Quebec adds $540M to education budget after criticism over spending restrictions

CBC News

· Posted: Jul 16, 2025 12:06 PM EDT | Last Updated: 4 minutes ago

The Quebec authorities is adding hundreds of millions of dollars to the acquisition fund for the upcoming schoolhouse twelvemonth aft coming under occurrence for announcing cuts that would person amounted to $570 cardinal little successful funding.

The sum of wealth announced connected Wednesday amounts to $540 million. 

When announcing the budgetary restrictions past month, Education Minister Bernard Drainville said it was up to schoolhouse work centres and schoolhouse boards to respect the budgets they were given.

Since then, teachers, parents, unions, schoolhouse unit and schoolhouse boards person heavily criticized those budgetary restrictions, arguing that pupil occurrence and services would beryllium affected.

Across the province, determination were protests and quality conferences to gully attraction to their concerns.

A petition launched connected the National Assembly website to reason these fund cuts, sponsored by Parti Québécois (PQ) MNA Pascal Bérubé, has already gathered implicit 157,000 signatures.

In a connection connected Wednesday, Drainville said the authorities had listened to people's concerns and was taking enactment for students.

But the backing comes with conditions.

"All the wealth invested indispensable beryllium utilized for nonstop pupil services, not for thing else. Let's beryllium clear: this is not an unfastened bar," read Drainville's statement.

"Of the $540 cardinal announced today, $425 cardinal volition beryllium paid into a dedicated envelope. To qualify, each [service centre] volition person to show that it has made efforts to trim its administrative expenses."

He hopes that a spending reappraisal already underway volition proceed and pb to savings.