Terence Corcoran glares balefully at what the federal government considers “deep cuts”:
We are destined for two days of political self-congratulation in Ottawa. Throne speech Friday. Budget Monday. Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Finance Minister, Jim Flaherty, will use these opportunities to heap praise on their even-keeled and prudent handling of the economy, their deft manoeuvring of federal finances through the global storm, and their unwavering determination to guide us through the many uncertainties that lie ahead.
What they will not talk about is how they are going to balance the federal budget on target. Even less likely are any signs of enthusiasm for what should be a Conservative priority: reducing government spending.
That project has been shuffled off to Tony Clement at Treasury Board, where he will chair a small Cabinet committee that will dither away for a year trying to find the fiscal equivalent of nickels and dimes in a piggy bank the size of the House of Commons. Their first year target is $1-billion in cuts in departmental budgets of $120-billion, a spending reduction of less than 1%.
This is not good enough, not even close. For future years, Mr. Clement’s team will be hunting for an additional $3-billion in annual savings aiming for a total reduction of $4-billion by 2014, or about 1.3% of Ottawa’s total expenses of $300-billion.
As anyone who has ever done a family budget, or worked through tough times on a corporate budget, a 1% cut is a piece of cake, not much more than a rounding error.
