The Toronto and York Region Labour Council represents over 180,000 working women and men in the City of Toronto and the communities of York Region. Our members work in every sector of the economy in a wide array of occupations. Union members deliver clean water and healthy food, build our houses and cars, care for the sick, report the news and welcome tourists. From skilled production industries to running our transit to staffing the CN tower, we make this city work. From the time when the native peoples called this a "gathering place", Toronto has been a city proudly built by immigrants and children of immigrants.

York Region is one of the fastest growing regions in the country, showing 720,000 in the 2001 census date. Many of our members have moved here, bringing a significant increase in school age children. While new schools are being built across the region, the shortfalls in staffing and supplies are cause for concern.

These hearings are taking place in a time of incredible turmoil in our province's education system. The largest school board in the country - the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) has been placed under government supervision. The boards in two of Ontario's other largest cities - Ottawa and Hamilton, have also been taken over. Nearly half a million students are now under the direct control of the Premier of Ontario and his minister of education. The reason for this drastic action is that each of these three boards has refused to cut millions of dollars from their budgets.

In Toronto alone, the cuts demanded by Queen's Park total $90 million. The report by Investigator Al Rosen shows what must be cut to meet provincial funding limits - swimming pools, educational assistants, music instructors, computers, lunchroom supervisors, outdoor education centres, hundreds of classrooms closed....

The funding formula doesn't work. Everyone admits that. Many school boards have drained reserves or other budget lines just to pay the real salary costs for teachers required to meet the legislated pupil-teacher ratio. The salary benchmarks for teachers and support staff established in the funding formula in 1997 were below actual salary costs in half of Ontario's school boards. Five years later, salary costs are higher and the funding gap is wider.

Yet the Eves government insists that Toronto trustees should strip vital programs out of our schools to make up for inadequate funding. And when Trustees failed to comply with this senseless dictate, Eves put the TDSB under supervision. The salary Paul Christie will make to act as overseer is more than all 22 elected trustees together will earn this year. The fundamental contempt for democracy which was the earmark of the Harris government continues, sadly, under the new premier.

The underfunding is not a dispute about "deficits". It is part of the crisis created by the downloading of costs onto our cities and school boards by the Harris/Eves administration. Millions of tax dollars have been siphoned out of this city. It is estimated that 35% of all education property tax does not come back to us. Instead, it is taken away and replaced by a flawed funding formula. Since they came to power, the Conservatives have slashed education funding by some $2,000 per Toronto student.

The programs at risk are not frills. They are integral to a system of education that has allowed people in the most multicultural city in the world to live in relative harmony. Many are a result of struggles that took place in the 1970's to ensure that immigrant children would have the resources they needed to succeed in school - and in society.

ESL, heritage language, and other programs allowed those children to appreciate and respect their own family background, and in doing so respect others as well. Innovative partnerships were created between the School Boards and the municipality to providing recreation and swimming opportunities for youth so they would have alternatives to the culture of the street.

In reality, the public education system has been a foundation on which our city has prospered. When we go to the international stage, seeking either business investment or world events like the 2008 Olympic Games, we boast about people from 170 different countries speaking 100 different languages and living together in peace. That is not a simple accomplishment. It required a whole mosaic of programs, services, and policies to achieve a balance that is unique in the world. It is the basis of our future.

The recent City Summit that gathered leaders from business, labour, professions, finance, and community placed education as a key element in the long-term economic health of this city. The co-chairs of this Summit - David Crombie, Alyse Allen of the Board of Trade, United Way President Francis Lankin, and John Tory of Rogers Communication, are known across this province. The Premier can hardly dismiss their opinions in the same way he has those of the school trustees elected by tens of thousands of voters. Yet they have come to the same conclusion. Providing our students what they need to succeed is one of the best investments we can make in the 21st century.

There have been many changes in Toronto in past years. The city accepts over 100,000 newcomers every year - many of whom do not have English as a first language. The gap between rich and poor is widening. We experience a 23% level of child poverty. The standard of living of the majority has dropped significantly. According to the study by the United Way of Greater Toronto "A decade in decline", the median income of a two adult family in this city fell by fourteen percent - $7,700 - in the 1990's. For single parent families, the loss was greater. The median income fell seventeen percent.

