Will they, won’t they?

September 21, 2009 Posted by markcoffin.

Budget day is Thursday in Nova Scotia. Four and a half months ago the previous Tory Government fell on their budget – creating a whirlwind of election excitement. Meanwhile, nobody noticed the roughly $ 1.5 Million discrepency between the funding allocated to universities and the funding that was promised. Nobody, except for ANSSA. The Memorandum of Understading between the Universities and the province (the holy grail of NS Student Leaders) had been renegotiated before the budget was released. At the time, we issued this press release.

$1.5 Million isn’t a huge sum of money considering the province is scheduled to spend about $318.7 Million in operating grants to universities this fall. But it is when you consider that almost $1 Million of that cut would come from Dalhousie. So now you might understand why the Dal Administration was so quick to wipe out credit card payment an an option to pay tuition to save the university almost … … … One … Million … Dollars (cue Mr. Bigglesworth).

So, when the new budget (which is sounding like it will look alot like the old PC budget) is released to a lockup of provincial stakeholders on Thursday, ANSSA representatives will be crunching numbers again to see how the funding promised compares to the funding recieved.