Next week, Finance Minister Mike de Jong will table the new provincial budget and with it there will undoubtedly be some spending and revenue “adjustments” to woo voters just in time for the provincial election, which is less than three months away.
Like Scrooge McDuck, de Jong is sitting on a pile of cash, but don’t expect him to take a miserly approach to things like the Disney cartoon character.
The minister is ending the current fiscal year with a whopping budget surplus of more than $2 billion. While next year’s budget is not expected to produce as robust a set of revenues (economic growth is expected to slow a bit, and the riches reaped from a red hot housing market will subside as well) things are still looking a tad rosy.
So what changes might we expect compared with what is the government’s current three-year fiscal plan (every budget contains a three-year projection, which provides a fairly good glimpse of what to expect from year to year)?
One area to keep an eye on is the budget for the Children and Family Development Ministry. The fiscal plan suggests it will get an additional $21 million added to this year’s budget of $5.6 billion, which is a tiny increase of less than one per cent.
But given the scathing and tragic report from the Children’s Representative on the life and death of Alex Gervais, who committed suicide after years in government care, one has to wonder how much renewed pressure there is to fund more resources to enable that ministry not to repeat its failures when it came to that young man.
Among other outrages, the ministry was paying someone $8,000 a month to look after Gervais, with no evidence this person ever did anything remotely good for him (quite the opposite, in fact). This kind of contract arrangement is likely not unique.
On top of that, Global TV discovered a man with a long criminal record and no training who was hired to look after two foster homes. He cheerfully admitted on camera that there was no way in the world that he should have been handed that kind of responsibility.
The cabinet minister responsible, Stephanie Cadieux, says she will press for more funding to decrease the amount of contracting out of children in care services, and we’ll see how de Jong responds to her calls.
Another area to keep an eye on is financial assistance rates for the disabled. Last year’s budget made a mess of things on this front, as changes to the bus pass system within the assistance program earned the government a major black eye. I expect de Jong to try to make amends this year.
Health care will, as usual, get a huge funding lift in the neighbourhood of a half-billion dollars. This almost-routine funding increase now occurs without much fanfare, as everyone becomes used to the fact that health care continues to gobble up tax dollars at a voracious rate.
But I’m interested if there is new money for seniors care, particularly home care. Seniors vote in greater numbers than most, and more money may be coming their way. As the baby boomer generation ages, the problems created will become bigger and bigger and the government will eventually have to respond in a meaningful and efficient way.
Finally, the public education system is in line for a major funding lift after a high court decision will require the hiring of thousands of more teaching positions (the government has been forced to restore plenty of old contract language that will make class sizes smaller). The B.C. Teachers Federation estimates the amount needed is about $300 million, which would be the biggest increase in decades.
Given the government is in talks on this matter with the teachers’ union, de Jong may “hide” the money in the budget through the use of the contingency fund and the forecast allowance.
The bottom line, though, is the budget will deliver a surplus and likely some goodies in key areas. Whether this budget will qualify as a successful pre-election ploy, however, won’t be known until May 9, after all the votes are counted.
Keith Baldrey is chief political reporter for Global BC. [email protected]
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