Forecasts predict major cold snap
A provincial election without a budget is like a chuckwagon without a driver — it’s likely to run off in crazy directions.
But that scenario could occur this spring. NDP sources confirm the possibility of a budget-free campaign. And that, in turn, could mean that the legislature doesn’t convene at all before voting day.
By provincial law (which by the way is bogus and non-binding), the election is supposed to come between March 1 and May 31 this year. The NDP pledges to honour that three-month window.
In 2015, PC premier Jim Prentice famously went to the polls a year early, thus defying the law, with a tough budget that raised 58 different fees and taxes for Albertans.
The result was unrivalled political calamity — a loss to the NDP and virtual decimation of the Progressive Conservative party, which now exists only as a legal shell within Jason Kenney’s United Conservative Party.
From this, the NDP seems to take two lessons.
First, don’t ignore a symbolic law that Albertans are principled enough to take seriously.
And maybe, don’t risk a budget at all, especially when it’s guaranteed to look ugly.
All the groundwork for a formal budget is being done in the treasury department right now, as a matter of routine. Work typically starts four or five months before the documents are taken to the legislature.
We all know what a 2019-20 budget would show: more deficit, rising debt, further challenges to the NDP pledge to balance the budget by 2023-24, and little inclination to cut spending.
But how does Premier Rachel Notley get away with pre-empting that formal accounting ?
Because Jason Kenney asks her to, that’s how.
For months the UCP has demanded a quick election. That obviously means a campaign without a budget.
On Dec. 18, Kenney said: “I commend the premier for saying that she will comply with the fixed election date law.
“But instead of bringing back a lame-duck session of the legislature next spring and tabling a budget with no credibility, the premier should let the people decide.
“I am therefore requesting that the premier ask the lieutenant governor to sign the writ starting a general election in early February for a vote in early March.” Kenney might just get his wish. The idea has attractions for the NDP. Untethered by a budget, Notley would be free to run a flexible campaign with last-minute promises that respond to the public mood.
If there’s fury over finances, she could pledge to tighten spending while continuing to shore up services. But she wouldn’t have to show how it could be done.
And Kenney, having brushed off the need for an NDP budget, won’t be able to criticize Notley for failing to divulge a full fiscal plan.
There’s a strong sense in both camps that an election is looming earlier than the May 5 anniversary of Notley’s win, even though the NDP has so far nominated fewer than half of its candidates.
Notley toured the new Calgary cancer hospital site Monday, using the occasion for a full-blast attack on the UCP.
The NDP said Kenney’s party will abandon the $1.4 billion project, leaving thousands of patients out in the cold.
UCP spokeswoman Christine Myatt responded: “It’s absolutely ridiculous to suggest we would stop the half-built project.” She also notes that universal publicly funded health was part of the merger agreement under which the UCP was formed.
Also on Monday, the UCP released new ads on the theme “Strong and Free,” featuring female candidates.
The flag hasn’t formally dropped, but we’re into the campaign already. Even the NDP seems tempted to get on with it.
Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald. dbraid@postmedia.com Twitter: @DonBraid Facebook: Don Braid Politics