Budget

Thursday December 13, 2012

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Thursday December 13, 2012

Toronto sets a good tone on police budget

A confidential report says Congratulations to Toronto’s police board, which had the gumption to nix a 2 per cent budget increase, voting instead to freeze its budget for 2013. Let’s hope that puts some pressure on the Hamilton Police Services Board to rein in the budget here.

There needs to be more than a little wiggle room in Chief Glenn De Caire’s requested 5.25 per cent increase, which is substantially higher than the 3.5 per cent hike the city expected. Meanwhile, all other departments and agencies have been told to build budgets based on no increased spending.

Members of our police board must stiffen their spines — they represent taxpayers as well as the police. While a 0 per cent increase probably isn’t in the cards, police management should at least hit the 3.5 per cent target. Taxpayers’ pockets are not bottomless. (Source: Hamilton Spectator) 

 

Thursday November 8, 2012

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Thursday November 8, 2012

U.S. budget crisis could push Canada into a recession

Budget monster lurks behind victorious Barack Obama

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty is urging U.S. politicians to get back to work quickly on resolving their budget crisis now that the election is over, warning that failure would plunge both America and Canada into recession.

The minister has voiced concern before about the so-called “fiscal cliff,” but the re-election of both Democrat President Barack Obama and a right-wing Republican House on Tuesday has led to new fears of the risk becoming reality.

“Of course we’re worried because it would mean, were the entire fiscal cliff risk to come to reality … (it) would put the U.S. economy into a recession quite quickly and the Canadian economy would follow shortly thereafter, and would have a significant effect on the global economy,” Flaherty told reporters Wednesday.

Flaherty said all his colleagues at the G20 meeting of leading economic powers last weekend in Mexico expressed concern about how U.S. policy-makers would deal with the threat.

North American markets also seemed to take the threat seriously. The Dow Jones Industrials plunged more than 300 points at one point before recovering slightly. There was also a significant, but more modest, sell-off in Toronto.

Flaherty’s comments came amid warnings that gridlock in Washington could prevent a deal to extend about $600 billion in tax cuts and spending programs beyond Dec. 31. That would represent about a four-percentage-point hit to an economy only growing at 2 per cent.

Economists have considered the issue a no-brainer, but Obama and the Democrats have insisted that taxes on the rich rise as part of the deal, something Republicans have balked at the past two years (Source: Hamilton Spectator) 

 

Thursday June 21, 2012

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Thursday June 21, 2012

Hudak got off too easy during budget crisis

As Ontario teetered on the brink of its second election in less than a year, attention was squarely focused on the public spat between Dalton McGuinty and Andrea Horwath.

But to understand why the province’s minority legislature is still very much on borrowed time, even after a summer campaign appears to have been narrowly avoided, there’s no getting past the role of the party leader who actively avoided the spotlight during the past week.

For all that Mr. McGuinty’s Liberals and Ms. Horwath’s New Democrats have at various points been guilty of bluster and false bravado and overplaying their respective hands, it’s Tim Hudak’s Progressive Conservatives who are most responsible for this legislature’s dysfunction.

Faced with a $15-billion deficit, Mr. McGuinty has decided that he needs to adopt a relatively fiscally conservative agenda. That should leave him looking to find common ground with the right-of-centre Tories. But because they’ve shown very little interest in engaging, he instead has to keep tilting left to appease the NDP. And the more that becomes obvious to the New Democrats, the more they keep pushing him away from what he wants to do, and toward impasses.

This situation began to play itself out around the tabling of Finance Minister Dwight Duncan’s budget this spring. Although the Tories now insist otherwise, it was obvious to most anyone around Queen’s Park that they had no intention of voting for it, no matter what was in it. That meant the Liberals had to table a document the NDP could conceivably be willing to support, then add various concessions – most notably a tax increase on the highest income earners – in order to get the budget motion passed in April. (Source: Globe & Mail) 

 

Monday June 18, 2012

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Monday June 18, 2012

McGuinty demands Horwath end budget impasse

Premier Dalton McGuinty has told NDP Leader Andrea Horwath the minority Liberals’ budget “must remain intact” and is urging her to help him avert a snap July 19 election.

In a letter Sunday to Horwath, McGuinty noted most Ontarians believe she had agreed to support the budget after an April 23 deal that saw a new NDP-designed tax rate for people earning more than $500,000, among other amendments.

“But to my surprise and disappointment, your party began to dismantle the very budget bill you personally agreed to see pass,” the premier wrote.

“Several key provisions were defeated on Thursday and your party has given notice that many more are at risk tomorrow and Tuesday,” he said.

“The budget bill must remain intact not only to fulfill our agreements, but more importantly, to provide the tools required to eliminate the deficit, grow the economy and create jobs,” said McGuinty.

“The good news is we have an opportunity to get the budget bill back on track. You need only ensure your caucus lives up to the agreements you have already made.”

Horwath was not immediately available to respond.

Mindful of criticism from within his own Liberal ranks that he was careless in the spring talks with the NDP — never writing anything down or getting any deal signed — McGuinty signalled this next round will be different. (Source: Toronto Star) 

 

Wednesday June 6, 2012

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Wednesday June 6, 2012

Opposition to stall budget bill

The federal NDP is warning it’s prepared to force potentially hundreds of confidence votes – taking dozens of hours – on amendments to the Conservatives’ sweeping budget bill that will keep the Tories on their toes in the House of Commons.

The NDP, Liberals and Green party leader Elizabeth May are informally teaming up to delay passage of bill C-38 and highlight to Canadians what they say is undemocratic tactics by the government to stuff so many “reckless changes” into one piece of legislation that will overhaul environmental protection and the country’s social programs.

While the government views the opposition’s tactics as procedural stunts, the proposed reforms in the 425-page budget implementation bill would have profound impacts on Canadians of all ages for decades to come. Bill C-38 proposes major reforms to Canadian environmental and fisheries laws, natural resource project approvals, employment insurance benefits, Old Age Security eligibility and food safety, among the hundreds of measures included in the legislation.

To combat the looming changes, opposition parties have been introducing dozens of substantial amendments at the Tory-dominated House of Commons finance committee, which is reviewing the bill, and a subcommittee that already examined the proposed reforms to environmental protection and resource development.

The finance committee is expected to send the legislation back to the Commons as early as today, where the Green party leader (who doesn’t have a seat on the committee) plans on introducing somewhere between 100 and 200 major amendments of her own. (Source: Saskatoon Star Phoenix)