The federal and provincial governments have been underfunding universities for decades. Recently, universities were able to start recruiting foreign students to make up for the shortfall, but it looks like that money tap will be turned down. It doesn't look like there's a plan to make up for it.
At the same time, the feds want to
recruit more than 1,000 top international researchers to Canada, with the budget injecting up to $1.7-billion into a suite of recruitment measures.
That'll be tough if universities see their income crater.
The problem was created by Provinces cutting funds to universities and education in general... Universities made up the shortfall by using International Students which was a Federally enabled escape valve.
This has been the game of mostly conservative Provincial Premiers; cut everything and blame it on the Feds.
I do feel for some of the legit universities but from what I see, the vast majority of the money milked from International Students did not go to improve the level of education (barely has moved in the last few years) and mostly went to "Mall universities" which are borderline a scam, all stamped and approved by the Provincial gov.