Finance Minister Bill Morneau delivered the 2018 federal budget on February 27, 2018.
The full budget is available at: http://budget.gc.ca/2018/docs/plan/toc-tdm-en.html

Budget highlights of specific interest to the college sector:

• $140 million over five years for the College and Community Innovation Program. This program currently supports applied research projects at Humber.

• Apprenticeship Incentive Grant for Women: Almost $20 million over five years for this new grant aimed at women in male-dominated Red Seal trades. Apprentices would receive $3,000 for each of their first two years of training (up to $6,000). This, in combination with the existing Apprenticeship Completion Grant valued at $2,000, will result in a combined $8,000 in support over the course of their training for a female apprentice training to become a welder, machinist pipe fitter or any other skilled trade that is male-dominated. Nearly 90 per cent of Red Seal trades would be eligible for the Grant.

• New Pre-Apprenticeship Program: This program will encourage underrepresented groups—including but not limited to women, Indigenous Peoples, newcomers and persons with disabilities–to explore careers in the skilled trades. The government will provide $46 million over five years for the program.

• Women in Construction Fund: An investment of $10 million over three years from Employment and Social Development Canada’s existing resources will support this new program. It will build on existing models that have proven to be effective in attracting women to the trades. These models provide supports such as mentoring, coaching and tailored supports that help women to progress through their training and find and retain jobs in the trades.

• Indigenous Skills and Employment Training Program: $447-million for a new program to help close the employment and pay gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people by focusing on training for higher-quality, better-paying jobs. It will replace the Indigenous Skills and Employment Training Program.

• Horizontal Skills Review: From basic literacy and numeracy support to specific skilled trades training to financial supports and work experiences offered to students, the government provides a wide range of skills programming to meet a variety of needs. To maximize the effectiveness of these programs, particularly in the way that they offer support to workers wishing to take advantage of emerging opportunities, the government will undertake a horizontal review of skills programming over the next year. This, in conjunction with the Future Skills organization (confirmed to launch this spring), will provide Canada’s labour force with the information and training needed to meet future challenges and opportunities head on.

• Up to $5.5 million over five years for Status of Women Canada to work with stakeholders, including provinces and territories, towards developing a harmonized national framework to ensure consistent, comprehensive and sustainable approaches in addressing gender-based violence at post-secondary institutions across the country. Starting in 2019, for those universities and college campuses that are not implementing best practices addressing sexual assaults on campus, the Government of Canada will consider withdrawing federal funding.

• $920 million over six years to renew the funding for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario. As part of the broader review of innovation programs, over the next year, the Government will explore ways to simplify the existing suite of 22 programs offered by the regional development agencies. It is proposed that the agencies will place greater emphasis in helping firms scale up, develop new markets and expand, as well as assist with the adoption of new technologies and processes. The agencies could also become the main platform to support regional innovation ecosystems.

• Reduction to the number of business innovation funding programs but an increase in overall funding, including $700-million in new funding for the Industrial Research Assistance Program over the next five years. Also, increased funding for female entrepreneurs and $572.5-million to give researchers "open and equitable access" to advanced computing and big data resources.