Manitoba Net Debt increases by $1 Billion

By ROSS ROMANIUK, SUN MEDIA

Business and taxpayer representatives are blasting the Doer government for making no cut to income tax for the coming year, while also changing its law to lessen the debt payment it has to make.

Shannon Martin, regional director with the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, said the NDP government's 2009-10 budget is a "shell game" that "boggles the mind" in continuing to allow a middle-income Manitoba family to pay 150% more income tax than it would in certain other provinces.

And he slammed the New Democrats' plan to change balanced-budget legislation to allow themselves to lower their debt payment this year to only $20 million from $110 million.

"That's absurd. That chicken is going to come home to roost, and the only reason the government has been successful so far in terms of debt-servicing costs is the low interest rates," Martin said.

"And when those interest rates start rising, the extra $1 billion that we see in our ... debt is going to cost us big-time."

Colin Craig of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation also had harsh words for the debt plan and the "very disappointing" lack of action on income tax, as well as for the province's 4.2% hike in spending -- above the 2008 inflation rate of 2.3%.

"More troublesome is that there's no long-term strategy to bring our personal income tax rates in line with other provinces," Craig said. "Manitobans pay some of the highest rates in the country, and the government is ignoring that."

'Way out of sync'

But while Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce president Dave Angus criticized Manitoba's high-income tax threshold as "way out of sync with other provinces" and called the debt-payment shift a "red flag," he lauded what he described as the budget's controlled spending and investments in education and infrastructure.

Social advocates, on the other hand, cheered Finance Minister Greg Selinger's debt plan as a boon for programs for the poor.

Marianne Cerilli of the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg said an extension on debt payments "over a larger budget cycle is a good thing."

University of Manitoba law professor Lorna Turnbull agreed.

"When you pay down the debt more quickly, you're drawing away from the capacity to invest in social programs," said Turnbull. "And those are the things that low-income people, and women in particular, rely on most heavily."

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BUDGET HIGHLIGHTS

- Increased "stimulus" spending on things like roads, bridges, social housing and schools

- Free access to provincial parks for the next two years

- A $50 increase for homeowners in the education property tax credit, from $600 to $650

- Small business tax rate reduced to 0% by December 2010

- A one cent per cigarette increase in tobacco taxes, effective immediately

- An increase in speeding fines

- A threefold increase in the value of government loans available to businesses

Deank wrote:"Free access to provincial parks for the next two years"

I just dont see the $20 per year fee being enough of a barrier to any family to have this make much of a difference

tick wrote:we parasites need time to elaborate the delusional fantasies we use to lead the host to the desired behaviour.
quit your griping and get back to paying our debts.

tick wrote:we parasites need time to elaborate the delusional fantasies we use to lead the host to the desired behaviour.
quit your griping and get back to paying our debts.

Deank wrote:who is going to pay for the bullets?