July 20, 2010 - No. 136
Federal Budget 2010-2011
Harper Government Dead Set Against
Strivings of the Workers and People for a Way Out of the Crisis
The Senate in a 48 to 44 vote passed the Harper
Budget Bill C-9 without amendments July 12, even though the Liberal
Party continues to say it opposes the budget. The Liberal Party in the
Senate could have defeated or amended Bill C-9, as the party still
holds a majority of Senate members. Several Liberal
members in the Senate stayed away from the vote allowing the bill to
pass. While Liberals in the House of Commons still speak publicly
against the Harper budget, they voted to pass it last spring to avoid
an election. The following article discusses some of the issues raised
by Harper's Budget.
***
The Harper government budget was presented last
March 4 and given Royal Assent July 12. The budget reveals a ruling
class and government determined to block the struggles of the Canadian
workers and people to defend the rights of all by restricting monopoly
right and building a pro-social self-reliant
economy that develops without crises. The Harper government sees no
possibility or future for the Canadian economy other than one ensnared
in the race among the rich and their monopolies to be competitive on
the global markets even if this means crisis and chaos in the economy
and in the lives of the workers
and people in Canada and on the world scale. During the G20 Summit
Harper said that Canada has no economy, as it exists only as a fragment
within the global economy or more properly said, captured within the
U.S.-led imperialist system of states.
The Harper budget reveals both a morbid preoccupation
with the idea of leaving the economy at the mercy of the vagaries of
the global markets and a hatred of anything that could be done to
deploy the assets of the nation in a way to serve the needs of the
Canadian people and engage in relations for mutual
benefit with other countries. According to the Harper government and
its budget, it is impossible and would be suicidal for Canadians to use
their human and natural resources and socialized means of production to
guarantee their own well-being and the health of Mother Earth, deploy
the human factor in a socially
conscious manner without destructive and wasteful unemployment and vest
the decision-making power in the people. The Harper budget serves
notice to Canadian workers and their allies that they must step up
their independent work to build an effective workers' opposition as the
only way to turn things around
for the benefit of the people.
Non-military measures in the
budget can be characterized as follows:
1) a budget that adamantly refuses to assist the workers
and people affected by the global economic crisis;
2) a budget that puts all the assets of the nation at
the disposal of the monopolies to assist them to secure their profits
and compete and win on the global markets at the expense of the people
and Mother Earth;
3) a budget that prepares for an assault of
unprecedented intensity on social programs and public services under
the hoax of returning to balanced budgets;
4) a budget that prepares for an anti-social revamping
of the retirement income system.
Refusing to Assist the Workers and People Affected by
the Crisis
The Harper government goes
on record for its stubborn and dogmatic refusal to provide any
assistance to workers and others who through no fault of their own are
in the midst of a global economic crisis. Canadians have been losing
their businesses and jobs by the hundreds of thousands and many are
facing economic insecurity and even the prospect of abject poverty and
civil death.
In this budget, the Harper government claims that it is
providing $4 billion to assist the unemployed and to protect and create
jobs. Of this $4 billion, $1.6 billion are said to go towards benefits
for the unemployed, including a one-year extension of the work-sharing
program. These measures are from the 2009
budget and extended into 2010-2011. They include five additional weeks
of EI benefits to workers eligible for EI and the possibility that
workers whom the government calls "long-tenured workers" will receive 5
to 20 weeks of additional benefits. "Long-tenured workers" are those
who have been paying for EI for
long periods but have never or rarely collected benefits. This budget
extends the two measures from 2009 for one more year. (As an aside,
workers should compare Harper's allocation of $4 billion for this
unemployment program -- dollars that mostly stay in the economy as
workers purchase necessities -- with the
$9 billion to purchase 65 U.S.-made fighter/attack jets plus an
additional $9 billion maintenance commitment -- dollars that mostly are
taken out of the Canadian economy.)
