St. Albert MP Brent Rathgeber met with local business leaders Friday in the lead-up to a federal budget that is expected to make big changes in how government operates.
For the third year in a row, Rathgeber held a roundtable meeting with business people at the chamber of commerce to get their input on the upcoming budget.
Rathgeber said he meets with the business community before the budget because they don’t normally seek him out to tell him what they think.
“We had a pretty good discussion about the state of the local economy generally and then specifically what the business community thinks the directions of the government should be as we put together a budget that should be tabled in March.”
Rathgeber said he expects the budget will show restraint and aim to reduce the deficit.
“We need to find our way back to balanced budgets.”
The government has asked all departments to prepare reports showing what a five-per-cent and a 10-per-cent reduction in their funding would lead to. Rathgeber said he doesn’t favour an across-the-board cut, but to get the nation’s finances in order, he believes some departments will have to cut more than 10 per cent, while others won’t be able to reduce their budgets at all.
Lynda Moffat, president and CEO of the chamber said the room was largely in agreement on what the federal government can do to help the economy.
Moffat said the business leaders always appreciate Rathgeber giving them insight on the government’s thinking, as well as asking for their input.
She said businesses don’t want to see a wholesale cut in government, but they do want to see the government closely examine the programs it operates and focus on those that help the economy grow.
Moffat said business leaders told Rathgeber they hope to see the Keystone and Gateway pipelines go ahead to diversify Alberta’s foreign markets.
“We want to see the federal government be strong advocates for all of that,” she said.
Rathgeber said he heard that message clearly, as well as suggestions from the business community to help move workers from other parts of the country to Alberta.
He said the current employment insurance arrangement, which sets different standards for different parts of the country, does not give people incentive to relocate. There are actually incentives for unemployed workers not to move and that, he said, “is something I need to take back to Ottawa.”
Moffat said the business community sees potential for labour shortages here and they want the government to help in attracting workers both from other parts of Canada and from abroad.
“For Alberta we have job creation to a huge degree, but we don’t have people.”
Rathgeber said the report he gives back to the finance minister on what he heard will be heard and will help with the fine-tuning of the document, but because of the complexity of the document much of the government’s approach is already worked out.
He said it is unlikely there will be sweeping changes to the employment insurance program in the budget, but it gets the discussion on the issue going.
“I think it is important to plant the seeds.”
