Right in the centre - Heading down the wrong road
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- Published on Thursday, October 26, 2017
By Ken Waddell
Neepawa Banner & Press
The last time I had a chat with former Premier Greg Selinger, he asked me when I was going to write a column that was critical of the PC Manitoba government lead by Brian Pallister. Well, here you go Greg and you still won’t likely agree with me.
Premier Pallister floated the idea a few weeks ago that a heath care premium was being considered. I came out and said it was good idea. People may recall that I said, “Most provinces have premiums, Manitoba does not. We used to have them. Back in 1971, I paid them, as did every other employee, each month as a deduction on our pay cheques. The premier of the day, Ed Schreyer, took them off. That was a mistake, as the fees generated a lot of money for health care.
There are several advantages to a health care premium. One is that it is designated health care money, unlike a PST increase that can stray its way into any one of a number of government departments. The second advantage is that it keeps it front and centre in a person’s mind that health care isn’t free. It has a high cost to it. Forty-two percent of all government expenditures go to health care.”
A poll came out that showed a majority of the people interviewed were against a health care premium. I happen to think they are wrong. If Pallister backs down, and maybe he has to in the face of heavy poll results, I think he is wrong too.
The PC government is also wrong to implement a carbon tax. Manitoba produces so little greenhouse gas that it is almost impossible to measure it. And yes, it may help the environment to reduce greenhouse gases, but we have to understand two things. Manitoba’s contribution isn’t only minimal, it is actually a net negative. With all the hydro power generated, with all the farmland we have acting as a carbon sink and all the forests we have doing much the same, there is no way on God’s green earth that we can be held responsible or taxed for carbon. A carbon tax is insanity at its finest.
The carbon tax is being brought in by Prime Minister Trudeau’s backers. He doesn’t understand enough about science to know a greenhouse gas if he saw one, but it is the flavour of the week. No, it’s the flavour of the decade and the federal Liberals are going to ride it for every vote they can squeeze out of it.
The biggest problem with a carbon tax, as compared to a health care premium, is that the carbon tax will be frittered away into general revenue. A health care premium might be designated funding for health care.
Actually, the Manitoba Liberals took a step in the right direction on the weekend. They elected Dougald Lamont as leader. The Winnipeg Free Press said in an article, “Lamont listed three policy proposals he’ll put to the caucus and party right away. He’d create a Manitoba business development bank to boost private-sector job creation and he wants health-care reforms, beginning with the end of regional health authorities and their boards. ‘We want to dismantle them and return control to local communities,’” Lamont said. The Liberals would significantly reduce the number of children taken into care by social workers, he promised. ‘We have a CFS-to-prison pipeline,’ he declared.”
How’s that for fresh approach? But that said, it’s doubtful that Lamont will be against the carbon tax or in favour of a health premium. He should be, but like all the other politicians, he will likely fall in behind the Trudeau pack who say “yes” to carbon tax and “no” to health care premiums.