The government does not say that close to 60 percent of
unemployed workers across the country are routinely not eligible for
any benefits at all. This is particularly the case amongst part-time,
temporary, contract and seasonal workers. Besides, workers in
non-standard categories, who now number tens of thousands,
if not hundreds of thousands, if they lost their jobs in 2008-2009 have
now exhausted their benefits and are moving in large numbers towards
social welfare to survive. The government does not even acknowledge
their situation or address the blatant discrimination of a system based
on arbitrary criteria for eligibility,
especially with respect to the number of hours that must be worked
before a worker becomes eligible for EI. Such discrimination in the
context of a global recession leads to tragedies in the lives of
workers but the government turns a deaf ear on their situation and
their demands and by doing so blames them for
their plight. Instead of introducing emergency legislation to guarantee
that no one suffers from lack of employment the Harper government is
very busy concocting a rosy picture according to which the recession is
mild in Canada compared to the G8 or G20 countries and that Canada is
already experiencing recovery.
Millions of workers are left to fend for themselves at the worst time
in their lives. For decades workers have been demanding that the
arbitrary criteria for EI be scrapped, particularly that the number of
hours of work required be reduced so that all unemployed workers are
eligible. But federal governments, including
the Harper government, have flatly refused saying they do not agree
with "hand outs" and are not going to finance workers on "vacation," as
this weakens the iron fist of the labour market to keep workers
submissive and without modern rights.
The government also announced that EI premiums would be
allowed to rise again in 2011 after a temporary freeze. Workers will be
forced to pay more in premiums for a program that 60 percent of them
are not even eligible to access.
The outlook of the federal government does not recognize
workers as the producers of all wealth in society and providers of
services. The government's capital-centred outlook considers workers
not as producers of social product but consumers and a cost of
production. It views the legitimate claims of workers
on the value they add through their work as a cost to the rich and
their monopolies. The government falsely insists that the aggregate
added-value annually produced by the Canadian working class
transforming the bounty of Mother Earth is created by the monopolies
and not the actual producers. With this obsolete
view, any money returned to the workers through social programs to
sustain their living standard is considered a waste while money taken
out of the economy by the claims of the rich and their monopolies and
through plunder of the state treasury in pay-the-rich schemes is
considered to be positive and a means to
create additional wealth and jobs.
The "job creation" work-sharing program, through which
workers can allegedly avoid layoffs, requires workers to agree to work
fewer hours and in return receive for a limited time a portion of their
lost income through EI. This, however, does not begin to address the
fact that entire sectors of the economy, such
as forestry and manufacturing, are being decimated and that there is
nothing to share.
A situation where workers are losing their
livelihoods and means of subsistence and are being cast into ever more
precarious situations must be considered a major problem for the
society. To deny the producers of wealth and providers of services
their crucial role and claims on the country's collective social
product puts in peril the economy as a whole. General and sectoral
unemployment are signs of the need to put in place emergency measures
to defend the workers and their vital role in the economy. An economy
that cannot function without destroying wealth and denying the actual
producers their vital role and claims
needs serious economic renewal. The budget refuses even to discuss the
necessity of economic renewal. Instead, it is filled with
capital-centred prejudice and non-scientific outlook, for example that
the fall of the for-profit banking and credit sector could mean the end
of the country but the collapse of industrial production
seems to be something that Canada can very well endure.
Putting All the Assets of the Nation at the Disposal of
the Monopolies
The federal budget sees no other way to deal with the
crisis than to put all the assets of the nation at the disposal of the
monopolies to secure their profits and to make them competitive on the
global markets.
The budget refers to the need for Canada to be a leader
in the opening of markets within the G8 and G20 countries. The Harper
government states that Canada must be a major player in the opening of
markets because "Canada is dependent on trade." This claim discourages
any public discussion on what kind
of trade that should be and what role international trade should play
in a self-reliant economy. Canadians have the right to discuss in an
effective way what kind of economy they want and the right to have real
power over the economy's direction. The recent direct experience of the
economic crisis has opened the
eyes of many that economic renewal is necessary at least towards an
economy that is pro-social and self-reliant and not so dependent on
exports, an economy capable of overcoming destructive influences from
abroad such as the dramatic crash of U.S. demand for Canadian made
social product, an economy that deals
seriously and scientifically with the obsolete business cycle and
labour market.
