statism watch

Good for Mr. Page. There is at least one civil servant on Parliament Hill performing his job admirably. It’s a shame that he’s going to have to quit in order to stop playing along with the charade of representative democracy that Harper’s gang has mounted. He can join the former Information Commissioner, Robert Marleau, who ‘quit before he got frustrated’ – an ironic master – in feeling that they can at least tell their kids they stood up to the totalitarian urge. Perhaps everyone that’s trying to do their job honestly, but can’t, ought to quit as well to lay bare the lie. These criminals – that’s right, you can read the CBC exposing them for pressuring Mr. Page to lower his shortfall estimates below, not politically palatable you must understand – have to be thrown out of office. It’s just too bad the other four gangs are just as capable of messing up the country in their own unique ways as well. Anyhow – here’s more of his fine work, linked below.

You see, this is why you need a media you can trust. One that will jump on issues that aren’t just bouncing the population back and forth between the corrupt Conservatives and the corrupt Liberals as the election cycles precess along and we ‘kick the bums out’ on cue. (Canadians, by and large, consider May and Layton to be court jesters, fools that speak some truth.) A media that won’t provide wall to wall Swine Flu propaganda as directed in the middle of flagship comedy shows.

Flashback: Budget officer ‘can’t tell’ if stimulus plan working | Cost of Afghan mission jumps to $11.3-billion | Tories seek extra $331-million for Afghan mission | Ottawa risks erasing decade of debt reduction | Afghan mission cost: up to $18B

CBC News
November 3, 2009

Parliamentary budget officer Kevin Page says he will recommend the government shut down his operation of monitoring Ottawa’s financial performance if he does not get more resources to do the job.

Page told the House of Commons finance committee he still has not been told whether his annual budget will increase to $2.8 million, which he says he needs to do his work. His office had a budget of $1.8 million in the past fiscal year.

He said several of his staff members are on loan from other departments, and if he doesn’t receive a critical mass of qualified personnel he will recommend closing the office.

Page’s appearance before the committee Tuesday came a day after his office released its latest assessment of the Finance Department’s fiscal and economic estimates. His department projected that deficits will accumulate to a total of $167.4 billion over the current 2009-10 fiscal year and the following four years, and it predicted the annual budget shortfall would still be $19 billion in 2013-14, even after an expected economic recovery.

This was at odds with the government’s forecast that Ottawa will be within $5.2 billion of a balanced budget in 2013-14.

Infrastructure spending questioned

Page also took a swipe at Ottawa’s infrastructure spending. He said the federal bureaucracy has been slow to give him information, but the data he has received indicates the government may not be able to spend all the money it has set aside to stimulate the economy. He suggested that Ottawa should extend the deadline so stimulus can be delivered.

Infrastructure Canada responded last week to Page’s request for spending details by delivering three boxes filled with 4,476 papers, a move criticized by NDP MP Thomas Mulcair as “an old lawyer’s trick to bury your opponent in information.”

The parliamentary budget office was created in 2006 and Page was appointed as the first person to head the office in March 2008, with a mandate to provide independent analysis on the state of federal finances.

He has since clashed repeatedly with the Finance Department over both its estimates of deficits and his inquiries into spending programs.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009 at 9:50 am and is filed under accountability, economics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.