of Quebecers, for which he has ministerial responsibility.”
Contacted last week by the Montreal Gazette, Girard’s office said the minister wanted to speak to universities before commenting.
On Wednesday afternoon, Girard’s office said he had no comment about the tuition hike or the QCGN’s statement.
Girard was given the anglo portfolio a year ago. In an interview with the Montreal Gazette in December, he acknowledged that relations with the English-speaking community “were not perfect in the first mandate.”
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“We have a responsibility to do better,” Girard said at the time. “As a government, we know that. When I say we need to do better, I mean we need to improve relations.”
The Legault government says the tuition overhaul is needed in order to boost French-language universities and to improve the status of French in Quebec.
French Language Minister Jean-François Roberge has complained non-Quebec students who don’t speak French are contributing to the “anglicization” of the province.
Martin-Laforge said the QCGN supports the preservation and promotion of the French language. However, she added, “we believe there is strength in Quebec’s diversity.”
She added: “While the CAQ’s measures in general, including the hurtful Bill 96, may be aimed at the Montreal region, they also bring collateral damage to the nearly 250,000 English-speaking Quebecers who live outside the metropolis,” she added. “We all pay a heavy price for the CAQ’s obsession with hearing ‘Bonjour/Hi’ in downtown Montreal.”
She said that “kneecapping English universities in Quebec, which include some of the best in the world, will only work against attracting the talent, energy, brains and perspectives Quebec needs to build and grow in an increasingly globalized economy. Make no mistake: Quebec’s loss will be someone else’s gain.”
ariga@postmedia.com
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