This day is a day to look ahead to what we need, but we can only do that if we learn from what hasn't worked in the past for Saskatchewan.
Provincial budget day is a great day to look ahead to the future, but it’s an even better day to demonstrate what you’ve learned from the past.
For Finance Minister Donna Harpauer and the Saskatchewan Party government, the 2023-24 budget unveiled Wednesday afternoon will be a glorious opportunity to show us how positives can emerge from the last three years of negatives.
More popular will be all of Wednesday’s spending.
It will be impossible to satisfy all stakeholders’ demands, so the challenge for the Sask. Party government this budget day will be demonstrating that it gets which priorities are truly the most important.
These past three years, there has been no lesson of greater value than the importance of our personal health and our health system as a whole.
Wednesday, the budget has to be about more than throwing around big health dollars to hire more doctors and nurses to address issues that predated the pandemic.
The government needs to now recognize the need for a better emergency response system. It must place far greater emphasis on preventative measures like normalizing the benefit of vaccination.
For purely political reasons, it seems unlikely that Premier Scott Moe, who is fighting to keep his own supporters from moving to the Saskatchewan United Party, will make this a public health budget.
Nevertheless, there are still smart ways where the government could accomplish this.
There is never a better time and place to demonstrate government innovation than on budget day. This government could unveil targeted, innovative funds in several health/social service areas including mental health, safe consumption sites, homelessness and better supports for the disabled and poor.
Often, it’s no more complicated than the government using its mistakes as a roadmap for where it needs to go.
It is a big request, but Saskatchewan has dropped from having the highest ($17,167 per student) funding in 2015-16 to sixth in 2019-20 at $14,011 per student.
This has resulted in a worst-in-the-nation 14.2 per cent decline in per-student funding — not exactly befitting of the Sask. Party “growth that works for everyone” mantra.
Surely, having the second-highest enrolment increase in the country at 9.6 per cent between 2012-13 and 2019-20 taught this government something about priorities, need and where it has fallen short.
Yes, this is a day to look ahead to what we need, but we can only do that if we learn from what hasn’t worked in the past for Saskatchewan.
Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
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