Wall delivers early knock-down to Broten

Give Round One of the spring sitting fight to Premier Brad Wall ... a knock-down even before the legislature resumes sitting.

Of course, a single win on any given day in politics is usually no big deal. But given that this particular battle was fought on NDP leader Cam Broten’s terms, the ease with which Wall dispensed with the Opposition leader says a lot.

Broten must better define issues and start offering alternatives. Otherwise, he might never get up off the canvas.

At issue were the leaders’ pre-sitting scrums — hardly earth-shaking news events, but politically revealing for other reasons.

Wednesday was Wall’s first dress rehearsal for defending what he describes as “one of the most challenging” budgets his government has put together.

The premier said there will be “a small surplus” this year (translation: a lot of debt postponed/added to the Crowns) and possibly a surplus in 2015-16 because of a series of “difficult decisions” that “will likely (result in) some job losses and a reduction in capital spending.”

All in all, a pretty tepid defence of his government’s budget plans by Wall. But compared with Broten’s attack, Wall was rather sterling.

In his scrum minutes earlier, Broten repeated his party’s own mantra, perhaps familiar to you because it now blares on your TV as a political ad. Broten asked: “Where has the money gone?” and — as in the ads — offered his own rhetorical answers of smart meters, $40 million to John Black and Associates and their senseis, and unnecessary trips to Ghana.

The problem, however, is that he was posing the question to reporters, who normally get to do the question-asking. And, as so many others have discovered, it’s easier to ask questions than answer them.

Seriously? Questionable health-care investments and smart meters costing a few million dollars is why we now have a budgetary shortfall in the hundreds of millions of dollars? It has nothing to do with the crash in oil prices and revenue? It has nothing to do with millions spent to hire more nurses, who got a 36-per-cent salary increase (which your party didn’t oppose) or the billions spent on infrastructure (which, again, your party supported and has demanded even more of, like a second bridge in Prince Albert)?

Heck, when it comes to Prince Albert, Broten couldn’t even say Wednesday that voters there should be guaranteed a byelection within six months, as is the spirit of the legislation. Instead, all he could say was the Saskatchewan Party’s Darryl Hickie wasn’t a very good MLA, anyway. So why not demand an immediate byelection to elect a better MLA in a seat your party has traditionally held?

Some of Broten’s responses were slightly better. While he is likely gilding the lily a bit to suggest there are many who view the JBA contract as top-ofmind when people wonder where all the money went, the NDP leader might be right to suggest some wonder why their classrooms are still overcrowded or their nursing homes are understaffed. But, generally, Broten’s questions Wednesday weren’t as good as Wall’s answers.

“Where did the money go? It’s in families’ pockets,” Wall told reporters, referring to his government’s cuts in personal income taxes or funding of municipalities’ property and education tax cuts.

The premier then continued to tee off on Broten’s major question, adding in the $3 billion in general revenue fund debt reduction, the $6.6 billion in capital project building and the 2,600 more health-care workers. Yes, it is government rhetoric, but sometimes that’s all government needs when the opposition’s question isn’t very good.

For the NDP leader to credibly ask “Where did the money go?” he would have had to oppose these choices. He and his party didn’t. In fact, Broten said Wednesday that an NDP government would likely reinstate the film tax credit or implement a better one. He also said the NDP would subscribe to higher staffing complement standards in nursing homes. Fine, but these would cost even more money.

At the very least, Broten has some obligation to demonstrate he has a plan to spend taxpayers’ dollars better or that the billions spent in the last seven years truly were wasted. But he has so far done neither. And one now wonders if he can.

This isn’t quite the 1980s’ Progressive Conservatives, who added a billion dollars of debt each year, never balanced the budget and didn’t have much to show for it in the end.

This is a government that can credibly justify its major spending choices ... or at least, its defence Wednesday was better than the Opposition leader’s criticism.

Give this round to Wall.