Canada’s COVID bill will be stiff
By Letter to the Editor on April 17, 2021.
When the bottom line is flush and the public coffers are overflowing with milk and honey, budgets can be a relatively pleasant experience for governments which can parcel out largesse in a celebration of democratic pragmatism to nearly every department and ministry that is holding their hand out.
Governments in Canada are rarely good at saving, and the temptation of an eye-popping surplus usually ensures those dollars will be funneled into program spending or catching the eye of the prospective voter rather than locked down in a “rainy day fund.”
Governments will roll out all kinds of statistics and leveraged estimates and debt-to-GDP ratios to justify why it’s “smart” to spend those dollars today, rather than put them aside for the future. It is not often when a premier or prime minister announces a surplus is going to be used for savings or debt reduction instead of some flashy new program or infrastructure investment. Say what you will about the long-term consequences of that line of thinking, but an emphasis on fiscal prudence isn’t always a guarantee of votes at the ballot box.
Not that an abundant and overflowing surplus is expected to materialize next week when the Trudeau Liberals table the federal budget. Quite the opposite, actually.
While the national economy nosedived into lockdown last spring, those anticipating a tight-fisted approach to the pandemic’s financial downpour would be rudely awakened from that daydream. Huge financial support programs, grants, and other supports were rolled out within days as Canadians worried about their health, their future, and most especially their bottom lines.
While much of the support rolled out by the Liberals was no doubt necessary to keep the wolf from the door for hundreds of thousands of cash-strapped and out-of-work citizens, at some point the chickens come home to roost. And judging by the hundreds of billions that have been spent so far, once Canadians get a good look at the bill it won’t just be our feathered friends that might be laying an egg.
Not to mention the fact that Monday’s federal budget will be the first time Canadians have seen a full accounting of the government’s spending during the pandemic, in fact the first budget we’ve seen since 2019.
Opposition parties have long cried foul over that little omission, and it appears to be hard to defend on the part of the Liberals. If the fiscal floodgates were thrown open in the wake of COVID-19, what other purpose is served by keeping that information from the Canadian public than obfuscating what might not be an altogether rosy picture about the state of government finances?
Speculation continues to mount about whether Monday’s budget will be a prelude to an election call. With the O’Toole Conservatives currently sagging in the polls the Liberals may feel the time is right to secure another coveted majority from the Canadian electorate. If that is indeed Trudeau’s intention – no matter what the state of the nation’s books next week – don’t expect to see an exposition of fiscal parsimony in the budget if vote-grabbing is the intention of the day.
-1
Trudope:”And the budget will balance itself.”
Isn’t it amazing how Canadians are fed up with these phoney conservatives , Reformers, and trust a guy like Trudeau more than they do them, yet we still have guys like Johnny and Dennis going along believing every lie they feed them and somehow that makes them a lot smarter than the rest of us. All they care about is the name conservative. The true conservatives in my world aren’t that stupid.
They don’t care that their Liberal , turned Reformer friend Jason Kenney has tried to drive out our rural doctors, close our provincial parks and privatize others. Tried to privatize our health care system, tried to pollute our water and wants to kick out the RCMP so he can dump all the costs onto the backs of taxpayers.
I had lunch with a retired RCMP friend and eight other friends last Wednesday and they all agreed with me that’s what he is trying to do but Johnny and Dennis don’t care what it will do to our property taxes, or our fellow seniors that might be hurt by it.
They don’t care that oil executives want the carbon tax to help them sell their oil and they don’t care that it would put some money into the pockets of some seniors who could use it. They don’t care Kenney’s popularity has tanked and his own MLAs have shown that they have respect for his leadership.They still do.
In other words Johnny and Dennis are losers and you can’t change them they are what they are But are good for a good laugh as my friends point out and that’s all that matters, isn’t it?
FC said, “We still have guys like Johnny and Dennis going along believing every lie the UCP feeds them and somehow that makes them a lot smarter than the rest of us. In other words Johnny and Dennis are losers”
You consistently go out of your way in almost every post to viciously insult other people.
In the past you have also accused me of being a “UCP loser”, yet since my first day of joining this forum, I’ve claimed my disdain for ALL political parties and our political system as a whole….so has Dennis.
You need to understand that just because someone agrees on a party policy, does not necessarily mean that they support everything that party does. Nor does it mean they support that party as a whole. On the flipside, just because someone disagrees on a party policy, does not necessarily mean that they support the opposing party.
This has been explained to you in the past by myself and Dennis, yet you still continue with your erroneous accusations.
What planet were you living on when Klein was destroying our health care system that almost killed my father after he had donated $30,000. to their party and his father Phil and daughter Angie were trying to help us vote him out of office, while these ignorant Albertans wouldn’t let us. .
Where were you when the nurses were bawling their eyes out in my office when Klein destroyed their careers and a doctor, with tears streaming down his face, told me he had six patients who desperately needed to be in a hospital and he couldn’t even get one of them in because of what Klein had done. I knew three guys who died in the back of ambulances waiting outside hospitals because of what Klein had done. Their families were all told that due to the shortage of beds, doctors, and nurses Klein had created they weren’t able to save them.
I helped 9 doctors and at least two dozen nurses relocate out of this province and not one of them wanted to go.
All the while this was happening lawyers, accountants, oilmen, bankers and former MLAs from the Lougheed era were telling us that none of this would have been necessary if these phony conservatives had carried on collecting royalties and taxes at the Lougheed levels and it’s been proven time and time again that they were right. Lougheed’s energy minister was a brother in-law of one of my uncles and I got to know several of the MLAs, they were all furious with Klein.
Maybe you should look at what economist Treavor Tombe from the U of C recently pointed out? Albertans were screwed out of $575 billion in oil royalties, yet oilmen tell me it’s a lot more than that because it doesn’t include Natural Gas royalties they gave away.
When six of us , in 2003, formed Sun (Seniors United Now) to try to get our fellow seniors to help us get rid of Klein we got called Liars, Traitor ,Lefties, Left Wing Nuts and Close Liberals by these ignorant seniors who thought Klein was their hero and now think Kenney is one.
Don’t forget all the sarcastic comments Johnny and Dennis hurled at a lot of us for providing the true facts. Dennis has only just recently realized that we were right and he wasn’t. Johnny still hasn’t.
As a lawyer friend would say there is nothing dumber than a senior pretending he is a conservative, and bashing Liberals while he is sporting one. Both Klein and Kenney were well known Liberal who became Reformers.
What upsets all the true conservatives in our world is the fact that these phony conservatives have destroyed our children’s future and they have. We know that Notley with her plan to gradually increase taxes and royalties back up to the Lougheed levels would have gotten us out of this mess.
To add to what I have said there is nothing intelligent about slashing taxes by $9.4 billion for the rich and promising to increase our children’s University Fees by 40% and cut 11,000 health care jobs, we lost 14,783 under Klein , cut teaching jobs and kick out the RCMP so they can dump the costs onto the backs of taxpayers, like Klein did with our power industry , yet we continue to hear some of our fellow seniors urging him to get on with it.
Too dumb to realize what it will cost them. Ignoring what the orphan wells mess is going to cost our children isn’t very smart either but they are. They don’t care.
WOW.
I won’t even begin to describe as to how you completely missed the very simple point of my post.