Almost every day, special interest groups meet with provincial politicians and put in requests to receive your hard earned tax dollars.
No doubt some of their projects are worthy of public funding, but many are driven by nothing more than self interest. So why don’t you counteract the efforts of the latter, by making your own pitch to the government?
You see, it’s provincial budget preparation time again and that means that the finance minister and his colleagues are working on the provincial budget.
Now is the time for you to send in an email or phone the finance minister to make your voice heard. Yes, we as taxpayers need to speak out and keep our politicians accountable not just at election time, but in between elections as well.
In fact, when the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, a non-profit taxpayers' watchdog group, presented our pre-budget recommendations to the Minister of Finance last year, the advice didn’t fall on deaf ears.
We pushed for school tax relief, reducing the small business tax, personal income tax relief and debt repayment to name a few recommendations.
And how did the government respond?
Well, here’s a hint: this year we gave the Finance Minister a t-shirt that read "I acted on the Canadian Taxpayers Federation’s recommendations to reduce the small business tax, cut income taxes and provide school tax relief, and all I got was this t-shirt.” Yes, some politicians do listen.
Some might call the t-shirt gift brown-nosing, but we believe it's not only important to haul politicians out on the carpet for wasting tax dollars, but to also give them a pat on the back when they do something positive.
This year we again noted in our pre-budget meeting that school taxes, personal income taxes, and sales taxes are all still higher in Saskatchewan than they are in Alberta. More incremental reductions were recommended to ensure Saskatchewan is as competitive as can be; allowing businesses the resources to compete internationally and to ensure talent from abroad is interested in moving to the province.
However, we also highlighted the government's Achilles heel; high spending increases. Yes, resource revenues are riding high, but what if the bottom drops out like it did in 2009-10? What if spending eventually outpaces resource revenue growth like it did in Alberta?
For years the province next door increased spending at an unsustainable pace. Now, they’re in a position where they’ve racked up over $8.3 billion in deficits over the past four years. Some will suggest it’s because they don’t have enough revenue coming in, but the reality is they actually increased spending too much.
Starting in 2005, had the Alberta government capped spending increases at the combined provincial rate of inflation and population growth, they would actually be running a $4.1 billion surplus this year; not a $3.1 billion deficit. Such a cap would have allowed for spending increases on average of 4.6 per cent per year – hardly break-neck, but hardly shabby either.
One thing is for sure, taxpayers give so much to the government in terms of tax dollars and taxing power itself. How can you afford not to tell them what you think they should do with it and how much you think they need in the first place?
Colin Craig is the Prairie Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation
