Aside from being one of the most arrogant and condescending finance ministers in a long time, Jerome Kennedy might need to brush up on his math a bit.
Here's a sample of the arrogant and condescending finance minister in action first:
It is important, and whether or not the – I understand that the Leader of the Opposition does not understand. Nor would I necessarily expect her to. The reality is that this is not artificial spending here. We are not borrowing to spend on infrastructure. We are taking $1 billion and putting into infrastructure.
Everyday Jerome is on his feet there's at least one of those sort of slimy comments. Totally unnecessary, but he makes them every day. Too bad there's no one like Antonio around to teach the poor fellow some manners.
But that's not the problem.
Here's the problem:
In Question Period, Jerome revealed that the province's unfunded pension liabilities have grown, according to the finance minister, by $1.5 billion as a result of the downturn in the world economy. Here's what he told the House:
As the Leader of the Opposition is aware, in 2006 we paid $1.953 billion into the Teachers’ Pension Plan, and a further $982 million into the Public Service Pension Plan 2007, trying to bring these pension plans up to the funding levels of 80 per cent to 85 per cent, which is suggested.
The recent downturn in the economy and what has happened, Mr. Speaker, has resulted in approximately, right now, a shortfall of $1.5 billion in terms of our pension funds. That is not unexpected in light of everything that has gone on, and some of the figures I think I gave last night in terms of losses by the banks.
One figure, though, that becomes important, Mr. Speaker, although we have decreased our debt servicing charges by approximately $200 million, there could be a result in the pension cost next year of an extra $180 million.
That last figure is only somewhat important.
It is only important to the extent that in his financial statement on Tuesday Jerome patted himself on the back for reducing the debt servicing charges.
In the House, he revealed that - all things considered - those charges will grow by roughly the same amount as the decrease this year. That is important considering that expenditures are going up while revenue is going down. Not a good position.
But look again at the front end and the middle bit of that quote because that's where the big problem comes in.
The $1.9 billion is the Accord 2005 money received in a lump in 2005 and already spent. The $982 million - if memory serves - was borrowed.
But all that doesn't matter since the pension fund has lost $1.5 billion in value in the space of a few months. Apparently those shopping malls mortgaged in Ontario and British Columbia to Great-West Life, among others, aren't pulling in the expected bucks.
The inconsistencies among Jerome's comments at different times gives the old boy a basic problem: an accountability problem. He just can't seem to give a straight account of the province's financial state.
That's a pretty bad thing for a finance minister because if anyone needs to be able to keep his accounts straight, it would be him.
Bottom line?
We won't know the real financial position of the province until sometime after March 31, 2009 and even then we'll likely have to take Jerome's words with a grain of salt.
-srbp-