Paul Rodgers
The 2018 Federal Budget was tabled on Tuesday, February 27 and on Wednesday, Kootenay-Columbia MP Wayne Stetski provided his reaction in a teleconference with the media.
In his February 27 media release, Stetski said that his first impression of the budget plan was that it “does little to address the growing inequality in our country,” despite Finance Minister Bill Morneau speaking about helping the middle class.
“People in our region are rightfully asking, ‘if the economy is doing so well, why am I not feeling those benefits?’” Stetski said in his release.
In his release he also expressed concern about the continuing trend of deficit spending. Morneau told a news conference on Tuesday, “We’ve shown to Canadians that making investments in them, making investments to allow more Canadians to be working, has exactly the positive impact that we want it to have.”
The 367-page budget document shows a $18.1 billion deficit including a $3 billion adjustment for risk, and bringing the current deficit to $651 billion, according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
Stetski began the call by addressing what he felt are the key elements missing from the 2018 budget that are important to the NDP and to the constituents in this riding. His concerns included a lack of money to support day care, which he said is a major way to support families and women, the lack of support to agriculture, post-secondary education and housing.
Stetski said that there is no new money to address the affordable housing crisis in the riding. The government plans to increase the amount of loans provided through the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) from $2.5 billion to $3.75 bullion over the next three years, to support modest and middle-income households in an expensive market.
Stetski feels more needs to be done in the short term, rather than this long-term proposal. He said that in the forums he held across the Kootenays, two out of three communities said adorable housing was a limitation to expanding businesses, because there was nowhere for new workers to live.
“I guess that’s where that Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation might come in handy for building those kind of units but it needs to happen now, not start in 2019 and go on for another eight years after that, it would be good to deal with it absolutely.”
Pharmacare was another of his concerns. The government announced that Pharmacare is an important part of the budget and Stetski said that could present a positive step, but only if something comes from it. The government is putting together a committee that will travel Canada to hear about people’s interests and concern on the subject.
“That committee is about to release that report and yet there’s no money in the budget at all for Pharmacare and no money actually showing to support this committee that’s going to go across Canada to talk about Pharmacare.”
Stetski referenced the Liberals’ playbook from 1997 that says that Pharmacare was one of their priorities.
“Now fast forward 21 years, it’s not in place, but now they’re starting the consultation process over again. So very hopeful that that does lead to universal Pharmacare here in Canada, it’s been on the NDP’s list of course for quite a while,” he said.
Similarly, Stetski highlighted that though there is presently a focus on pay equity, another prerogative of the NDP’s for decades, there is no money showing in the budget for it. He explained the concept as the government leading by example by ensuring companies or agencies they regulate actually move towards pay equity.
“Right now, depending on where you are in Canada, women only make anywhere between 70 cents and 90 cents on the dollar for every dollar that a male makes and that needs to be fixed for sure long term,” he said. “So again we’re hopeful that that actually turns into a positive future.”
He then discussed what he considered to be some of the strengths of the budget. Stetski said that Canada Child Benefits now being indexed to inflation is good news, because it should see the benefit go up at least a few dollars a year.
Another point was the Canada Summer Jobs program, something Stetski has sent out media releases about to encourage businesses and students to apply for, that will see an additional $448.5 million over the next five years. The fund subsidizes wages for small businesses for community organizations to provide students with meaningful summer employment, and Stetski hopes that with the added money will mean increased jobs for students.
He was also happy to see money allocated to forestry and the Border Services Agency with $162 million allocated to support projects including the reforestation of public forests, which will increase carbon absorption and $85.5 million to Border Services to continue existing operations.
Another thing close to both Stetski and the riding at large is the good news announced for parks and conservation in general. To support Canada’s biodiversity and protect species at risk the government proposes to invest $1.3 billion over five years including $500 million to create a new $1 billion nature fund.
Similar to the fund run for the last years by Nature Conservancy Canada, this new fund will provide matching money if people want to put forward land for conservation. There will also be more money going towards protecting species at risk, towards funding new national wildlife areas, migratory bird sanctuaries and managing protected areas such as national parks, of which this riding has four.
“So some good news for conservation,” Stetski said. “I’m particularly interested of course, that’s my critic area is national parks and conservation so very pleased to see the government delivered on what we had been lobbying for.”
Stetski addressed the riding’s concern about broadband internet, and he was hoping to see more money for broadband, and while it’s not showing in the global budget, it does propose $100 million funding over five years for the Strategic Innovation Fund, with a focus on supporting projects that relate to low-earth-orbit satellites. Because our riding currently focuses on laying fibre on the ground, or across Kootenay Lake, it’s not clear whether this will benefit the riding at all.
He also said he was happy to see money going towards First Nations communities to get them off boil water advisories and put waste water infrastructure in place and money for First Nations children.
Another thing he addressed that impacts people in the riding is the “fiasco” pertaining to the Phoenix pay system, that has underpaid, overpaid or not paid thousands of federal public servants across Canada. The new budget calls for $431 million to address these problems and they will look at eventually doing away with it completely.