On Friday, the Conservatives revealed how they’d pay for their promises, although the platform was sparse on details, and the party limited how many questions could be asked about its plans – that explains why they released it a day after the last debate.
Andrew Scheer’s cuts would ‘pay for themselves.’ That optimistic messaging echoes the failed fiscal policies introduced by Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper and of recent, that of Ontario premier, Doug Ford.
The Conservatives are promising $35.4 billion in spending cuts over five years to make good on their pledges. The platform also promises to freeze public service hiring, for an estimated saving of $1.2 billion over five years.
The Conservatives say “other operating expenses reductions” — spending cuts — would save $14.4 billion over their five-year plan, although exactly what would be cut is not clear from their document.
53 billion in cuts proposed by the Conservative platform to balence the budget by 2024 (I’m calling BS). Let’s take a guess what will get cut? #ScheerCuts
— Lucy 🇨🇦 (@TheBlueGem3) October 11, 2019
Harper’s cuts / 11000 jobs cut
Harper came to office in 2006, over the period of five years there were five federal corporate tax cuts for his conservative corporate friends, with the last 1.5% tax reduction taking effect on 30 December 2011, bringing the federal corporate tax to 15 percent.
By the end of 2011, the corporates are saving up their corporate surpluses or dead money as former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney called them. And the cut didn’t pay for itself, Canadians paid.
11000 jobs were cut within eleven months in 2012. In November 2012, Stephen Harper’s Treasury Board president Tony Clement stated that the federal government had cut 10,980 public service jobs, This include health care cuts.
Here are few of the Harper’s job cuts we were able to track:
| Departments Affected | Jobs cut | |
| 1 | Health Canada | 840 |
| 2 | Statistics Canada | 273 |
| 3 | Library and Archives Canada | 105 |
| 4 | Transport Canada | 180 |
| 5 | Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada | 490 |
| 6 | Department of defence | 1149 |
| 7 | Human Resources and Skills Development Canada | 908 |
| 8 | Institute of the Public Service of Canada | 1500 |
| 9 | CBC | 650 |
| 10 | Agriculture & Agri food | 5561 |
| 11 | Park Canada | 2327 |
