Tepid Reaction To Federal Budget

Thursday's federal budget is failing to wow politicians and analysts in Saskatchewan.

The province's only Liberal Member of Parliament, Ralph Goodale, calls the budget a, "slap in the face" to Canadians.

"It is a fictional budget, it is not credible. The government is not telling the truth to Canadians. On carbon capture, for example, so very important to the Saskatchewan economy, the federal government has invested in foreign technology." He insists there's nothing in the budget for the average, middle-income canadian and also points out the infrastructure plans under which the money for a stadium in Regina would need to come are about to expire, with little room for new spending.

While Saskatchewan's Finance Minister wasn't expecting an announcement on a potential new stadium, the lack of money for a joint carbon sequestration project with the state of Montana is a concern.

"It'll take officials a little more time to dig into the details," explains Rod Gantefoer, who says on first blush he isn't seeing money for some of their big asks. "We're hopeful there's still a possibility of the funding for the projects that we're talking about but they're not obvious." He was also hoping to see some mention of funding for a medical isotope reactor proposed for the University of Saskatchewan. While he is glad to see Canada Health and social program transfers will remain intact, Gantefoer is concerned the feds' revenue projections are too high. And yes, he recognizes the irony of that.

"Well, as I often said it's difficult to predict things with accuracy. We've said that we have to be more cautious, we've learned something from the 2009/2010 budget year in terms of the volatile commodity markets, and we've certainly lived through the ramifications if you are over-optimistic. Maybe that's where the caution could be taken in a meaninful way because once burned, twice shy."

Regina Mayor Pat Fiacco says the budget looks good from a municipality standpoint.

"It doesn't look like communities are going to be negatively affected with any cutbacks of any sort. They've managed to maintain the gas tax in regards to the GST refund and of course another year of the stimulus funding." He adds they'll now need to start focusing on the future and what sort of infrastructure funding will be available in the coming years.

Meanwhile, News Talk Radio's business analyst, Paul Martin, says this is very much a status quo budget with nothing too dramatic happening on either side of the ledger.

"Some relatively minor tinkering," is how he sees it. "I think probably when you think about knocking $17 billion in spending down over five years when you have a budget that's a couple hundred million bucks that's not a very dramatic number." He says Saskatchewanians will welcome a shift in the basic income tax exemption, which should allow residents to earn a bit more before taxes start getting taken off. While some are concerned about the possibility of opening up industries to foreign investment, Martin notes that we already have overseas companies investing in uranium here. He says we could see more action in telecommunciations with more companies moving in and competition driving down prices.