Budget Countdown: Miramichers add their voice

Miramichier choose HST over Health Care and Education Cuts. Also favour end of duality, though it was not on the list of options.

This time next week the provincial government will be announcing a budget designed to eliminate the deficit.  The province has been operating with a yearly budget deficit for 7 years, and the government has been engaging the public in a review of spending to determine where to cut costs, and where they can raise revenue.

Miramichiers had an opportunity  to weigh in on the conversation last week, as did all New Brunswickers, in a series of public meetings held to inform the government on what cuts and increases the public would accept.

Click here to see full list of choices:  LINK

The meeting in Miramichi at the MAEA was prefaced by remarks from Bill Fraser and Lisa Harris.  The government had been saying the budget was a choice between cuts to education and health care, or an increase in the HST.  Opening remarks did not deviate from that proposal.

About 100 people at 15 different tables sat in groups and chose 3 proposed CUTS they could live with from a list of 20 contained in the government's CHOICES report.  Each group was also asked to choose two proposed CUTS they would not accept.  Each table was asked to do the same with the list of 12 potential ways to increase REVENUE.  Each table chose a spokesperson, and they stood up and announced their choices to the room.  Their choices were recorded, and the moderator said the results would be considered for the final budget expected on February 2nd.

On a few occasions, people spoke and said they were pessimistic that their input counted for anything, and said they expected all the decisions were already made.

Another common comment, that had nothing to do with options given to the participants, was about the cost of duality in the province.  Some spokespeople called for an end to separate buses for French and English kids, and they also called for an unification of hospital boards.  Translation services were offered at the session.  The entire presentation was conducted in English.

The list of CUTS options included reforming health care, increasing class sizes, and reducing the number of teaching assistants.  Almost every group had these items o their lst of CUTS they would not accept.  There was a few table of teachers in attendance at the event.  The CUTS that most groups agreed they could accept were to do with reshaping the civil service, and making administrative efficiencies.

Two items from the list that were not mentioned was the contracting out of custodians in schools, and reforming the pension plans of school bus drivers, janitors and nursing home workers.

Large group of CUPE workers, bus drivers, janitors and nursing home workers, staged a quiet protest in the pavilion for most of the session before filing out of the building with their signs.

In their first year in office, the government froze the wages of MLA again, reduced the ministers salaries, and froze the budgets of legislative officers (ombudsman, auditor general, etc).  The government did this a s a sign of good faith knowing that the second year of their mandate would see an austerity budget.

One participant at the Miramichi session stood up and said that he hopes that the cuts the ministers and MLAs took would not be refunded to them in the future as was done with judges who had their salaries frozen, but later received all the money back when the freeze was removed.

On the REVENUE side of the equation, almost every table placed an HST hike on the acceptable list, as well as the idea of increasing corporate tax.  Another item that made the list at almost every table was the idea of road tolls.  While most could accept tolls, they could not accept tolls with  an increase in diesel fuel tax, one of the other options on the list.

Increasing tax on tobacco and increasing the budget for cracking down on contraband tobacco was also acceptable to most people, though they couldn't understand why the government didn't already just go ahead and do those things.  One man suggested raising the tax on cigarettes soon before more people died from smoking.

The idea of monetizing NB Liquor was not one many people favoured, neither was an added tax on insurance premiums.

There were suggestions from the crowd that were not on the list:

• - Increase resource royalties.  DNR collects $77 million and spends $100 million
• - Add ORVA enforcement duties to DNR and reduce duplication
• - cut MLA pensions
• - end corporate welfare (province wrote off $27 M last year)
• - cut high paid civil servant salaries

Overall, the group said there was not enough detail in the CHOICES report to offer good advice on what to do, and that the government was too close to the budget to accept any recommendations from the public.