Another year, another budget. An open invitation for your thoughts and prayers.
In general, I would have liked the Liberals to hold to their election idea of keeping the budget below $10B. Times may get tougher, and some of the spending could probably be better planned. I believe the economic ideas showing “deficits don’t matter” to be flawed.
I like the money towards starting the ball rolling on Pharmacare. Since in the long run I think it would save dollars, the government could be more ambitious.
I think with low interest rates Canada should be investing much more heavily in public infrastructure than it has done, including an efficient transportation system for the whole GTA and satellite cities.
Skills training and subsidizing farmers have their place but are given a lot of emphasis here. I wonder how much bang for the buck will be delivered.
I do think the Internet to be a vital service available to all communities, and any community deserves clean water. I am in favour of supporting journalism but wouldn’t want independence compromised in any way.
Reducing the interest on student loans is a reasonable goal but sacrifices should be divided between the public and private lenders.
I wonder if spending money on drugs for rare disease or mortgages will lead to higher prices than might otherwise exist. Something does need to be done regarding home affordability but a start might be taxes on non-residents, more efficient defences against laundering, encouraging growth in areas and provinces which are not already hugely populated or other measures.
Canadian governments have a poor record of measuring the efficiency of funded programs and I don’t see any changes here.
But what do I know? What do other Canadian dopers say?
As someone who works at a cable company, I find the idea of broadband access across the land by 2030 to be laughable. This country is vast and the kind of infrastructure work needed is absurdly expensive, especially considering most of the country is frozen solid for ten months a year.
You have to remember that the Canadian budget process is different from the US. The budget is a general policy statement. The expenditure details are in the Main Estimates introduced subsequently, which turn the budget generalities into detailed planned spending amounts on a program-by-program basis for each department and agency. These expenditures are in turn authorized by Parliament through a series of Appropriation acts. (See Main Estimates details here.)
This fits with the major Conservative Party policy platform for the upcoming election;
“If Trudeau Does It, It’s Bad. Blame Trudeau. HATE HIM”
That’s it. That’s all. That is the Conservative strategy going into this election.
I’m quite confident that some party strategist has looked south of the border and saw how the Hillary Hatred Train was quite successful at getting a complete idiot elected. Hate wins elections.
Xplornet does it, the issue is that they are overpriced and unrespectful to their customers by not providing with what they are paying for (advertised speeds and limited bandwidth).
But it seems that they are opening to unlimited bandwidth but at a higher price.
Compared to fibre the cost is outrageous.
To be honest I have trouble understanding why the price is higher when compared to fibre looking at the infrastructure.
A LTE tower should be cheaper to install and maintain than running fibre cable to every single dwelling.
There is currently a plan to provide 4G cell coverage along Highway 16 in northern BC by installing a whole bunch of small cell antenna on power poles, rather than building large towers. Granted, this will only provide coverage along the highway, so the trapper cabins up the valleys will have to wait.
