Tuesday 12 January 2010

Here come the planned spending cuts

Flaherty's economic plan blasted - thestar.com
We all know that Conservatives don't like to spend money on social programs - healthcare, justice for the poor, education, etc. It was always their plan to cut programs in Canada. But, the problem was, we were not running a deficit. The government income was very good. So, in order to justify this, they had to badly mismanage the money for a while to then say, oh, we can't afford these things. Well, over the past couple of years, they have blown the surplus, and with the spending they did in the past year - mainly spending on infrastructure programs in Conservative ridings, they have created the largest deficit in Canadian history.
Now they are going to say they need to cut spending to social programs.
Remember the Mike Harris government in Ontario? He did the same thing - manufactured crisis, and then cut spending to social programs. The Harper government is doing the same thing. The government financial crisis is mainly of their own making. This has been predicted by many over the past year, and here it comes. In March (unless a miracle happens to throw them out sooner), the Conservatives, in their budget, will severely slash spending on core social programs. They will blame it on the recession while they only have their own mismanagement and manufactured crisis to blame.


Here's another take on this from Erin Weir at The Progressive Economics Forum. I don't agree, (I think the big cuts are coming sooner), but here it is all the same:
What Could Conservatives Cut?

More notes on this here:
Northern Reflections: Micawber's Progeny




No comments: