The 2022 Federal Budget - A Higher Education Strategy Associates Commentary

The backdrop to the budget was a spike in the cost of living – especially housing prices, the war in Ukraine, and of course the lingering COVID crisis. [...] Many had to do with the expansion of the Canada Student Financial Assistance Program, others had to do with research and innovation – such as a putative “Canada Advanced Research Projects Agency” modelled on the American DARPA program, expansion to the Canada Research Chairs Programme, and a variety of boutique science initiatives distinctly not in keeping with the spirit of the Naylor report. [...] A New Innovation and Investment Agency In what might be the best news of the budget, the Government of Canada has seemingly ditched the idea of a Canada Advanced Research Projects Agency (CARPA) and replaced it with the idea of an “Innovation and Investment Agency” (as yet unnamed), modelled on the Finnish TEKES agency (now known as Business Finland) and the Israel Innovation Authority (IIA). [...] Its aim is “ to be more responsive to the needs of workers, businesses and the economy” and to “modernize” the LMAs to reflect “the changing needs and challenges of both the current and future Canadian labour market”. [...] The budget also provides $4 million, through the Department of Canadian Heritage, to support the Muslims in Canada Archive, a collaborative initiative of the Institute of Islamic Studies at the University of Toronto.