Kenneth Brown
of The Crossroads
It has been two weeks since the Saskatchewan government released its provincial budget, and various stakeholders have shared their views of the document.
The province’s finance minister, Donna Harpauer, announced the 2018-19 budget in Regina on April 10. The roughly $14.6 million budget has a deficit of more than $365 million down from the $685 million deficit in 2017-18.
Harpauer said the province is shifting its finances to rely less on revenue from non-renewable resources. She touted that revenues from non-renewable resources is about 10 per cent of the 2018-19 budget, and it has decreased from a high of about 32 per cent in 2008-09. The goal is to balance the budget by 2019.
“Our government has a plan and that plan is on track,” Harpauer said, referring to a three-year plan to balance the budget and reduce the province’s reliance on revenues from all non-renewable resources. “This year’s budget keeps that plan on track by controlling government spending, by making important investments in health care, education and social services for Saskatchewan people, and by keeping our economy strong.”
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Harpauer presented various facts and figures as she highlighted investments from the budget. She also mentioned different cuts to programs including the suspension of the Saskatchewan Rental Housing Supplement as of July 1.
Investments of interest to west central Saskatchewan include $924 million in highway infrastructure improvements such as the continuation of work to twin Highway 7 between Delisle and Vanscoy and planning work for passing lanes between Rosetown and the Alberta border, along with $4.9 million to support the province’s rural crime strategy, $415 million in support to municipalities and $378 million for the agriculture budget.
Tom McIntosh, a political scientist at the University of Regina, said he would agree the 2018-19 budget didn’t make a big splash like last year’s with its cuts and consumption tax increases, but there are cuts and increases “that will have some impact.”
He referred to the rental supplement being suspended and how it will have a big impact on the people who need it. McIntosh said an interesting aspect of this year’s budget is there are fewer broad tax increases such as PST being applied to more goods and services or broad cuts to institutions.
“It’s a much more targeted kind of budget in the way it distributes both the cuts and the tax increases,” he said, recognizing that the spending increases are even more targeted and he does not expect groups to be as shocked and disappointed as last year.
McIntosh said the budget is not making headlines only two weeks after it was announced, but it stayed in the headlines for several months last year. It is both quieter and more focused than last year’s budget, he said.
He noted that his office is beside the university’s economists and in discussions he has had with his colleagues, he believes the government should be able to balance the budget or get close to a balance. He said there are ways of adjustment accounts to make it appear as if the budget is balanced, but he is concerned with debt.
“We’ve also seen the overall debt in the province double in the last 10 years,” McIntosh said, referring to the province’s debt going from $10 billion to $20 billion. “They inherited a budget that was running a surplus at the height of a boom and still managed to rack up an awful lot of debt.”
Cathy Sproule, the finance critic for the official New Democratic Party opposition, agreed the 2018-19 budget was quiet compared with last year, but the opposition has concerns over a rising debt when interest rates are increasing.
She noted that it does not address the rising cost of living for an average Saskatchewan family or investments into job training and creation, but the rising debt has not been addressed and she does not “see any plan there for dealing with the long-term debt.”
Gordon Barnhart, president of the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association (SUMA), said the association has no major complaints regarding the 2018-19 budget. He said the province has also addressed the members’ biggest concern from last year.
“We are more positive than we were a year ago,” he said, recognizing that last year’s budget came as a shock to SUMA members and the association was pleased to see better consultation prior to this year. “We were pretty well aware of what was coming down the pipe.”
He said the members did not get everything they wanted from the budget, but it was still an improvement over a year ago. The cap on the grants in lieu for Crown corporations was taken away, but a five per cent levy on natural gas consumption through SaskEnergy available to municipalities is a welcome addition.
According to Barnhart, the association is supportive of the government’s efforts to balance the budget. He added that SUMA would like to get an extra point of PST from revenue sharing, but the members are pleased to receive the current single point.
Ray Orb, president of the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities (SARM), said the association has not heard a lot from members in reaction, but the budget helps with investments in various areas of importance to SARM members.
“We were pleased that it gave us some positive things in some key areas,” Orb said, referring to the ongoing commitment to revenue sharing and new funding from various sources to help support measures to tackle rural crime.
He noted that there are areas where SARM members would like to see improvement in certain areas. Orb said the budget also includes lots of infrastructure funding for municipalities to access. The association would like to see more funding to help maintain municipal grid roads, he added.
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