We can point to a number of key factors that caused this, including some direct policies of the Common Sense Revolution. But more importantly, it tells why community access to school facilities, including swimming pools, is viewed so passionately. We are a big city, with inner city realities. Those inner city realities exist not just downtown, but in a series of neighbourhoods from Rexdale to Flemington to the Kingston Rd. motel strip. Anyone who thinks that the "classroom" should stop at four walls inside a school building is dooming many of these kids to failure.

The task of your panel is to find ways to improve equity, fairness, certainty and stability for students and school. For this city, it is quite clear that the imposition of provincial policies including the funding formula have been at the root cause of five years of terrible instability in our schools. Labour disputes, school closures, evictions of community programs, staff demoralization, the crisis around the swimming pools... the list gets longer with each passing week.

You have also been instructed to "take into account the fiscal situation of the province". This parameter is quite interesting. Does that mean the recommendations must fit within the prescribed budget set by the Ministry of Finance and the Premier? We would suggest that the $2.2 billion to be squandered on corporate tax cuts would be better spent on our schools. Or is the mantra of downloading to continue, with some fixed formula that will be outdated by time the second budget must be met.

It is not just money that is at issue here. It is a matter of priorities, and the choices made that indicate those priorities. A tax credit for private, unregulated schools that will draw hundreds of millions out of the public purse is a choice made over investment in quality public education. A decision to deregulate electricity prices is a choice that will impact on utility costs of schools and other public institutions across the province. And depriving school boards of funds to keep up with inflation creates instability and labour disputes when education workers are faced with demands for concessions and loss of real income.

Ontario's capital city has been shortchanged in nearly every aspect of its relationship with Queen's Park. Our transit has been strangled, social housing cancelled, revenue streams reduced, and program costs dumped onto the property tax base. Federal funds intended for daycare have been pilfered. The lack of understanding of what makes a city work is truly shocking. The arrogance of Investigator Rosen's comments suggest that we are in a situation where decisions are made by those described in the old adage "they know the price of everything and the value of nothing".

This commission can either follow in the short-sighted thinking that has brought us to this crisis, or you can make recommendations that will restore and repair our education system. If you believe as we do, that every one of us has a role and responsibility in the ongoing process of city building and enriching our society, then the priority is to establish what it is that our students need to succeed.

The Toronto District School Board undertook and extensive process of consultation and analysis to create the "Need to Succeed Budget". It looks at every aspect of our system and the resources required to deliver a quality, well-rounded and accessible education. It is quite achievable if your priority is to quality public education. That is our goal, and our key recommendation to you is that the financial resources be committed to meet the "Need to Succeed Budget".

There is a concern with suggestion that school boards make up for shortfalls from Queen's Park funding by having them levy further property taxes. For Toronto taxpayers who are already providing Queen's Park with abundant largesse, being taxed again does not make sense. Instead, a percentage of what is currently levied could be rebated directly to each Board for its use on those items which are community priorities. Other revenue streams such as development charges could be considered.

There is one other key financial approach that you should embrace. The experience of the Better Building Partnership in Toronto has shown that investment in energy conservation measures pays huge dividends. Reduced utility costs, water savings, and decrease in CO2 emissions are benefits that are obvious to all. Similarly, initiatives around waste reduction and diversion are vitally important. Incentives should be created in any funding model for these kinds of programs. Allowances made for high environmental standards in capital investment, building maintenance and daily operations will pay back many times in the future.

Our Council is on record as being in favour of the full restoration of democratic rights of local school boards. That includes the power to raise revenues and elect trustees who receive adequate remuneration for the vital role they have to play in our society. We are also very clear that the integrity of the entire system education must be protected, and respect given to every employee who helps deliver this vital public service.

If we are to have equity, fairness, certainty and stability in our schools, then the unjust policies of the provincial government will have to be reversed.