TORONTO, March 26, 2024 – “Ontario’s universities share the government’s goal to put Ontario on a path towards a more promising future, as outlined in today’s provincial budget. Universities welcome the government investment of nearly $1.3 billion in financial support for the postsecondary sector. While this investment will provide immediate financial relief, it falls far short of what the sector needs to be financially sustainable.
We welcome the new medical school at York University, which will focus primarily on training family doctors and help address critical gaps in the health-care labour market. We thank the government for providing the additional investment to support enrolment increases of registered nurses over the next three years. To further ensure Ontario has the physicians that it so desperately needs, COU is also calling for increases in capital and base operating funding for the previously announced medical school expansions, which will help address the funding shortfall in training more physicians.
Expanding funding opportunities through the Building Ontario Fund also helps ensure universities have access to critical capital and infrastructure that will help provide students with more of the housing they need.
To ensure continued student success, the long-term financial sustainability of universities needs to be addressed. It is why Ontario’s students and universities recently came together in an open letter urgently calling on the Ontario 2024 Budget to provide the additional base funding that was recommended by the government’s own Blue-Ribbon Panel.
The Panel was clear with its recommendations for the financial health of Ontario’s postsecondary sector: full implementation of these recommendations is critical for the sector’s financial sustainability. Full implementation would mean a total of more than $2.5 billion in base revenue for the postsecondary sector over three years, including more than $1.9 billion in base revenue for universities.
With more than a decade of declining provincial grants, increasing demands on universities, a 10 per cent cut to tuition and now an eight-year long tuition freeze, as well as a federal cap on international students, Ontario’s universities are at a breaking point. Universities will have no choice but to scale back on the programs, services and supports students rely on.
Even after factoring in the $100 million in STEM funding for 2023-24 and the one-time funding of $700 million over three years for the postsecondary sector, at least eight universities are still forecasting operating deficits in 2023-24 for a combined total of $152 million. This number increases the following year to at least 12 universities projecting operating deficits in 2024-25 for a combined total of $293 million.
Ontario’s universities have a long history of finding cost savings and doing more with less, as shown in our recent efficiencies report. We will continue to innovate and evolve to find even more efficiencies, but efficiencies can only cover a fraction of the funding gap that universities face.
Universities remain committed to working with the province to ensure we have the resources in place to continue to foster student success, drive innovation and build the strong communities Ontarians need. We look forward to continued conversations with government on a longer-term financial sustainability package.”
– Steve Orsini, President and CEO, Council of Ontario Universities