The government refuses to say that it makes cuts in schools. Last week, Prime Minister François Legault even said that he found “a little esoteric” those who were talking about compressions. What really really?
The order placed by Quebec in schools to reduce their expenses by $ 570 million aroused shields in the school network. Directions, teachers and parents are common -faced against what they describe as devastating “cuts” in education.
But the government refuses to use this term, preferring to speak of “budgetary effort” or “economy measure”.
Technically, it is true that he has not reduced the budget of the Ministry of Education. The sums allocated increased by 5 % compared to last year.
To reach this figure, the government compared the budget of last March for the year 2025-26, or 23.5 billion dollars, to that of March 2024 for the year 2024-25, or $ 22.4 billion.
But in fact, he spent much more than planned in 2024-2025.
According to a report from the Ministry of Finance published last week, actual education expenses reached $ 23.4 billion last year.
It is a billion more than what had been planned.
Considering what was really spent in education in last year (23.4 billion) and the budget planned this year (23.5 billion), we would therefore obtain a budget increase much less than 5 %.
Admittedly, last year’s real expenses included non -recurring sums (for example, the student aid program affected by strikes), which harm the comparison.
By subtracting these non -recurring expenses, which would represent $ 400 million, according to Quebec, the net increase would be around 2.5 %.
Either way, this gives an idea of the height of the challenge imposed on the network.
Since 2018, budgetary targets have been “almost systematically” exceeded, underlines the cabinet of the Minister of Education, Bernard Drainville. “We can no longer accept that,” he argues.
This is precisely the message he transmitted to school service centers a few weeks ago.
To comply with their budget, they will have to find a way to reduce their expenses. Because if they continued to increase at the same rate, Quebec projected an exceeding of the expenses of $ 570 million in 2025-2026.
And he warned the school network well: in the difficult financial context, no deficit will be authorized.
Difficult choice
By asking them to reduce their expenses, Québec places school service centers before difficult choices. After paying the salary increases, there are few fats since wages represent the majority of the budget envelope.
Consequence: we mention cut in positions of specialized educators, psychologists and speech therapists, in extracurricular activities, food aid and summer courses.
“There is no other way of doing things, you have to cut in services,” says Ève-Lyne Couturier, researcher at the Institute of Research and Socioeconomic Information (IRIS), which analyzes public policies and the economy of Quebec.
The moment the announcement was made did not help either. School service centers received their budgetary rules a few days before school holidays.
“There was not midnight less, it was 2 a.m.,” illustrates Natalie Huchette, director of the Ozias-Leduc high school, in Mont-Saint-Hilaire.
Caught by surprise, members of his staff melted into tears by learning the bad news.
“Promise investments and then announce compressions, without clear strategy or dialogue with network leaders, testifies to a worrying planning deficit,” said Mr.me Huchette.
Opposite visions
So, is it esoteric to talk about cuts? It depends on who is talking and what we consider.
The government defends itself by saying that it has increased investment in education each year, including this year. And he claims that the number of teachers has increased faster (+21 %) than the number of students (+8 %) for 5 years.
“An average budget increase of more than 7 % [annuellement] Since we are in government, it is major and it is above all factual, ”underlines the cabinet of Bernard Drainville.
But on the ground, that’s not what we feel.
When schools no longer have the means of their financial commitments, we are “far from esotericism,” said Nathalie Huchette.
With the collaboration of Francis Vaille, The press
