Advanced Education Minister Naomi Yamamoto has been raked over the coals in recent days as post-secondary students across B.C. joined a national protest, calling for lower tuition rates, the elimination of interest rates on student loans and the expansion of non-repayable grants.

But her ministry is apparently having a hard time backing up some of her comments with actual facts and figures.

On Tuesday, Yamamoto told the Times Colonist she’d reviewed what it would cost the provincial government to lower or eliminate student loan interest rates, and it wasn’t worth the price tag. The government currently charges prime plus 2.5 per cent. B.C.’s biggest universities, and its students, have been calling for lower rates for years.

“We’ve looked at it and looked at how much it would cost,” she said. “I’m not convinced that lowering the interest rate of student loans is going to increase access to post-secondary education.”

So what would it cost the government to lower interest rates, or eliminate them entirely, on student loans?

We asked the Ministry of Advanced Education on Tuesday for the figures.  At the time of this posting, Friday afternoon, we still don’t have a response. There’s no indication when an answer may be coming. It’s not unreasonable, after four days without a response, to wonder whether such numbers even exist. Just what calculations was the minister referring to?

This is not Yamamoto’s first misstep. In the same interview, she told the TC that students should “have some skin in the game” in the form of student loans they have to repay, to encourage them to actually finish their education. Students blasted her for the statement, calling it insulting. Last March, only two days into the job as minister, she was forced to issue a public apology after her ministry put out a press release suggesting students could cover tuition increases by spending less on coffee.

If Yamamoto’s ministry coughs up some figures to back up her previous comments, we’ll make sure to post them here.