Liberals have education vision, few specifics
Rana Bokhari sure doesn't think much of the state of public education in Manitoba.
"We failed at math, we failed at science, we failed at reading," the recently elected leader of the Manitoba Liberals said when we sat down to discuss her party's education policy. "Clearly, it's not a money issue -- we're missing something."
Our talk wandered all over the map, with few details or specifics, so I can't give you a shopping list of how the Liberals stand on all the things the New Democrats have done in the past 15 years -- the moratorium on closing schools, greater emphasis on nutrition and physical education, Bill 13 for special needs, Bill 18 for anti-homophobia protection, continuing the reliance on property taxes, continuing to base inequitable education on the assessed values of properties in an area, capping tuition increases, literally dozens of policies that delight and infuriate disparate groups and individuals.
"I'm not going to sit here and bash the NDP... and the Tories," said Bokhari, who bemoaned the lack of research-staff funding that plagues parties with just one MLA -- former leader Jon Gerrard. Nor, she said, is she about to lay out her platform this far ahead of an election.
"We can't make policy just for the election cycle," said Bokhari, adding it's vital the province train young people and keep them here.
"We need to keep our young people in this province -- when they go, our economic base goes," she said. "It's going to slam us in the face."
Bokhari said she won't promise the Liberals would remove property taxes from funding education until they know the numbers: "I won't be irresponsible. If the province is going to fund it, where is the province going to get the money?"
I pointed out the numbers are there, down to the penny, in the FRAME (Financial Reporting and Accounting in Manitoba Education) annual report, all $2.1 billion or so of it. I told Bokhari that whenever anyone talks about the province's funding 100 per cent of public education, I always ask, 100 per cent of what? Who determines in that situation how much each school division has to spend, since there is such a wide -- sometimes enormous -- difference in per-student spending, based largely on local assessment bases and the willingness to tax.
Bokhari is a huge supporter of early-childhood education and would license daycare centres more quickly. But would she fund them, and if so, to what degree? She wasn't ready to address that yet.
The Canadian Federation of Students has told her what Bokhari calls a tuition freeze is "not a freeze at all," she said.
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Liberals have education vision, few specifics