The budget opposes the
outlook that trade should be conducted on the basis of mutual benefit
and not be an instrument to block the strivings of the people to be
sovereign in all their affairs including their economic affairs. The
most promoted measure of the budget in this regard is the elimination
of tariffs on
the import of machinery and equipment. The Harper government boasts
that it has been progressively eliminating tariffs over the years and
that 2010-2011 will see their total elimination. It presents this
measure as being critical to Canada's long-term prosperity and a source
of competitive strength for Canadian businesses.
For Canadian workers and their economy, the elimination of tariffs on
machinery and equipment means that the government is putting the nail
in the coffin of an economy that produces its own means of production,
an important component in the building of an all-sided sovereign
economy. The government raises
the issue of the so-called "competitive strength of Canadian business"
to hide this extreme weakness of the Canadian economy, its lack of a
diverse machine-building sector in all regions. This lack means that
much of the heavy industrial equipment necessary in modern production,
which are commodities containing
the most added-value, must be purchased abroad draining our collective
wealth and denying us work and expertise in this crucial sector and
security of supply.
Another measure pertaining to what the budget calls the
opening of markets is an "aggressive bilateral strategy that currently
includes efforts to complete a Comprehensive Economic and Trade
Agreement with the European Union, exploratory talks with India and the
implementation of recently concluded agreements
with Colombia, Panama and Jordan." Free trade agreements are an
abdication of social responsibility by governments. They hand over the
power over trade to the global monopolies that manipulate trade to
their narrow benefit and to the detriment of both Canada and others
ensnared within monopoly-controlled free
trade agreements.
As well, the elimination of regulations limiting foreign
ownership of Canadian subsidiaries of foreign monopolies is a move
widely seen as the precursor to the broad sale of Canadian
telecommunications and other companies to foreign interests.
Through all these measures, a view is presented that
Canada's future is inextricably tied to increased foreign domination in
all sectors of the Canadian economy. This comes at a time when the
examples of U.S. Steel, Vale Inco, Xstrata and others show that the
monopoly right of foreign owners to plunder our
resources and to act as they please -- including leaving people
stranded when the global monopolies decide to pack up and leave -- must
be restricted.
The budget includes tens of billions of dollars in
subsidies from the public treasury to assist monopolies to secure their
profits within the context of the global economic crisis and to make
them competitive and winners on the global markets. No broad discussion
of this issue has taken place. To many it appears
on the face of it as ludicrous to pay a monopoly to be competitive when
its competition may also be active in Canada. If the strength and
success of a monopoly wipe out a competitor how is the Canadian economy
any further ahead or more secure? As well, when monopolies grow
stronger this gives them increased
capacity, ability and willingness to move their operations globally or
control global production by limiting operations in their Canadian
subsidiary not to speak of their greater strength to manipulate prices
and drive down wages, benefits and pensions to the detriment of the
economy. Encouraging monopolies to compete
and win and paying them public funds to do so may make certain global
monopolies winners but Canadians, their communities and economy are the
certain losers.
The government is well known for its slavish regard for
the monopolies in the energy and mining sectors, which are particularly
notorious and opposed for their destruction of the natural and social
environments in Canada and abroad and for the dirty role they play in
feeding the war machine of the U.S. imperialists
and their military allies. In addition to everything else Canada
provides to private empires in the energy and mining sectors --
infrastructure, natural resources, a standing army of workers through
the obsolete labour market, large numbers of public subsidies and
incentives and low corporate taxes. These features allow
the monopolies to reap enormous wealth from Canada both as arrogant
spoilers of Mother Earth under the hoax of taking risks for
development, and increasingly under the camouflage of using "green
energy" and "green technologies."
