REGINA - Today, in response to the first quarter financial update, Official Opposition Finance Critic Trent Wotherspoon condemned the timing and priorities of the Sask. Party’s affordability plan.
“We’ve been calling for affordability relief for months. The Sask. Party government has hidden and hoarded billions of windfall resource revenues since March, yet they still hiked taxes, fees and utility rates. Waiting until the eve of a byelection to buy votes - while families have struggled for months - is completely irresponsible,” said Wotherspoon.
As Saskatchewan people face crushing cost-of-living increases, the Sask. Party’s affordability payment is a fraction of the increases in household expenses since they tabled this budget.
Families are set to spend six per cent more on sports and entertainment, and some face $200 in lunchroom fees. Next year, they will have to pay hundreds more for utilities alone. The plan announced today does not recognize the cost burden families are facing, as a childless couple is set to receive more than a single parent of three.
Wotherspoon also noted that despite receiving nearly $62 million months ago in surgery funding from the federal government, none has been allocated to deliver these services.
“The Sask. Party is giving regular people a one-time payment of their own tax dollars, while pocketing federal cash once again,” said Wotherspoon. “Instead of acting quickly to help people when they needed it most, this government is dead-set on recklessly taxing regular working people into submission, with no end in sight.”
“At the same time the Finance Minister wasted eight grand on a single flight to North Battleford, families had to cancel road trips just to put food on the table. The people of Saskatchewan deserve a government that doesn’t buy their trust, but earns it.”
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