We now know when to expect a provincial budget — June 1 or more than two months after it is normally presented in the Saskatchewan legislature.
However, we don’t know “what” to expect in a tough 2016-17 budget in which the downturn in oil and the overall Saskatchewan economy appears to have caught up with us.
Judging by some hints Premier Brad Wall has already dropped, it may be that we really don’t want to know.
Something is about to give — something we are about to find out two months later than we normally do and not until after the provincial election.
To the credit of Premier Brad Wall and company, where they have often demonstrated skills is the not-so-easy task of keeping operational spending in line.
Admittedly, there are those who would argue this has not necessarily always been the case.
The Saskatchewan Party government’s first budget was chockfull of overspending — both in capital spending and operational spending.
Most significant was the 36-per-cent-plus four-year settlement given to nurses, which set a precedent for all public sector spending and drove up the expense side of the ledger as quickly as the revenue side of the ledger was increasing at the time.
The problem, however, was that revenues did not remain high because what was once $140 US a barrel oil is now $40 US a barrel.
By contrast, government spending — even when you take into account the flexibility of supposed one-time capital investments — remain with us and is much harder to reduce.
But under former finance minister Ken Krawetz in particular, the government proved to rather good at keeping operational costs in line within the budget year. That included health spending, that somehow always seemed to explode within the budget year under old NDP government.
In fact, short of the unexpected costs like fire and flooding, the Sask. Party has been very good at meeting the budget goals it set out.
What it hasn’t been very good at, however, is keeping the budget at the same level year after year.
And keeping the 2016-17 budget close to last year’s $14.3 billion — a budget that contained an admitted $427-million deficit plus $700-million on capital borrowing the government doesn’t much talk about — will be a tough job.
The challenge for the Wall government begins with the reality that it was elected on continuing to provide services and not cut services that the public saw as a priority.
Included in that is specific promises to rural folk like an extra $70 million to fix the roads.
Further complicating his situation is Wall’s recent commitment to increase spending to health ($5.6 billion) education ($3.6 billion) and social services ($1.2 billion).
That totals $10.4 billion plus the promised modest increases, leaving the government to find the savings in the remaining $4 billion of spending.
Included in that $4 billion is highways spending (that Sask. Party platform said it would increase) and municipal government (where rural and urban communities have been told they will still get their full share of the revenue sharing pool).
Moreover, Wall also said recently his government won’t raise taxes and plans to keep the deficit at less than last year’s $427 million.
That leaves preciously little wiggle room for his government that must look at other critical ministries as potential candidates for cuts.
Among those ministries most likely to feel the axe in the June 1 budget are ones critical to rural Saskatchewan. That would include agriculture, environment and natural resources and economic development.
Also, while Wall might say there will be increases in health education that doesn’t mean rural and smaller city hospitals or rural school boards aren’t about the feel the pinch.
Cost cuts will not come easy.
Murray Mandryk has been covering provincial politics for over 22 years.
