REGINA – The Saskatchewan Legislature was back in action this week, but much of the real action appeared to be elsewhere.
From a Saskatchewan perspective, the real action was in India, where Premier Scott Moe joined Prime Minister Mark Carney for a major announcement impacting the province. It was news that a nine-year contract of approximately $2.6 billion had been struck for Cameco to supply uranium concentrate to the Government of India’s Department of Atomic Energy, for use in India’s nuclear reactors.
From a world perspective, the action was in the Persian Gulf as war broke out, taking out Iran's key leaders. Iran’s retaliatory strikes impacted oil shipments in the region and helped push oil prices higher.
That could have an impact on revenues for the upcoming provincial budget on March 18. Deputy Premier and Finance Minister Jim Reiter spoke to reporters at the Legislature on Monday, and he acknowledged the war with Iran and the spike in oil prices might have an impact on budget projections.
“Nobody anticipated that a month ago so these kind of things are always very difficult,” said Reiter. “That’ll bring more revenue in for the province (but) on the flipside of that, you’re going see, you’ve seen recently the Canadian dollar is stronger now. That seems kind of opposite of what you’d expect, but that actually costs us money in the provincial treasury. So this happens all the time — budget, of course, is a snapshot in time making the best that you can at that point in time.”
He said when it comes to the fluctuations seen in resource prices, the “best contingency we can have in this province is to not rely too much on natural resources, saying that his predecessor Donna Harpauer had spoken about that.”
As for the budget itself and whether there is a path back to balance from the $427 million deficit forecast in the midyear update, Reiter again acknowledged a looming deficit.
“There are economic headwinds that every province in this country is facing. I don’t think you’ll see a balanced budget in the country this year,” said Reiter.
“Having said that, we are positioned better than anyone fiscally. We have the best credit rating in the country, we have the second best net debt to GDP in the country so these are difficult times but we’ll get through it. The future is bright when you see things like we announced today with the uranium signing with India, there’s lots of projects happening in the province. Our future is bright.”
But the opposition NDP criticized the government this week over the province’s finances. They accused the government of being about to break a campaign promise where the Sask Party had pledged to balance the budget by 2027.
When asked about that criticism Monday, Reiter acknowledged balancing by 2027 was “going to be difficult, but there’s a forecast as part of every budget so I’m going to have to defer to March 18.”
On Tuesday, the NDP stepped up their attacks on the financial situation facing the province. At a news conference Opposition Leader Carla Beck and Finance Critic Trent Wotherspoon stood beside placards in which they predicted a potential $1 billion deficit for the province.
Beck said the financial situation “can be summed up by saying they’re a bit of a mess.” She accused Premier Moe of “steering the province’s finances off a cliff,” and also pointed to the debt doubling to $40 billion.
Beck said that “Saskatchewan people because of this financial mismanagement are paying $1 billion every year in interest alone to bankers in Wall Street and Bay Street just to pay the interest on that debt. The bottom line is that it’s Saskatchewan people who are already struggling to pay their own bills, who will ultimately pay the price for this government's continued mismanagement.”
