This spring the Manitoba government introduced Bill 32 which is designed to increase dramatically the power of the politicians over the internal functioning of Manitoba's universities. The government is doing this by abolishing the University Grants Commission and creating a new Council on Post-Secondary Education which will be much more under the thumb of the Minister of Education and Training than its predecessor. The issue will be debated in the Manitoba legislature this fall.

This summer the CAUT Executive took vigorous exception to the draft code on research about human subjects proposed by the three federal research councils. All three councils have codes about research on human subjects. Now they are proposing a new code that would be applicable to all researchers.

Forty delegates from across Canada gathered recently at Val David, Quebec, to consider the Challenges of Concessionary Bargaining, this year's topic at the annual Collective Bargaining Conference.

Traditionally, the learned journal has served as the primary medium for scholarly communication, legitimizing and assessing scholarly discourses and intellectual labour, and facilitating the academic review and reward process. Electronic publishing may now have the potential not only to share this function, but also to revolutionize method of research and collaboration.

With the opening of universities, colleges, and schools across the country comes the annual deluge of editorial opinion and punditry on all things educational. In the last week of August, The Globe and Mail came out once again for higher tuition fees and a system of student loans with income-contingent repayment through the income tax. The unfortunate victims of similar schemes in New Zealand and Australia find themselves paying 10 per cent of their incomes (in New Zealand after the $13,000 mark), and for most of their working lives.