Michael appalled with government-created crisis

NDP Leader Lorraine Michael (MHA, Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi) says the provincial government has created an economic crisis with bad fiscal planning and is unfairly expecting workers to pay for its mistakes.

“Any government that is doing responsible planning would not all of a sudden discover it has the potential for $1.6B budget deficit,” Michael said today. “This government should have been doing long-term planning. Instead, it has been indulging in crisis decision-making. When they had extra money, they spent it. Now they think they will have less money, they are frantically cutting.”

Michael says government’s erratic approach to budgeting has created a work environment dominated by fear. At the same time, she says, cabinet ministers and the premier continue to talk about how well the provincial economy is doing.

“Just over two months ago, this government was putting all its efforts into committing the people of this province to our biggest megaproject ever,” Michael pointed out. “Are they saying that they had no idea of this looming deficit when they were committing our grandchildren to paying for Muskrat Falls?

“As recently as last week, the finance minister was referring to our economy as a Camelot of prosperity,” Michael said. “I think government needs a wizard like Camelot’s Merlin to get them out of the mess they have created.”