Amongst these measures is the decision to further reduce
the federal general corporate income tax rate, which was lowered to 18
percent January 1, 2010 and further down to 16.5 percent January 1,
2011 and to 15 percent on January 1, 2012. The Canadian government
boasts that by 2012, Canada will have
the lowest statutory corporate income tax rate in the G7. This deprives
the public treasury of funds that should be allocated to social
programs and public services, and to build public enterprises in each
sector of the economy as the core of an economy that serves the people.
In the budget, plundering of the state treasury to
finance private empires is done under the hoax of stimulating the
economy to bring it out of recession and build the economy of the
future. No discussion is entertained of a people's stimulus to ensure
that public funds go only to strengthen public enterprises and
not into the coffers of the rich to reinforce their private empires
that pay the rich schemes are forms of corruption, privilege and
backwardness. Also, no discussion takes place surrounding the origin of
the stimulus money and that government borrowing acts as a safe-haven
for capital during a crisis when there is
nowhere else to invest. For example, this budget adds another $10
billion in subsidies to the monopolies ostensibly to rebuild Canada's
infrastructure and to help distressed industries, but these programs
serve to secure the profits of the construction monopolies and
suppliers, and also the financial oligarchy in the
context of a global economic crisis by providing risk free areas for
the investment of their capital.
That specific part of the budget called "stimulating the
economy" is scheduled to wind down at the end of March 2011. Even
before the conclusion of the stimulus program, the Harper government is
engaged in a propaganda campaign for "austerity to pay down the debt
and bring down the deficits to a balanced
budget." Those debts and deficits were incurred mostly from spending on
pay the rich schemes, providing infrastructure for the monopolies and
shifting claims of the people for modern healthcare, education and
retirement with dignity away from companies to the public treasury.
Austerity means paying down the
debt on the backs of the people by limiting funding of social programs
and public services, increasing individual taxation such as the HST and
government fees of all sorts.
In this budget, the thrust of the plundering of the
state treasury is shifted from what was called a "stimulus package" to
what Harper is now calling mobilizing all the resources to ensure,
"This country is going to emerge from this recession in the strongest
position of any first-tier country." The growth he refers
to in the budget is the growth of private capital and private empires
on the global markets, not the planned growth of production within new
relations that ensure that growth takes place to serve the needs of the
people and the general interests of society.
Under the general theme of partnership with the private
sector, the budget continues previously adopted measures to use public
money to pay the rich. One set of these measures pertains to the
increased financing of research done for the monopolies in research
institutes and educational institutions. Programs include
financing the development of the RADARSAT Constellation mission to
monitor the operations of the Canadian armed forces in their aggressive
role as annexed mercenaries to U.S. imperialism and to provide
lucrative contracts to the aerospace industry, and other projects such
as the College and Community Innovation
Program. The budget states that all research and educational activity
in the country makes sense only when geared towards what it calls "practical
applications," which means putting the human and material educational
and intellectual resources of the nation and public money at the
disposal of the monopolies.
Within the theme of plundering the state treasury to pay
the rich, much of the budget's emphasis is dedicated to what it calls a
review and speeding up of the regulatory review process of projects
proposed by the monopolies. The emphasis here is especially on projects
in the energy and mining sectors, which
are exactly the sectors where workers and communities in Canada and
abroad are waging the most bitter struggles to restrict monopoly right.
The example of BP's reckless destructive activities in the Gulf of
Mexico is now burned into our consciousness but the Canadian government
sees things in the opposite way
and proposes to expedite the review process to allow these monopolies
to do as they please without social and natural restrictions demanded
by the people.
The budget states: "Canada has established itself as an
energy superpower, being the third-largest global producer of gas,
seventh in oil production, and the world's largest supplier of uranium.
