Province's and city's spending skyrocket

“Events, dear boy, events,” said onetime British prime minister Harold Macmillan when asked what could suddenly divert a government from carrying out its best-laid plans. Which brings us to how COVID-19 knocked the Ontario government, once determined to balance the books and exert strict fiscal discipline, so far off course that this week it unveiled a budget with a cavernous $38.5-billion deficit.

Few will criticize it for the borrowing binge. In fact, many think it hasn't pledged enough. The budget doesn't identify specific money to support increased staffing at long-term care homes, for instance, though Finance Minister Rod Phillips promises the funds. Other critics say the education portion of the budget isn't as generous as it must be. And so on. The demand is to spend even more, both on pandemic prevention and on helping businesses get back on their feet after a year of lockdowns. Fair enough.

By contrast — sort of — Ottawa Council unveiled a city budget this week that Mayor

Jim Watson asserts is “balanced.” He's being creative, of course: Municipalities can't run deficits, so it's balanced only as long as upper levels of government cover a $153.5-million revenue shortfall for 2021. They did, after all, come through with an initial $124 million to help battle COVID-19 this year.

The major local problem is a $72.8-million gap for OC Transpo. Ridership plunged in

2020 as people worked from home and avoided local travel in general. As well, council wants to ensure Ottawa Public Health has what it needs in a time of extraordinary costs. It also wants to hire 14 more paramedics. And with police under fire over the death of Abdirahman Abdi and the rise of Black Lives Matter, council doesn't want to be seen abandoning the force: 30 new hires are still envisioned for 2021.

Councillors also hope to put needed resources into affordable housing, a crisis made more difficult during COVID, and into the environmental goal of reducing greenhouse gases. And finally, the majority on council don't want a property tax increase of more than three per cent. Good; their constituents don't want that either.

In short, both the province and the city are willing to spend dizzying amounts more than they are taking in — following the lead of the federal government, whom they count on to continue showering them with COVID-busting largesse. In this pandemic year, few Canadians object to such an approach. We will worry about paying the piper some other time, when we are less in crisis.

Events, dear boy, events.