D
Darkstar416
Guest
I know it's been discussed much on this forum already, but it's always nice to see some more discussion (even if it's just in the T.O. media)...
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Eye - April 20, 2006
Editorial
Big brother is broke
Let's talk about equality, a subject in the news following the meeting of Canada's provincial premiers in Montreal last week.
As The Globe and Mail pointed out this week, the province of Quebec balanced its budget this year and provides its citizens with universal $7-a-day childcare, a program often trumpeted by pur laine nationalists as evidence of the superiority of La Belle Province. The province of Ontario ran a deficit of $1.4 billion and has no universal childcare program, leaving parents in Toronto to pay private daycare rates of $50 per day or more.
How has Quebec managed this miracle of combined generosity and fiscal responsibility? It's simple, really: Ontarians pay for it.
In the name of "equalization," taxpayers at this end of the 401 sent over $2 billion more or less directly to Jean Charest's government in Quebec City last year. In fact, Ontario tax dollars received in equalization payments by Quebec were enough to pay for their entire $1.6 billion childcare program and their benevolent $500-per-person tax cut, with just over $120 million left over.
Clearly, something is wrong with this picture. When the "have not" provinces -- all the provinces that receive equalization payments from Ottawa to help them keep up (in other words, all of the provinces except Ontario, Alberta and Saskatchewan) -- begin to enjoy a higher level of government service than the so-called "have" provinces who pay the bills, the formula is in need of amending.
And, yet, the proposal entertained at the premiers' conference last week would have seen equalization payments increase, so that Quebec would receive $7.4 billion next year, bringing Ontario's contribution to Quebec City to almost $3.2 billion.
(Are we picking on Quebec too much? How about this: Newfoundland spends $3,000 more per capita on services than Ontario, while receiving more than $800 million per year in equalization payments -- 43 per cent of that from Ontarians.)
Pretty much everyone agrees that something's wrong. Federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty was quoted in the Montreal Gazette April 10 saying "the current equalization process is a mess...." Mike Chong, the intergovernmental-affairs minister, also quoted in the Gazette, calls the system "broken." And Dalton McGuinty walked out of the premiers' talks last week when he found himself a minority of one in his opposition to the enhancements to the scheme.
Yet McGuinty was roundly criticized for his bravery in pointing out that this equalization system is a three-card monte scheme in which Ontario always loses. PEI Premier Pat Binns, whose government receives $277 million -- more than $2,000 per resident -- in equalization payments and would get about $50 million per year more under the new scheme, said "It's disappointing that Ontario, the big brother of Confederation, would take this kind of a position."
Well, guess what, Premier Binns: big brother, unlike most of the rest of the family, is struggling to pay his own bills. Ontario has been letting infrastructure crumble, starving public transit, stalling affordable housing and keeping its cities in constant financial crisis while it racks up more debt. Ontario cannot afford to give more than it already does to provinces that enjoy services better than it provides to its own citizens.
There's a good reason why Canada has equalization payments to ensure that all Canadians can have access to an equivalent level of service no matter what province they live in. It's a principle so important we enshrined it in the constitution. But there's a big gap between that principle and the practice of equalization today. The system needs to be fixed.
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Eye - April 20, 2006
Editorial
Big brother is broke
Let's talk about equality, a subject in the news following the meeting of Canada's provincial premiers in Montreal last week.
As The Globe and Mail pointed out this week, the province of Quebec balanced its budget this year and provides its citizens with universal $7-a-day childcare, a program often trumpeted by pur laine nationalists as evidence of the superiority of La Belle Province. The province of Ontario ran a deficit of $1.4 billion and has no universal childcare program, leaving parents in Toronto to pay private daycare rates of $50 per day or more.
How has Quebec managed this miracle of combined generosity and fiscal responsibility? It's simple, really: Ontarians pay for it.
In the name of "equalization," taxpayers at this end of the 401 sent over $2 billion more or less directly to Jean Charest's government in Quebec City last year. In fact, Ontario tax dollars received in equalization payments by Quebec were enough to pay for their entire $1.6 billion childcare program and their benevolent $500-per-person tax cut, with just over $120 million left over.
Clearly, something is wrong with this picture. When the "have not" provinces -- all the provinces that receive equalization payments from Ottawa to help them keep up (in other words, all of the provinces except Ontario, Alberta and Saskatchewan) -- begin to enjoy a higher level of government service than the so-called "have" provinces who pay the bills, the formula is in need of amending.
And, yet, the proposal entertained at the premiers' conference last week would have seen equalization payments increase, so that Quebec would receive $7.4 billion next year, bringing Ontario's contribution to Quebec City to almost $3.2 billion.
(Are we picking on Quebec too much? How about this: Newfoundland spends $3,000 more per capita on services than Ontario, while receiving more than $800 million per year in equalization payments -- 43 per cent of that from Ontarians.)
Pretty much everyone agrees that something's wrong. Federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty was quoted in the Montreal Gazette April 10 saying "the current equalization process is a mess...." Mike Chong, the intergovernmental-affairs minister, also quoted in the Gazette, calls the system "broken." And Dalton McGuinty walked out of the premiers' talks last week when he found himself a minority of one in his opposition to the enhancements to the scheme.
Yet McGuinty was roundly criticized for his bravery in pointing out that this equalization system is a three-card monte scheme in which Ontario always loses. PEI Premier Pat Binns, whose government receives $277 million -- more than $2,000 per resident -- in equalization payments and would get about $50 million per year more under the new scheme, said "It's disappointing that Ontario, the big brother of Confederation, would take this kind of a position."
Well, guess what, Premier Binns: big brother, unlike most of the rest of the family, is struggling to pay his own bills. Ontario has been letting infrastructure crumble, starving public transit, stalling affordable housing and keeping its cities in constant financial crisis while it racks up more debt. Ontario cannot afford to give more than it already does to provinces that enjoy services better than it provides to its own citizens.
There's a good reason why Canada has equalization payments to ensure that all Canadians can have access to an equivalent level of service no matter what province they live in. It's a principle so important we enshrined it in the constitution. But there's a big gap between that principle and the practice of equalization today. The system needs to be fixed.