Our international reputation as a safe and reliable energy supplier
creates unprecedented opportunities for exporting our
energy products within an integrated North American energy market and
to the rest of the world. Our substantial reserves of oil, natural gas
and other energy sources make Canada an increasingly attractive
destination for global investment. These major new investments will
allow us to tap our abundant energy potential
while contributing to faster economic growth, creating a significant
number of high value jobs and rejuvenating communities, especially in
remote and rural areas.
"The Government can play an important supporting role in
promoting investment in major energy projects by ensuring that its
regulatory approval processes are timely, predictable, and do not
unduly delay investment decisions. In this budget, the Government is
taking steps to accelerate regulatory reviews of
major energy projects, while continuing to protect the environment and
ensuring that Aboriginal peoples and other interested stakeholders are
effectively consulted. These changes will lead to increased investment
and economic benefits for Canadians."
Workers will note that the
energy resources of Canada are considered by this government as annexed
sectors of the U.S. empire (e.g., "an integrated North American energy
market") and not precious assets of the nation to be used with extreme
caution regarding the natural and human environments and as part
of nation building and strengthening a diverse self-reliant economy
with manufacturing as an essential component in all regions including
the resource-rich ones. Workers will also note how the fact that these
resources are largely located on Native lands is raised as a sideline
issue and not as a matter of upholding
the hereditary rights of the Aboriginal Nations and of Canada entering
into nation to nation relations with those nations. This policy of
marginalizing Aboriginal Nations is based on negation of their
hereditary rights, elite accommodation through bribery and other means,
increased violence of the social conditions
and against those who refuse to submit, and criminalization of
resistance. This must be opposed by all.
The budget's concern for the environment is a fraud.
This is shown in part by the fact that the government is looking into
ways to accelerate regulatory review of major energy projects as if
speed is the problem, and by a measure in the budget that proposes that
environmental assessments of energy projects will
no longer be the responsibility of the Canadian Environmental
Assessment Agency. This important task will be delegated to the
National Energy Board and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.
Again, as part of eliminating any obstruction to the
impunity of the monopolies to do as they please, the budget announces
the establishment of a new Red Tape Reduction Commission involving both
Parliamentarians and private sector representatives to review federal
regulations and reduce what is called the
compliance burden on businesses.
Preparing for an Assault of Unprecedented Intensity on
Social Programs and Public Services under the Hoax of Returning to
Balanced Budgets
Returning to balanced budgets is another of the main
themes of the budget. Prime Minister Harper was very blunt about his
government's aim in his response
to the March 3 Throne Speech: "There is a widespread understanding
among Canadians of the need to return to balanced budgets when the
recession is over, to ensure funds are freed for the private sector to
create sustainable long-term jobs and growth." This is neoliberal
gibberish. How do balanced budgets free
funds for the private sector? A balanced budget is both an objective
and subjective relation between revenue and expenditures. The
government has great control over both aspects. A balanced budget could
just as easily demand that the monopolies provide more tax revenue for
the government thus increasing the
amount of public funds available for social programs, public services,
infrastructure and productive investments in public enterprise.
The budget announces a set of measures under the title:
"Containing the Administrative Cost of Government." The main two
measures are the following:
- in 2010-2011, the budgets of the departments are not
going to be increased to fund the 1.5 percent annual increase in wages
for federal public employees. The departments will have to finance that
increase with their operating budgets.
- in 2011-2012, and 2012-2013, the operating budgets of
the departments are going to be frozen at the 2010-11 levels.
The budget states that it is the expectation of the
government that the other federal organizations such as the Crown
Corporations will also freeze their operating expenses. The government
is going to meet with the unions representing federal public service
employees to assess the measures to be taken to review
their claims for wages, benefits and pensions. In an ominous tone, the
government states that it wants "better management" of those claims and
to make sure that the organization of the work is "effective." A
state-organized propaganda campaign against public service
defined-benefit pensions has already begun in
earnest.
