STFX University political science professor Jim Bickerton offered his insights into the province’s recent budget announcements and the reaction from Nova Scotians.
Last week, the province announced cuts totalling around $130 million to over 280 budget grants, with the elimination of some. Bickerton said the announcement ignited a fair bit of controversy over what is relatively a small portion of the $19 billion budget, but the cuts affect thousands of people in rural Nova Scotia.
St. FX Political Science Professor Jim Bickerton (St. FX Photo)
Bickerton said Premier Tim Houston received quite a bit of negative blowback, adding Houston recently made some indication that perhaps the government will take another look at things, so we’ll see if the government moves forward with the cuts.
What he finds interesting, said Bickerton, is the opposition parties aren’t really leading the charge against government, but are instead trying to catch up to the public, or at least the portion of the public upset with the announced cuts. He said we are beginning to see the NDP and Liberals catching on to the fact there is people showing their displeasure and putting a human face on these kinds of cuts.
Bickerton said it’s unfortunate things came to this, adding he thinks it could have been easily avoided if the government was more careful in their approach to getting the reductions they needed in order to limit the deficit. He said he hopes the government is willing to learn from this and take some corrective action.