Instead of accepting responsibility for their own mismanagement, scandal, and waste, the Sask. Party is once again attacking hardworking Saskatchewan people, including those who serve in classrooms across the province.
“The Sask. Party’s billion dollar deficits were not caused by the hard-working people of this province and they were not caused by women and men who work in our kids’ classrooms,” said NDP Education Critic Carla Beck. “After years of hiding the truth and lying about the state of the finances, instead of accepting responsibility, the Sask. Party is finding every way possible to force Saskatchewan people – including our kids and their schools - to pay the price for Sask. Party mismanagement, scandal, and waste.”
After significant concerns were raised over a Sask. Party letter to school boards demanding that salary costs in the 2017-18 fiscal year be no higher than 2016-17, the Finance Minister revealed Monday that similar letters were sent to all Saskatchewan public employer groups. That includes those who work on the front lines of health care and in our Crown corporations.
“It’s hard to believe how arrogant the Sask. Party has become. This freeze on staffing costs means that they plan to either rip up commitments and contracts they have already signed or they’ll throw even more Saskatchewan people out of work. Let’s remember that the Sask. Party already refused to provide school boards with the proper funding to pay teachers; they are a government that happily added three new MLAs to the legislature; and this is a party that continues to take tens of thousands of dollars from big corporate and out of province donors and hand it over to the Premier, just because he’s their leader.”
Beck also noted that it was the Sask. Party and not the people of Saskatchewan who blew through nearly a decade of record revenues, the $2 billion Rainy-Day Fund, and the billions in surplus the last government left them.