The federal Conservatives are planning significant spending reductions for the upcoming 2012-13 budget year in areas such as environmental monitoring, fisheries and oceans, Via Rail, national defence, the Canadian Space Agency and green energy initiatives, to name just a few, according to the main estimates tabled Tuesday by Treasury Board president Tony Clement.
At the same time, the government is expecting to spend noticeably more implementing its tough-on-crime agenda, and on planned increases to health and social transfers to the provinces.
It's also budgeting nearly $1.5 billion in the upcoming year alone on the new Shared Services Canada, a federal agency created last summer to streamline federal information technology and save taxpayer dollars.
Overall, total spending included in the government's 2012-13 main estimates is forecast to increase around $1 billion (0.4 per cent) over last year, to nearly $252 billion.
However, the estimates don't factor in the government's deficit reduction plan — which is searching for up to $8 billion in annual savings, and will be released in the budget — so actual federal spending for the upcoming fiscal year could be reduced significantly when austerity measures are announced.
The federal Liberals assailed the government Tuesday for providing "zero details" about upcoming spending cuts and said it's time to stop hiding the information from Canadians.
"A lot of what we see in the estimates at this late stage is really not going to tell us very much," said interim Liberal leader Bob Rae.
"The budget is going to be the bottom line for the government. We have to see what's in it."
The federal budget and billions of dollars in cuts from the spending review aren't expected to be tabled until March, but the estimates released Tuesday give a good indication of the government's spending priorities for the coming fiscal year.
As it faces international criticism for its decision to pull out of the Kyoto Protocol, the Conservative government is cutting funding to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency by 43 per cent, down to about $17 million from $30 million.
The Department of Natural Resources budget will be reduced by more than $700 million (about 20 per cent), largely due to the sunsetting of $550 million for greening pulp and paper mills (a program that finishes at the end of the fiscal year), and reductions to funding for biofuels and wind energy programs, and climate change adaptation initiatives, some of which are also sunsetting.
With the Afghanistan combat mission now over, the Department of National Defence's budget is expected to be reduced nearly $1.5 billion (seven per cent), including a $570-million chop to "equipment acquisition and disposal" and $232 million less on "recruiting of personnel and initial training."
Government spending is also expected to decrease nearly $490 million on "international peace, stability and security."
However, expenditures on the government's tough-on-crime agenda are forecast to increase significantly in certain areas.
Spending on the Correctional Service of Canada is expected to grow to more than $3 billion, including an increase of about $172 million to implement the Truth In Sentencing Act, which ends the practice of giving offenders credit for twice the actual time served in pre-trial custody.
The spending reductions also extend to the rails. Payments to Crown corporation Via Rail will be decreased nearly $152 million — 33 per cent — due to sunsetting funding for major equipment maintenance and capital projects.
The Canadian Space Agency, meanwhile, is facing a $61-million (14 per cent) reduction to its budgetary expenditures, although the government says it's due to the winding down of costs on some projects that needed more dollars in previous years.
Critics, however, say the government continues to hide its real spending plans, including what will be cut in the multibillion-dollar spending review.
Clement is leading the sweeping expenditure review, as the government searches for a minimum of $4 billion — and up to $8 billion — in annual savings over the next few years as it tries to balance the books by 2015-16.
"We've got a government that I think has a completely misdirected and ideological sense of priorities," said NDP finance critic Peter Julian. "If they do go for (additional) cuts, we're looking at a significant economic downturn. It will provoke a worsening of the economy."
Original Article
Source: ottawa citizen
Author: Jason Fekete
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