By: Alana Roscoe
With a name like “The Road to Balance: Creating Jobs and Opportunities,” the 2014 budget might be expected to significantly contribute to the creation of jobs and opportunities for Canadians. Instead, most pundits agree, the Harper government’s latest budget doesn’t do much except offer the Conservatives a chance to position themselves favourably just before the 2015 federal election.
“Missing action,” “do-nothing,” and “plain vanilla” were descriptions offered by commentators from across the political spectrum, with Finance Minister Jim Flaherty himself admitting it may be considered “boring,” before adding that he takes this characterization “as a compliment.”
In a National Post comment piece, even Conrad Black agreed with NDP leader Thomas Mulcair and Liberal leader Justin Trudeau when they said “there is nothing for jobs,” and “the government has run out of ideas,” respectively.
Commentators from organizations such as the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) and labour groups argued the budget’s continuing austerity stifles relief from unemployment, economic growth, and critically needed investments. In fact, the CCPA’s senior economist, David Macdonald, says that the 2014 budget contains the “largest annual spending cuts to date,” with previous budgets’ cuts totalling $14 billion coming into effect.
The Fraser Institute, on the other hand, recommends caution in relying on “ambitious” revenue projections contributing to 2015-16’s anticipated $6.4 billion surplus and calls for even more spending cuts. The institute published pre-budget recommendations that included cuts to corporate welfare spending, “inefficient” Crown corporation subsidies, and government employee compensation.
So what does the budget do to create jobs and opportunities? Funds are earmarked for a smattering of reforms and programs over the next few years, but it is youth internships and vocational training in the skilled trades that generated most discussion, particularly from progressives.
Noting that dismal job prospects are particularly grim for young workers, the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC)’s Angella MacEwen wrote that the new money for education and training initiatives is “a mere drop in the bucket,” and that the internships’ focus on workers in high-demand fields is a “shocking non-solution to a very real crisis.” CUPE Senior Economist Toby Sanger further commented that internships are often abused as a way to underpay youth for their labour and that they “will do little to reduce unemployment” for this group.
Paul Wells did some investigation on “the Conservatives’ fascination with college education” for Maclean‘s, questioning the budget’s focus on vocational training and trade apprenticeships. He pointed to research that connected voter support with educational attainment, claiming,”It’s among university graduates that the Liberal advantage is greatest,” while Conservatives have more support among college graduates. Wells suggested that Harper is therefore concentrating on pleasing the latter group in anticipation of next year’s election.
While it garnered relatively little attention from most commentators, the new spending program for on-reserve education was lauded by progressives and the Assembly of First Nations (AFN). AFN National Chief Shawn A-in-chut Atleo welcomed the investment as a step “toward First Nations control of First Nations education based on our rights, jurisdiction and Treaties.” He went on to note that more improvements are needed in other areas.
The Toronto Star reported that Chief Charles Weaselhead of Alberta’s Blood Tribe more cautiously stated that the band “in no way endorse[s] the proposed legislation in its present form,” but that they remain “open to continued dialogue.”
Scientists, who have generally not fared well under the Harper regime thus far, may feel optimistic at the announcement of $1.5 billion slotted for post-secondary research. However, the Council of Canadians’ national water campaigner Emma Lui cautions that “it is not clear where that money will be funneled,” given the new fund’s explicit focus on “research areas that create long-term economic advantages for Canada,” a stipulation that received little analysis from most news outlets.
It is once again public servants who find themselves the subject of discussion by commentators of the federal budget. They are, as the CBC bluntly asserts, one of the “losers” of the 2014 budget, based on the continuing federal bureaucracy spending freeze and compensation reductions such as public servant retirees’ doubled share of health-care plan costs.
Progressive organizations and labour unions decried not only the erosion of civil servants’ benefits, but civil services themselves. For example, the Public Service Alliance of Canada stated, “After cutting a number of essential services, the government is now putting forward half measures that do nothing to restore what were once highly successful programs.”
More conservative writers, however, focused on labeling public servants as over-compensated and attacking their unions: Black commended the Harper government for the “reduced indulgence it has shown the rapacious public service unions.”
Overall, most budget 2014 analyses with any depth found something to criticize, with favourable comments (unsurprisingly) increasing as contributors’ political ideology veered right. However, no matter what political ideology they adhered to, most pundits’ cynicism was clear.
By positioning themselves to announce a sizable surplus and significant tax cuts next year, the Conservatives are aiming for a budget in 2015 that will please people enough to cause collective amnesia of everything they’ve done to displease those same people over the past nine years.
Political opportunism – and not the best interests of Canadians – is the real motivation behind the 2014 budget. From the National Post’s Andrew Coyne (“…whether it does the right thing or the wrong thing it is always and everywhere because it serves the government’s political interests.”) to the CCPA’s Macdonald (“This budget, while it is being pitched as one of economic management, is really about electoral management.”), the Conservatives aren’t fooling anyone.
This article first appeared in The Leveller Vol. 6, No. 5 (Feb/Mar 2014).
