Commuters in and around Canada's largest city got the bulk of the cash Thursday in a budget that seeks to buttress Ontario's busiest roads, bridges and transit system - and pave the way for a Liberal election win in 2007.
The province's Liberal government unleashed $1.2 billion in new infrastructure spending, mostly in the vote-rich Toronto area, in a move critics denounced as an effort to woo support for an election that's just over 18 months away.
Last year's projection of a $2.4-billion deficit remained unchanged for 2006-07, though this year it includes a $1-billion contingency fund, leaving Ontario as one of only two provinces in Canada that has failed to balance its books.
Health spending jumped $1.9 billion, including $12 million to buy insulin pumps for 6,500 children with Type 1 diabetes. Education spending climbed by $424 million, and highlighted a doubling of spending on post-secondary student aid.
Tax rates remained unchanged, save for a two-year acceleration of the government's original plan to eliminate the capital tax rate by 2012, long considered a drag on economic investment in the province.
Welfare rates and living allowances for people on social assistance are also set to increase by two per cent, the second time the Liberals have increased benefits. A promise to stop clawing back federal child tax benefits, however, failed to materialize.
And farmers circling the Ontario legislature on their tractors all week to protest a lack of funding saw little new beyond a recent pledge of $125 million for livestock producers and grain and oilseed farmers.
Annual revenues were $2 billion higher than expected, prompting opposition critics to accuse the government of borrowing a tactic from their federal Liberal cousins and low-balling previous projections in order to report better-than-expected results.
About $838 million of the $1.2-billion infrastructure package, dubbed Move Ontario, was earmarked for the Greater Toronto Area, including a $500-million expansion of Toronto's subway system and dedicated bus lanes in the suburbs of Brampton and Mississauga.
There was $400 million in one-time funding for rural and northern municipalities, money that Finance Minister Dwight Duncan estimated would pay to fix 800 local bridges and resurface 3,000 kilometres of municipal roads - the distance from Thunder Bay to Ottawa and back.
The new transportation funds follow previous pledges of $3.4 billion for southern Ontario highways and $1.8 billion for highways in the north.
The budget paid lip service to the need to improve delivery of goods across the Canada-U.S. border, but offered nothing new short of restating commitments of $300 million for the Windsor Gateway and $323 million for the Niagara and Sarnia crossings.
Those cities - in particular Windsor, Duncan's hometown - have for years clamoured for relief from border congestion, which they say slows the flow of millions of dollars worth of goods every day.
Duncan said a bilateral report on the crossing, expected soon, would help direct governments on how to improve traffic flow.
What the budget means for Hamilton
Hamilton has pressed the government every year for help to cope with the downloading of welfare costs to the city by the Conservative government of Mike Harris.
Di Ianni called this budget important to the well being of the city. The budget offered happy news for the city which asked for and received $25 million.
The mayor said the infrastructure money would be welcome in Hamilton. This is an understatement to say the less. The city's first infrastructure report card, in December, said Hamilton earned only about a C+ average for the state of its assets, such as facilities and parks, transit vehicles and storm water management. Roads earned a D rating, because of the massive backlog in upgrades.
Di Ianni also said he is anxious to see if Hamilton has a seat at the table when the long-awaited Greater Toronto Transportation Authority is unveiled in the budget. The new authority is part of a plan to create a seamless transit system for the Golden Horseshoe. It's significant to Hamilton because about 25,000 city residents commute to jobs in the GTA every day.
Di Ianni wants to see Liberal money before he embraces the idea of a region-wide transit system. And he and Burlington Mayor Rob MacIsaac see funding as a key component in any plan to improve transportation and reduce gridlock.
Later,
Kenaz
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