Tories’ first mini-budget cuts deficit, taxes for working poor
Critics say rent control changes will hurt poor residents reeling from an affordability crisis
THE PROGRESSIVE
Conservative government’s first mini-budget offers poor Hamiltonians a tax cut — but also ends rent control for new units in a city with a housing affordability crisis.
Ontario’s fall economic statement focused on finding ways to cut a disputed $15-billion deficit figure the new government says it inherited from the previous Liberals.
“The fiscal hole is deep,” Finance Minister Vic Fedeli said in presenting the document to the legislature Thursday. “The road ahead is not an easy one and will require difficult decisions. Everyone across the province will be required to make sacrifices, without exception.”
But Fedeli added he was proud to introduce an income-tax exemption for workers who earn $30,000 or less, which he said should benefit 1.1 million workers. “Nobody in Ontario deserves a tax break more than lowincome workers,” he said.
Most of those workers would have benefited more from a January minimum-wage hike to $15 that the Tories
have already killed, argued Tom Cooper, director of the Hamilton Roundtable on Poverty Reduction.
“It’s a bit of a shell game, a disservice to low-income workers,” said Cooper, who suggested the $850-equivalent tax cut for a lowincome worker can’t compare to the $2,000 benefit expected for the working poor from the now-axed minimum-wage hike.
He also noted the tax cut cannot begin to replace the value of Hamilton’s basic-income experiment that the new provincial government has also announced will end.
The Tories also said they would end rent controls for new units in a bid to encourage the creation of much-needed new rental housing.
New housing is needed, Cooper agreed — but he noted the previous Liberal government recently brought back rent controls for new units after years of exemptions failed to spur an apartment building boom.
“It didn’t work before, so I’m
not sure why it would work now,” he said. “What we’re doing is just hurting people who are already dealing with huge rent increases.” A spring study found 20 per cent of tenants in Hamilton spend 50 per cent or more of their income on rent, making the city one of the least affordable for renters in Ontario.
Cooper also said he felt “uneasy” about the province’s plan to “reform” Ontario’s social safety net, details of which are expected next week. Close to 50,000 people rely on social assistance in Hamilton alone.
The official Opposition also slammed the mini-budget for announced or impending social service cuts.
“Things were already getting tougher and tougher for so many people just trying to make ends meet and get ahead of the bills,” said NDP Leader and Hamilton MPP Andrea Horwath. “Instead of fixing that, it looks like Doug Ford is hell-bent on making people pay more for the things they need in life.”
The government says it has cut the province’s deficit by $500 million, bringing the figure down to $14.5 billion in its first few months in office.
The province said it has made progress on cutting the deficit by finding $3.2 billion in efficiencies in operations, including a hiring freeze across the public service. Though it is spending less, the government said it is also taking in $2.7 billion less in revenue in the fiscal year — including $1.5 billion from the cancellation of cap-and-trade.
The belt-tightening measures also include rolling the positions of three independent officers — the environmental commissioner, the child and youth advocate, and the French language services commissioner — into the offices of the auditor general or the provincial ombudsman.
The Tories will also end the per-vote subsidy for political parties and cancel plans for a French-language university.
The update also pledges to expand hours of operation at Beer Store and LCBO outlets across the province, allowing them to open seven days a week until 11 p.m.
The NDP previously raised the prospect of funding cuts or outright cancellations for bigticket transit projects like light rail transit in Hamilton ($1 billion) and Mississauga ($1.4 billion).
The economic statement did not refer to either project specifically but noted in the transit section that a review of all capital projects continues. Metrolinx, the provincial transit agency that is in charge of Hamilton’s LRT project, is also under review.
A spring study found 20 per cent of tenants in Hamilton spend 50 per cent or more of their income on rent, making the city one of the least affordable for renters in Ontario.