Winnipeg Free Press Thu Apr 5 2007

NO matter how you cut it, the 2007 provincial budget delivered yesterday at the Manitoba legislature is a triumph of thinking “inside the box.” Like a game of financial whack-a-mole, Finance Minister Greg Selinger managed to lay his hammer on all the major issues — taxation, education, health care, the environment. And there was more money for key programs (housing and clean water) and tax cuts. Even business owners, who remain the most aloof of all political constituencies in Manitoba, got a little something to be happy about with downward adjustments to corporate tax and payroll tax.

But as has been the style of this government since it was formed, the benefits of this budget will be largely unseen and back-end-loaded. Things won’t get worse in Manitoba, but evidence that we’re doing better will be hard to find.

And if there was any expectation this budget — largely seen as a springboard for the next provincial election — would demonstrate the reckless abandon of which this government has steered clear for eight years, those hopes were dashed moments after the budget papers were made available to reporters.

Massive tax cuts? The measured, sober attack on corporate and individual taxes that Premier Gary Doer has been waging since early in his first term continues, but in denominations and on schedules that ensure we’ll hardly notice them.

Huge increases in capital spending? There will be more money, but Winnipeg’s roads and the highways surrounding the capital city are still falling apart faster than we can fix them and this budget only slows the decay, it does not stop it.

Remove the burden of education taxes on property? Again, there is relief in the form of an increased property tax credit but Selinger all but dashed any hope the entire education portion of the property tax bill could be hacked off. Selinger said it was “not realistic” and by this time, we know if nothing else he is an expert on realism. Manitoba’s New Democrats are demonstrating the dilemma facing modern Canadian governments. Even modest gestures that carry very little individual benefit cost a lot of money. In Manitoba, where revenue growth is steady but not spectacular thanks to the predisposition of subterranean oil deposits to migrate westward, you can’t write huge cheques now because history shows they can’t be cashed later.

The more important question is whether this budget serves as a platform for a re-election campaign. Pundits and political organizers have been speculating for months that an election is just around the corner. If this budget is going to be the blueprint for the campaign, the NDP is obviously willing to gamble that slow and steady will win the race. And why not? It’s worked before.

In the 1999 election campaign, armed with little more than a pleasant grin and a plan to rid hospital hallways of annoying stretchers, the NDP strolled directly into the path of what at first appeared to be a political juggernaut. Former premier Gary Filmon’s infamous 50-50 plan — $500 million in tax cuts and $500 million in new spending — was unleashed early in that campaign and created an impression by the end of Week 1 that the NDP had nothing to compare with Filmon’s bold policies. As it turned out, Doer & Co. knew something we didn’t know.

Manitobans didn’t like bold and risky back in 1999. They especially didn’t like it coming from someone who earned his political stripes by taking a firm, steady approach to governing. During his time in office, Filmon was cast as the rock of Manitoba politics, a steadying influence who had guided the province through the rocky, reduced-spending, deficit-slaying 1990s with elegance and resolve. When he suddenly started talking about dropping an extra $1 billion on Manitobans like he had just discovered the money hiding under his sofa cushions, it was out of character.

The NDP laid back and watched bold and brave Filmon flounder all the way to defeat. In many ways, Doer has not abandoned that laid-back approach as he has tackled government. But as the Conservative party is proving on the federal stage, Canadians are developing a bit of an appetite for bolder, grander gestures.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has been a master at using a smaller list of loftier policies to woo support. Why make voters dizzy with pledges to reduce the percentage of tax rates and slide thresholds for tax brackets? Just give everyone $500. That’s a policy everyone can get behind.

Thinking inside the box has been good to the NDP. It has helped win two elections. And it has denied opposition parties a beachhead on which to launch a viable challenge. But will it be enough to garner a third term? A laid-back approach to reducing education property taxes, in particular, gives the Opposition Conservatives the opportunity for traction. The Tories screwed this issue up royally in 2003, when architects of a plan to eliminate the education portion proved they couldn’t add properly. A realistic plan, with a bolder outcome, could make the NDP vulnerable.

Doing a little on a lot of issues is fine, and Manitoba has seen progress under the NDP. But doing a lot on one or two issues may prove to be the fashionable strategy this time around.

This article was posted on Thursday, April 5th, 2007 and is filed under Canadian Issues and Politics, NDP. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.