Saskatchewan NDP calls for gas-tax cut as provincial deficit grows

Although Saskatchewan received an economic boost of $331 million from higher oil prices, the deficit has gotten worse.

It’s grown from $819 million to $825 million since the provincial budget was tabled in March.

Saskatchewan NDP finance critic Trent Wotherspoon joined The Evan Bray Show on Wednesday to discuss what the opposition party would do to reduce the deficit.

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Listen to the full interview, or read the transcript below:

The following transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

EVAN BRAY: How do you view this quarter update?

Trent Wotherspoon: I think it’s rather damning when you look at the fact that we’ve all identified that revenues were going to be up in a fairly big unplanned way by way of oil revenues, due to international conflict outside of our control that drives up revenues for the province. What it does at the household level and for a business or for a farm is it drives up costs in a big way, right at the at the pump. So it puts a squeeze on people. What I think is concerning when you look at this report, you’ve got over $300 million of additional oil revenues rolling in, but despite that, the debt’s still growing, the deficit’s larger, and there’s not an ounce of new relief for families, farms, and businesses that are facing all these pressures. So, we continue to push and say, “Hey, if the oil price is up like this, it’s providing unplanned revenues for the province of Saskatchewan, and it puts undue hardship, real hardship, real pressure for farms, families, and businesses who deserve a break at the pumps.”

This year, the flooding caused a number of crop insurance claims early in the year, which is not normal. But because farmers weren’t able to get in there and seed the acres, I think the question that some people will often ask is: does the crop insurance program, SGI, when it comes to hail damage, why does that show up on the books when we’re doing these financial updates? Do they not have their standalone budget?

Wotherspoon: We have a summary financial reporting in Saskatchewan. That’s the expectation of public sector standards, and we were a slow adopter on that front in Saskatchewan. But we’re there with the rest of the provinces. But you’re right to point out that programs like crop insurance, of course, there’s the contributions and the surplus that sits there, the funds that are there to support producers in this situation. So, it’s certainly not right for Reiter to blame producers or something for a deficit here. In fact, they’ve contributed their premiums. So has the province and the feds, those dollars are there. Similarly, with your insurance program. What you see, I think, is continued mismanagement of costs on other fronts. You see a government that hasn’t planned properly on the healthcare front, and I think all too often we see a government that’s gone down a path where they’ve made choices that cost taxpayers more than they should, which end up wasting dollars and not getting people the value for money that they deserve. So if you’ve got 300 million additional revenues rolling in, people should get a break at a time where the pressure of cost of living is real for the people of Saskatchewan.

I want to make sure I didn’t misspeak. The minister didn’t blame crop insurance. He just cited it as this is one of the pressure points. We know healthcare is also one. I asked the minister kind of a follow up question. I said, “What are the unexpected costs in healthcare? It sounded like it had to do with labour. He said it was to do with doctors, because my understanding is we’ve got a couple of big union settlements that haven’t happened yet, so that wouldn’t have been factored in there yet.

Wotherspoon: I think they have to do a better job of planning for these very foreseeable costs and managing healthcare in a better way to get value for money and the outcomes people need and deserve. You know that you’ve had this contract that hasn’t been settled in over four years, there needs to be a contingency and allocation of funds there. The fact there isn’t is concerning. And look at areas like healthcare, they’re spending what 10 times more than (they should) to deliver a mammogram in Calgary for women in Saskatchewan, who should have that here. 10 times more the cost, really large sums. Three times the cost for these out of province travel nurses to come in here, work for a couple weeks, make way more than the nurses here. At the same time, as we have real challenges with the labour force here, it’s not good good for morale. Certainly not a good long-term solution, and it costs us a lot more.

You can point to this as misspending, but at the same time, there’s lots of things that we need to spend money on, and so how do you allocate money? We’ve got this large deficit, which I think does and should concern people, it adds to our debt. Yet at the same time, we have exponential needs. So, where does the money come from to do this, and how do you see that the government is has got it wrong?

Wotherspoon: Certainly this is a government that’s really struggled with our public finances. This premier’s more than tripled our debts, so you’re right to identify these concerns. And on front after front, we see a government that’s choosing more costly paths to deliver services for the province of Saskatchewan, wasting dollars. And at the end of the day, whether you’re paying 10 times more for private mammograms in Calgary, three times more for contract labour, wasting hundreds of millions of dollars on projects, procurement, IT projects that have gone sideways and that don’t work, or possibly buying sound cannons that for a police force that doesn’t even exist.

