Students want debt, jobs to be an election issue

Canadian students are “drowning” under huge debt, often not getting the jobs they need to pay back loans after they graduate, and campaigning politicians are not addressing the issue, says Bilan Arte, national chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students.

‘Highest levels of debt ever’

“In Canada today, students are facing, as a generation, the highest levels of debt ever recorded in our history,” says Arte. She notes that over the last year, about 200,000 recent graduates were unable to make a single payment on their student loan. The Canadian government supports students through loans rather than grants and internal documents indicate it will take more aggressive action to make sure students repay their debt.

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Every year the government must write off some student loans either because the debtor goes bankrupt, the debt passes the legal limit of six years for repayment, or the debtor cannot be found. Two years ago it lost $300-million in bad debts.

Government ‘more concerned about the public image’

“The federal government rather than actually addressing that issue head on… is more concerned about the public image of writing off those debts and so is running a campaign based on solutions to help their public image, not based on ones to actually rescue this generation that is drowning in debt,” says Arte.

‘We need a national strategy on youth employment’

Students need access to publicly-funded education and then access to jobs, says Arte. “We need a national strategy on youth employment in particular because we know that youth unemployment in Canada today is at about 14 per cent. It’s double the national average. And that number continues to rise with little to no action on the part of our government.

The Canadian Federation of Students has an ongoing campaign to get students to vote and to invite candidates to college and university campuses to address these issues.