Budget Archives - Page 2 of 9

E. Preston Manning- Management Consultant circa 1983

19Jul

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Capital Spending, Fiscal History, Government Finances, Politics

E. Preston Manning- Management Consultant circa 1983

In this extraordinary document, found in Lou Hyndman's papers deposited with the Provincial Archives in 1986, is a 12-page submission by Manning Consultants Limited to pitch a "Citizens' Committee on Productivity and Economy in Government." It was proposed that Manning Consultants co-ordinate the organization of "information request forms," workshop and final report. As the document reveals, the proposal is highly moralistic in tone. The document is a response to unfortunate stories in the media about government "extravagance and waste" and lifestyle choices of elected government officials and senior civil servants. The document's fiscal conservatism is vintage Preston Manning whose Reform party publicized government waste and inefficiency. This remarkable document sheds light on Mann...

Lou Hyndman’s reply to Preston Manning’s proposal

19Jul

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Capital Spending, Fiscal History, Government Finances, Health, Politics

Lou Hyndman’s reply to Preston Manning’s proposal

In an earlier post, in the fall of 1983, Preston Manning, then President of Manning Consultants a firm his father established wished push fiscal policy changes. The timing may be significant because by that time Peter Lougheed had been in office for 12 years and there was speculation growing about when her would exit. Lou Hyndman's somewhat testy reply to Preston Manning's circulation of his groups report to all M.L.A.'s and to Progressive Conservative delegates at the annual convention was especially cool. The displeasure is evident in Manning's courageous and naive proposal to reduce the size of the Alberta Legislative Assembly consistent with principles that fiscal discipline should begin at the top. His reference to the earlier Social Credit government allowing the civil service to r...

30Jun

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Credit Ratings, Economic Data, Energy, Fiscal History, Politics

Ideas, Thoughts, Experiments Episode 4- Conversation with Robert Bhatia

This conversation occurred one week before the provincial election and canvassed three main topics- fiscal and economic policies, and politics. Click here to see the conversation. Robert Bhatia is a retired, long-term Alberta public servant rising to the position of deputy minister. He served as deputy minister in four ministries including Alberta Revenue and Alberta Finance. During his tenure he served on the boards of provincial agencies including the Alberta Investment Management Corporation and the Credit Union Deposit Guarantee Corporation. Since his retirement, he has joined the Local Authorities Pension Plan Board, was chair of the Alberta Balancing Pool and was named as a public member to the Credit Union Central Alberta board of directors where he is now Vice-Chair. He had signi...

31May

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Energy, Fiscal History, Politics

Ideas, Thoughts, Experiments- Alberta 2023 Conversation with thought leaders Episode 2- Lori Williams

To watch the conversation click here. In the second of a series of conversations with well known Albertans, Bob Ascah speaks to Professor Lori Williams of Mount Royal University. This conversation was recorded on Thursday 18, before the leadership debate. The discussion delved into the 2023 election which, at just past the mid-point remained too close to call. Ms. Williams identified health care and affordability as the key policy issues in this election. Other topics covered included how safe are the 41 "rural seats" for the UCP? Williams noted that during the 2019 election, Jason Kenney's controversial history as a student at a San Francisco Jesuit seminary this was generally ignored in the campaign. So why did Smith's leadership opponents not dig out these con...

Oil and Gas royalties, unpaid municipal taxes, and unaddressed reclamation

17Apr

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Agencies, Budget, Energy, Environment, Opinion/Research

Oil and Gas royalties, unpaid municipal taxes, and unaddressed reclamation

In June 2022, Alberta’s then Energy Minister Sonya Savage, a former executive with the Canadian Energy Pipelines Association, warned the federal government not to consider a tax on windfall profits of the energy industry. When asked about the oil industry’s record cash flows and remediation liabilities, Savage stated: “The current spike in oil prices isn’t enough reason to require the industry to spend more on cleaning up the tens of thousands of abandoned oil and gas wells in the province.” In reflecting on this statement, it suggests that expanded spending by Alberta’ producers on remediation expenses might imply royalty payments to Alberta might fall. In short, the province may have a short-term financial interest in not losing revenue when reclamation spending increases. This cont...

