Debates of May 23, 2008 (day 14)
Question 177-16(2) Budget Address 2008
I wasn’t planning to ask any more questions, but after the Finance Minister offered to let Mr. Ramsay help him write his next Budget Address, for one minute I thought he was serious. I thought I had seen a little evidence of something called working together. I believed him, and then he said, of course, “Oh yeah, I won’t be the Finance Minister next time.”
I don’t know who the Premier and Finance Minister hired to write his speech this year, but we seem to be having some trouble with the language in it. We’re having a little difficulty understanding it. As Mr. Bromley said, maybe we’re just dense on this side of the House. But in the interest of clarity, we have the budget paper, economic review, fiscal review. Would it be possible to add to that? In the interests of people understanding why we are making these reductions, if we could include a fiscal forecast in this, that would lay that out for the next several years.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Minister of Finance, Mr. Roland.
Mr. Speaker, I believe that would be good advice. We talk about it as Members. We shared that, our fiscal strategy, the years of projections, what goes into our projections and using our relationships. For example, our first year of budgeting comes from numbers we know we had from the federal government. We build on that with estimates. So yes, I can't see why we can’t put that in place.
Thank you, Mr. Roland. Oral questions. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.