That got shut down.

Wotherspoon: Right, but the money’s being spent, the minister wasn’t even aware. I guess what I would say is, you need to get value for money. We really need to open up the books. We need to look at all these contracts that have been signed, and we need to make sure that we’re getting as much value out of those hard-earned dollars as we can, because it hasn’t been a shortage of revenue in this province. Revenues have been very strong, but this is a government that misses its budget year after year and has spending that doesn’t provide people the outcomes or value that they need and deserve. And when it comes to the cost of living on families and farms and businesses, again, there are families that are being squeezed, families that are doing all they can to make ends meet. Some that can’t keep their heads above water, working hard to get their kids the school supplies they need, for example, to get back to school. When you see a spike in oil prices, that brings additional revenues in the way it has to the province of Saskatchewan, it’s only right and it’s only fair that there’s some relief passed along at the pumps, for example, to give a break to families, farms, and businesses.

I’ll be the first to say who who doesn’t like to save cash at the pump, right? And we just heard the federal government announcing yesterday this federal tax holiday is going to be continued until January of next year. We talk about it federally and provincially, but how do you do that if you ask for rebates on the gas and let’s cut the gas tax, but at the same time let’s not grow the deficit? Is that even possible?

Wotherspoon: We’ve called out year in year out the mismanagement on the finances by this government. So you’ve got to stop wasting dollars. And if you look at some of those projects, small and large, they all start to add up, and they’re all added to the debt, and we’re all paying on that. So that’s why we really need to open up the books and get the value for the hard-earned money that Saskatchewan people deserve. Now, if we look at oil revenues in Saskatchewan, they’re up right? Because of international conflict, the Strait of Hormuz, and the blockades there, all the supply chain impacts that puts oil prices up in a big way for the province of Saskatchewan. You’d expect your province to be managing its dollars in a way that would allow families, farms, and businesses to then see a bit of a break at the pumps. The cost of living and the pressures that families are facing right now really are real. In fact, we’re the highest in the nation by way of financial anxiety. This is one way that we could provide a bit of relief. And you’ve got the feds doing the right thing, extending that suspension of the gas tax, the province should be stepping up and doing the same. The feds is 10 cents a litre, ours is 15 cents a litre. So if they were combined that would be a 25 cent a litre suspension or break, it would be certainly appreciated and needed by Saskatchewan families.

I know you hinted at a couple of things in one of your earlier answers, but if if the province were to say, “Okay, we’re going to suspend the provincial tax on gas,” that’s some lost revenue on what is already a fairly significant projected deficit. You said the answer is don’t mismanage money in other spots. Have you got a couple of of tangible examples of where that money could not only be made up, but maybe even cut into the deficit?

Wotherspoon: You see a government that’s making these choices in healthcare where there’s wasting dollars and not getting outcomes for patients. Whether it’s the mammograms, whether it’s the IT projects that have gone sideways, whether it’s not addressing the labour force and spending far more on out-of-province travel nurses who pay their their taxes elsewhere. They need to get it right as well when you’re looking at the big choices around power generation for the future. And what’s frustrating, I think, for most Saskatchewan people now, is it’s become evident that this government’s choosing a path that may be more costly to the tune of billions of dollars, that’s not chump change, that’s real money. We can look back to choices they made and waste with things like the GTH and the bypass. Those were big dollars, and they’re all booked in the debt, all growing, and we’re all still paying for the interest and costs on that.

The NDP have called for the early recall of legislature, why and what could be accomplished by going back early that couldn’t be accomplished if you’re not?

Wotherspoon: I think we really need to make sure we’re all united, steady, and strong as full partners in this Team Canada effort right now, in making sure we’re protecting the interests of workers and industry in our province, in our country, with the reckless and damaging actions of Trump. We need to make sure we have those measures in place for workers and industries that are being impacted. We should also be acting right now to be delivering some cost of living relief for the people of the province. And scrapping the gas tax is something that should be happening, corresponding with the federal extension would be good timing that would offer up some some relief. And we should have some accountability for why our finances continue to really not deliver for the people of the province. This is a government that budget to budget even, first quarter results in the last three years to what the final year-end results-they’ve been off by a billion dollars on both the expense and the revenue side. That’s the average over the last three years. So, this is a government that’s been poor with the budgeting that hasn’t gotten us the value that we deserve on our finances. And a recall of the legislature would allow us to act in an urgent way around the tariffs and the trade situation, and some cost of living, of course, as well.