Brad Wall's Deficit Could Have Built Three Domed Stadiums In Saskatchewan
-the weather
-the Roughriders
-Politics
Well:
-Saskatchewan has been breaking temperature records this week
-the Roughriders are hosting the CFL Western Final this weekend (and)
-Brad Wall's Saskatchewan Party government just brought down the second worst deficit in the province's history!
Up until yesterday, the hottest political topic was whether or not the provincial government should proceed with a plan to build a domed stadium in Regina - a new home for our beloved Roughriders to play.
Well guess what ... the size of Brad Wall's current deficit is big enough to have built THREE domed stadiums! One for Regina, one for Saskatoon and one for perhaps Moose Jaw or Prince Albert!
But don't just take my word on it ......
"What was truly most disturbing was the complete and total lack of humility we saw from this Saskatchewan Party government, which should damn well be embarrassed by its own incompetence right now, rather than celebrating. Yes, celebrating.
We just witnessed Thursday a Saskatchewan finance minister present a mid-year budget update revealing that a surplus he forecast last March was now an overall $1.05-billion deficit. It's the biggest deficit since 1991-92 ($1.3 billion), when the provincial government was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy and the second-biggest deficit ever.
And Gantefoer gets two standing ovations from his caucus colleagues in Thursday's question period? Are you kidding us? What is it about running government that you don't understand?"
Murray Mandryk
Regina Leader-Post
"Finance Minister Rod Gantefoer clearly was uncomfortable when he stood in the legislature Thursday to defend his government's mid-year fiscal numbers. His discomfort was deserved. [...] Taxpayers deserve to have the government budget honestly."
Saskatoon Star Phoenix
It was bad enough that Saskatchewanians, suddenly awash in oil money, started acting like demented Beverly Hillbillies by purchasing big vehicles and voting in a neocon government. Now, what does the province do with its money? Why, spend money *and* cut taxes, of course. So now it's stuck with a big deficit. Big surprise.
Apparently the Devine fiscal fiasco was too long ago for Saskatchewan to remember the lesson from it.
Posted by Mike | 11:01 am, November 20, 2009
We've been scrimping and saving through good times and bad for the past fourteen years to pay down the mountain of debt left over from the Devine years. We finally get to the point where we could all start to breathe comfortably then Brad and his friends got busy maxing out our charge cards again. How did we go so far wrong so fast?
It isn't enough anymore for me to know that the stalwart always reliable New Democrats are waiting patiently in the wings to come clean up yet again. I've worked too hard for too long and paid too many taxes in this province to watch all our progress just pissed away again by a naive and inexperienced administration.
Posted by Elliott Taylor | 9:49 pm, November 20, 2009