Combined with this is the announcement of what is called
"a strategic review of government operations." Under this category, all
departments have to assess all their programs and identify 5 percent of
their lowest priorities and their "lowest performing" ones. This review
is to be done under the authority of the
President of the Treasury Board. Part of the review is the assessment
of ways to "improve service delivery" keeping in mind the two main
measures mentioned above.
Grants and contributions emanating from the government
are also to be reviewed to make sure that funding is tied to furthering
the priorities of the government. Part of the review of what is called
"corporate asset management" is now underway and will continue, with
three possible options: status quo, amendments
or divestment. Women's organizations have already revealed huge federal
cuts in their grants and contributions.
Then the budget proposes to eliminate 245 Governor in
Council positions. These are the management positions of state agencies
and Crown corporations (e.g., Canadian Wheat Board, Canadian Grain
Commission, Canada Post.)
The combination of these measures point to what could be
an unprecedented assault on social programs and public services, and
privatization and sell-off of public assets such as AECL, which is
already a small shell of what once existed. The federal government does
not share the view that social programs and
public services are a necessary component of a modern society and with
vibrant public enterprises in each sector acting as the core of an
economy that serves the needs of the people and protects them and the
economy from the downturns of the business cycle, downturns which are
becoming more severe and prolonged.
The Harper government sees social programs and public services as a
cost to society, which must be reduced or eliminated so that more of
the aggregate social wealth can be put at the disposal of the
monopolies and in the hands of the rich. This includes leaving social
programs and public services at the mercy of
private profiteers. Neoliberals view every pore of the economy and
social life as an "opportunity" for private gain at the expense of the
public good. Across the country, public services such as public
education and healthcare are under pressure from lack of funding and
government support. The private profiteers demand
more and more areas within public services be opened up and plundered
by owners of capital.
The attacks on state agencies in the form of elimination
of staff and continual restriction of financing and operations to
within very narrow parameters are in line with government priorities.
They reveal that under the hoax of a review of administrative costs, a
state structure is being built that will proceed to dismantle
and privatize public services as "purely administrative" measures
without any say by the people and elected officials, and by
criminalizing the opposition of the people. The repression of executive
members of the Canadian Wheat Board in recent years shows what is meant
by making these organizations more "effective"
in line with the priorities of the government, such as offering more
private monopoly controlled "choice."
The Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) and the
Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) have already pointed out that
the further elimination of jobs and stepped up privatization in federal
agencies underway at this moment are occurring under the hoax of
improving "efficiency" and offering "choice."
The Harper government is providing a template for similar cuts in
provincial services and institutions such as the attacks on local
provincial boards of education and their elected trustees.
The budget also announces
an overhaul of the retirement income system without a single word about
workers' pension monies that have been stolen by the monopolies with
the blessing of the state and which must be returned to them. Harper's
budget utters not a word of its social responsibilities to defend the
well-being of the people such as the necessity to guarantee the
pensions workers already have and extend Canadian standard pensions to
all so that no senior is left insecure in retirement. The budget makes
it very clear that the pension overhaul is to reform the retirement
income system on the basis of all pensions
becoming a savings fund and source of money capital for the rich. As
with everything connected with the economy and social life, owners of
capital want pensions and retirement as a source of private profit.
They and the government do not view pensions as a social program that
all Canadians deserve as a modern
right, which must be funded from annual revenue of the socialized
economy. Workers while active produce all the wealth of society and a
portion of that social product must be allocated for elderly Canadians
during retirement at a percentage of their previous average earnings
with a guaranteed minimum Canadian standard for all.
This federal budget is a slap in the face of the
struggles and the deep strivings of the working class and its allies
who are facing the crisis with great courage by defending the rights of
all and fighting for a way out of the crisis based on the renewal of
the economy. The budget once more tells the workers that
they cannot expect a remedy from the gods of plague and that it is up
to them to build a society that is humane and advanced and works for
the benefit of all.
Read The Marxist-Leninist
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Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: editor@cpcml.ca
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