28Mar

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Energy, Environment, Government Finances, Health, Opinion/Research, Politics

Solutions-based policy development and Some Modest Recommendations

There are major issues confronting Alberta- a massive understatement if there ever was! As a student, practitioner, and teacher of public policy for over 40 years, the following ideas are in a germination phase and readers are encouraged to comment and add their suggestions on the central germ of this idea. A solutions-based approach to government policy-making offers a means of identifying a small number of “problems” which require immediate attention and on which there is a consensus on the need for action. This approach starts with Problem identification. The government’s prerogative, but our current government arguably sees things much differently than a majority of Albertans- (e.g. the visceral hate of the federal government as represented by Mr. Trudeau.) In this blogpost, I set o...

<em>A Better Future </em>– Recommended Reading

26Mar

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Capital Spending, Fiscal History, Government Finances, Opinion/Research

A Better Future – Recommended Reading

Updated 27 March 2023 A Better Future: Fiscal Recommendations to Position Alberta for Success, authored by Todd Hirsch for NDP leader Rachel Notley was released Friday 23 March. Hirsch, ATB’s Chief Economist (2007-2022) is deeply knowledgeable about Alberta’s economy and the financial system having worked earlier in his career at the Bank of Canada (full disclosure: I hired Todd while I was at ATB Financial). In short, he is a respected economist and a consummate communicator, A Better Future is a valuable contribution to a long overview discussion of Alberta’s public finances. In the Introduction, Rachel Notley observes the following. Albertans want and deserve excellent healthcare and a top-flight education The Government of Alberta relies on natural resources revenue. Natural resourc...

Budget Speech- Annotated and The Economic Consequences of Mr. Toews

9Mar

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Credit Ratings, Employment, Energy, Fiscal History, Government Finances, Intergovernmental, Opinion/Research

Budget Speech- Annotated and The Economic Consequences of Mr. Toews

Budget Speech delivered on Tuesday 28 February 2023, Legislative Assembly of Alberta Mr. Speaker, I count it a tremendous honour to rise in the House today to present Budget 2023 – the fifth I have presented on behalf of Albertans. In the fall of 2019, I put forward a four-year plan to bring the province back to fiscal responsibility and a balanced budget. In some respects, these past four years have felt like a century – in part, due to the extraordinary global challenges we faced but also because of how far we’ve come. When, as a government, we took office in 2019, Alberta had an economy that was flat-lined, and we were spending $10 billion more than comparable provinces on services, without better outcomes. Our plan to strengthen Alberta’s economic foundation was two-fold: First, to bri...

Budgetary advice from UofC and the Fraser Institute – cross-examined

15Feb

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Energy, Environment, Opinion/Research, Politics

Budgetary advice from UofC and the Fraser Institute – cross-examined

“Don’t Spend Away the Windfall: Better Options for Alberta’s Unexpected Revenues,” written by Jack M. Mintz, Trevor Tombe, Joel Emes, and Tegan Hill is timely asit arrives a few weeks before the provincial budget (28 February). This contribution, combining the right leaning Fraser Institute and two well-known University of Calgary economists offers three approaches for considering the windfall by Alberta’s finance minister Travis Toews. The paper’s moralistic title suggests politicians are not to be trusted with windfalls At this moment, we are also awaiting the report of Todd Hirsch who was engaged by the Alberta NDP to study “how an NDP government can stabilize the province’s finances and build a more resilient economy.” His mandate has been interpreted as what to do with the windfall b...

Moody’s upgrades Alberta’s credit rating

11Feb

By Bob AscahNo Comments

Budget, Credit Ratings, Energy, Government Finances

Moody’s upgrades Alberta’s credit rating

After a decade of seeing its credit rating fall steadily from the coveted triple AAA rating to AA3, surging oil revenues have again lifted Alberta’s credit rating. Nature of credit ratings Credit ratings do matter to all governments which borrow on international and domestic capital markets. There is so much debt in the world that for large bond buying desks their analysts cannot focus on every credit in detail. These institutional investors count on rating agencies to undertake thorough, in some cases almost forensic work, to assure large institutional investors- think Vanguard, Swiss RE, J.P Morgan and the CPPIB- that the risks they are managing, including default risk, are fully understood and the debt/credit portfolios have risk limits understood by the bond buyers.. Credit ratings a...