OTTAWA -- After all those billions of dollars of head-spinning election promises (frankly, we lost track), the Conservatives present their first federal budget today, detailing exactly how they plan to put our money where their mouths are.
Listening to all the political hype and hoopla over the past few months, ordinary Canadians might be excused for thinking that Stephen Harper is about to radically rewrite the way the feds will spend almost $200 billion of our money this year.
Maybe next time. Truth is, short of blowing up entire departments and programs (and that's not likely in a minority parliament) even the most grandiose of Conservative measures expected in today's budget -- for example, the 1% reduction in the GST -- won't make more than a relative dent in overall government spending.
For instance, the largest single expense for taxpayers is interest on the national debt. That works out to your paying $170 on each $1,000 of taxes pulled from your paycheques and family pocketbook.
(Put another way, if you are paying $10,000 a year in income taxes, GST and other federal levies, you will be paying $1,700 of that just in interest on the debt.)
By contrast, even Harper's rich plan to give families with pre-school children $1,200 a year per tot isn't such a crushing expense in the overall scheme of things, costing each taxpayer about $22 per $1,000 of taxes paid.
Here are some of the government's other big-ticket items, most of which won't likely change in any huge way from last year's Liberal budget to the one being presented today by the Conservatives. Again, the amounts shown are what you will pay from each $1,000 of your tax bill. (Warning: Some nausea may occur.)
- The second-largest spending item in the federal budget is old age pensions and support for poor seniors: $140.
- Federal departments and agencies such as Justice (home of the infamous money-eating gun registry); Public Works (home of AdScam), Human Resources Development (home of the billion-dollar boondoggle) and Industry (home of the great technology partnership swindles): $115.
- Employment Insurance payments (not premiums), including job-training programs and various parental and compassionate leave schemes: $75.
- Direct transfers of federal cash to the provinces for spending on health care: $75.
- National Defence: $70.
- Equalization payments intended to spread the national wealth around from richer provinces to the so-called have-not provinces and territories: $65.
- Payments under the Canada Child Tax Benefit and the GST credit, both for lower-income families: $60.
- Various forms of federal support for aboriginals: $45.
- Transfers to the provinces for post-secondary education, social assistance and other related programs: $40.
- Miscellaneous giveaways to the provinces for things such as reducing medical wait times, and Paul Martin's special equalization deal for Newfoundland: $30.
- National safety and security, including the costs of running the RCMP, the federal prison system, and policing international borders: $25.
- The cost of the Canada Revenue Agency squeezing hard-working folk for all the money to pay for all of the above: $20.
- Foreign aid and other international assistance: $18.
- Federal handouts to Bombardier (every year guaranteed) and other corporate welfare programs, including regional dole schemes: $18.
- All spending on Parliament, including salaries for MPs, senators and staff, to oversee the public purse on behalf of beleaguered taxpayers: $2.38.
As always, you get what you pay for.
By GREG WESTON
