There it’s done. Valérie Plante was swallowed. The fear machine permanently activated byestablishment Anglophone, the Employers’ Council and the Chamber of Commerce every time Quebec wants to assert its French-speaking character (or its secular values) has ended up swallowing up the mayor. Having become a cog in the machine herself, she declared on Wednesday that Quebec’s policy towards English-speaking universities was “a direct attack on Montreal”. How does she manage to equate the fate of two universities, McGill and Concordia, to “Montreal”? This is because they “contribute directly to the economic vitality of the downtown core”. So, she said, “penalize English-speaking universities, no thanks ! “.
And how does she conclude that this contribution will decline? Because it regurgitates the figures for reductions in admission applications issued in recent days by the two universities. I asked for details of these figures and I thank the two institutions for providing them to me. Either Valérie Plante does not have them, or she chooses not to understand them. Because when we take the trouble, we see that next year, the drop in the number of registrations will be 0%. The impact on the economic contribution of students will therefore be 0%.
For what ? Because there are more applications for admission than registrations. First, among applicants, many apply to more than one university and, depending on the number of acceptances, go elsewhere if they feel like it. Then, once this sorting is done, there are not enough places to accept everyone who wants to come. McGill and Concordia only choose the best. In recent years, McGill has only accepted between 9 and 11% of those who applied for admission.
Yes, but if the number of applicants drops, will we have to make do with less brilliant students? Not according to McGill vice-rector Fabrice Labeau, who is “happy to be able to say that, despite the fact that the pool is smaller, it is a pool of very high quality candidates.”
In short, dear Valérie, the measure will have no impact on the number of foreign students in Montreal next year. None. Neither in quantity nor in quality. This is perhaps because the increase in tuition fees will also be 0. Because McGill and Concordia have chosen to pay students the equivalent of the increase imposed by Quebec in scholarships.
But why on earth are fewer of them willing to come? For McGill, 9,500 Canadians outside Quebec said they were going in 2023 compared to 7,500 in 2024 (only 1,250 will be admitted). At McGill as at Concordia, I am informed that in recent months there has been confusion over the real level of tuition fees, but also that the declarations of each may have made candidates feel that they are not were not welcome in Quebec. Put some on! The Toronto and English-Canadian press constantly said that Quebec wanted to “destroy McGill” and was hostile to English education. How could she be so hysterical? She was only relaying the apocalyptic reactions of Anglo-Quebec spokespersons. To which we must add today the declaration of swallowing.
In view of the figures, I am, on the contrary, astounded that so many thousands of young Anglo-Canadians agree to risk walking the streets of Montreal despite the warnings received.
A mayor who really wants her city to be the “French-speaking metropolis of the Americas” would applaud with both hands the measure requiring that 80% of students from outside Quebec at these universities must learn the official language of their city during their stay. This requirement will not appear until next year and it will not be until the beginning of 2025 that we will be able to see what proportion of Canadian or foreign students say no thanks to our language. But to reach a situation where we would have fewer foreign students sitting in Concordia and McGill classes in the fall of 2025, the number of candidates would have to drop by 80%. Do you see, Valérie, the margin we have left before saying that Montreal is under attack?
And here, in conclusion, is a hypothesis that would require a spinal transplant from the mayor, and from Quebec. A massive architectural gem lies empty on the mountain: the hulk of the Royal Victoria. By the looks of it, we could install a thousand family and intergenerational housing units, a daycare and a primary school, a restaurant and a small grocery store.
When a call for proposals was made a few years ago, no real estate developer raised their hand. The reconversion costs were prohibitive. The McGill expansion project was selected for part of the buildings. The Caisse de dépôt is working, for the rest, on a student residence project which could accommodate 1000 young people.
We will only know at the beginning of 2025 the Caisse’s business model, and therefore the number of hundreds of millions of dollars that will be requested from the State to raise the project. However, we know that Quebec has committed to paying 650 million to McGill for the realization of its own.
My question: if, at the time of the call for tenders, the real estate developers had been told that they could count on a subsidy of at least 650 million to build a mini-district in the old hospital, how many hands would have stood up? I did a probe into this environment. The appetite would have been gargantuan.
Since the decision was made to dedicate this invaluable corner of the mountain to McGill and, essentially, its students, the housing crisis has assumed epic proportions. The negotiation between the state and McGill is not over. The Caisse’s project is still theoretical. Given the crisis, nothing would prevent us from turning around and giving priority to families looking for housing. This would be seen, by theestablishment, not as a salutary reorientation of priorities, but as an attack on English-speaking institutions. Which camp would Valérie Plante be in?