For a third year in a row, the BC government is touting a balanced or surplus budget.
And, as expected, it is a give-and-take in all directions.
Those who are fiscally conservative-minded applaud the government’s spending restraint while others concerned about maintaining the province’s social safety net are alarmed by the government’s tightfistedness.
Medical Service Plan (MSP) premiums are going up again for the sixth time in five years and a higher tax bracket for those making $150,000 per year or more is being eliminated. Parents who receive disability or income assistance will no longer have their payments clawed back if they receive child support.
Although the amount of money allocated in the $46-billion budget has risen for both health and education, both sectors will likely continue to feel considerable strain this year.
Funding increases for health care, the government’s largest financial responsibility, will barely cover the cost of inflation and critics charge that the province will continue to see an increase in hallway medicine. And while the government said it has earmarked more money for public education, those funds will be used to pay for the teachers’ collective agreement. School districts have been told to look at additional cost saving measures as they will have less money this year to keep school doors open. School District 47 will not only have to pay the cost of the province’s MSP four per cent increase, it also will not be receiving any additional funding to implement MyEducationBC, the province’s new student information database system. BC Teachers’ Federation says the provincial government has reneged on its promise to fund the teachers’ contract and not download the cost on the already financially lean school districts.
Finance minister Mike de Jong is making paying down the province’s debt, which will reach $70 billion by 2017, a priority with the predicted surplus. Not all debt is equal and the government should not make the mistake of placing debt reduction ahead of enhancing the province’s economy through spending on infrastructure projects.
For many people on the Sunshine Coast, a faint hope was dashed when the government announced it would not invest some of its surplus in helping to solve the ongoing challenge of BC Ferries. The ferry system is an economic driver of coastal communities as well as the province.
