What will be the cost of funding faith schools?

From the Sentinel's Editorial of Aug. 1; ". . . We have to accept that Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory did the right thing last week when he announced that faithbased schools would be included in the public system, complete with funding, should he be elected to lead the next government."

Leaving aside the moral issues raised by this proposal, has anyone attempted to estimate the costs of implementing such a program?

How many religions? How many schools? How many school boards? How many teachers? How much supporting staff? How many custodians? How many school buses? How many drivers? How much additional congestion on roads as students are shipped all over the place to and from these new schools?

Do we really need to create yet another bureaucracy at a time when we stagger under our present taxation load? Don't we already have a vast multiplicity of government levels, agencies, and programs that are slowly leading us to bankruptcy?

Is John Tory doing this to provide the people of Ontario some previously unseen benefit, or is he just desperate to get elected?

L.J. Salisbury,

Nobleton