The Politics of Choice

Abstract

AS A FORMER westerner now living in central Canada, I like to believe that I am somewhat more sensitive than my neighbors to the offensively Ontario-centric nature of our national universe. It should follow, then, that these columns would muse regularly about the arts in Alberta, the basics in British Columbia, and new math in Newfoundland. Alas, I discern a different pattern. For once again I am reporting on Ontario developments, diverted from my good intentions by the education policies of a government so extreme that it tirelessly provides me with raw material for my columns. So even as I beg the indulgence of readers more interested in other parts of the country, let me remind them that somewhere nearby lurks a band of aspiring politicians cheering, Attaboy, Mike! You never know when you are just one election away from the Common Sense Revolution. This chapter in Ontario's sad education saga began in 1999, when the United Nations concluded that it was discriminatory for Ontario to fully fund Catholic schools but not to fund schools controlled by other religions. Several Jewish and Christian groups that had initiated the complaint were rewarded when the UN agreed that the province should fund either all religious schools or none of them. The UN's finding was embarrassing, but hardly surprising. Public funding for separate schools - Protestant in Quebec, Catholic elsewhere - was built into the quid pro quo of Confederation. Ironically, in 1997 Quebec renounced its denominational in favor of a linguistically based system. In Ontario, however, the full funding of parallel systems is taken as an immutable feature of provincial affairs. When the UN's report became public, it appeared that the Ontario government was quite prepared to maintain the status quo. Certainly, it was not about to de-fund Catholic schools, a move tantamount to political suicide in a province where 30% of all students attend them. Nor did the government appear to have an appetite for the alternative. Minister of Education Janet Ecker stated that extending funding to religious private schools would result in fragmentation of the education system in a province that is home to 730 private schools, half of them linked to a church, synagogue, or mosque. Extending full public funding to support their enrollment of 103,000 students would cost taxpayers between $500 and $700 million each year. In fact, there was no hint from Premier Mike Harris that any new policy was afoot, which explains why both the opposition parties and the public were stunned when the Tory government buried its new plan deep in the tedium of a summer budget bill. Not only was the government going to underwrite approximately half the cost for every student to attend a private religious school, but it also promised to extend the same benefit to all private schools, including those whose deity is Mammon. In a North American first, public funding would be paid directly to parents through a tax credit worth $3,500 per year per child by 2006. Parents with two eligible children could look forward to a $7,000 hike in their annual after-tax income. As might be expected, the government's announcement set off another round in Ontario's education wars. Under pressure from the Ontario School Boards Association and opposition parties, a legislative committee agreed to hold hearings on the new bill, albeit in only six locations on six days. The media began to examine the government's motives for such a quick and public reversal of its previous stand on private school funding. Certainly, it was out of character for the Tories to put much stock in what international bodies thought of the party's legislative agenda. As it turned out, a lobby somewhat closer to home, both geographically and ideologically, had much more influence. The Ontario Alliance of Christian Schools had spent more than $175,000 lobbying for tax-credit legislation, a fact that might have escaped attention had the Alliance not boasted of its success in a letter to its members appealing for another $500,000 to fund a media blitz to ensure the bill's passage. …