Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Recently, I had an issue brought to my attention about Student Financial Assistance. After doing my own research, I have some questions for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Mr. Speaker, some students exhaust all their remissible loans or supplementary grants. They end up needing to access student loans, which need to be paid back. In speaking with students, they don't have any issue with that. However, there seems to be a roadblock in the way. It's called an assessment of a student's income. I had one student after getting reassessed only get $120 per month. This did not help the student, so the person had to reach out for help. Can the Minister advise us why we need to do an assessment of a student's income if a student loan is what they are asking for? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I do have to start by saying that we have one of the best student financial supports in the country. I know I've accessed student loans from other provinces and supplementary program for Indigenous people wasn't an option, so I do have to start with that. The other thing is that Student Financial Assistance isn't a basic right. It's a privilege, actually. The Student Financial Assistance isn't meant to provide unlimited financing to everybody in the world to access. It's actually meant to supplement income, and actually support people. It is income tested. We can't just give it to everyone who needs it. We just don't have that kind of money in our fiscal budget, so it is based on a needs assessment to determine how much the student would need.
I don't think anywhere in my comments did I say anything about how bad our system was. Our system is one of the best in Canada, so let's get that straight. I understand that system. It works well. However, it's about a student loan that they have to pay back. It's right in there. It says how much you get. You get a maximum of this, so all of a sudden the student is put on the spot. We're talking about Northerners, and when we talk about income assistance and assessments and that, we're having struggles.
To streamline the process, can the department have a monthly amount students can access in loans instead of having an assessment process done?
As stated before, at this point, it isn't just a monthly amount that anyone can access. It is based on the needs, so we do do an assessment, and I think at this point we'll be staying with that because we just don't have the money to support everybody to do anything. I think that it should be income tested. I think that, if people can afford it, then they should help supplement. Like I said, it's something that we try to supplement, but we have to make sure the money goes across as many people as possible.
I guess we should just tell our students to quit going to school, or go down south and don't come back, because that's what some of the students are saying, is that they cannot afford what they're getting with this assessment. When we do these assessments, as I said, I had a student who got $120. It's not that she has an elaborate rent, or anything like that; it's not because she's eating five-star meals. This is what her struggle was. She was looking at about $850, then it went down to $120. So this is the problem.
If the department is going to do calculations, then a minimum amount needs to be identified in the policy so that students are aware of this and don't plan on things that will not be available to them. Will the Minister direct the department to add this information to the policy or website?
Yes, we will absolutely look at our policy and add the minimum amount, because, in some cases, people might even qualify. If we don't have that in, we should have that in, so I will commit to actually having that information in our policy.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister's commitment on that. During my research, I noticed that Form F has to be filled out each time a student applies for SFA. Can they Minister explain why this has to be done? Once it's done, shouldn't it be good enough? I mean, their status is not going to change, so can the Minister explain that? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The Form F is actually a form that is signed to show either you have a status number, or if you're Metis, actually you're signed by your band or your Metis association. In fact, I don't see any reason why, once someone has been acknowledged as falling within the Form F that they have Indigenous rights based on being from the Territories, that we should be asking, so if we're doing that, I'm hoping it's a mistake. If we're doing that purposely, it should be fixed, and we will make sure that we look at that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
