You'd hope and expect that canadian conservatives would not get sucked down the massive-deficit tubes fashionable among neocons elsewhere, eh ... remains to be seen, but i highly doubt such a course is likely, we'll be cancons not neocons ..... one of the differences is that the canuckabuck has never had any propping up due to seigneurage effect, nobody ever gave us real goods and services in exchange for bits of paper they'd use in their own economies, or stack up as reserves, so we've never been able to rely on such support, and haven't formed bad habits centred on it ..... also what Michael says is true, spiral deficit financing went out of style all over, with a single noted exception recently .... we've still got a massive debt of course, thanks to PCs partly, but more thanks to big-L Liberals .... speaking of which -
' Gun registry cost soars to $2 billion
Last Updated Fri, 13 Feb 2004 23:02:56
MONTREAL - Canada's controversial gun registry is
costing taxpayers far more than previously reported,
CBC News has learned.
INDEPTH: Gun Control
Nearly $2 billion has either been spent on or
committed to the federal program since it was
introduced in the mid-1990s, according to documents
obtained by Zone Libre of CBC's French news service.
The figure is roughly
twice as much as an
official government
estimate that
caused an uproar
across the country.
The gun registry was
originally supposed
to cost less than $2
million. In December
2002, Auditor
General Sheila Fraser revealed that the program would
run up bills of at least $1 billion by 2005.
But the calculations remained incomplete, so CBC
News obtained documents through the Access to
Information Act and crunched the numbers.
A large part of the $2 billion expense is a computer
system that's supposed to track registered guns,
according to one document. Officials initially
estimated it would cost about $1 million. Expenses
now hover close to $750 million and the electronic
system is still not fully operational.
Other errors and unforeseen expenses include $8
million in refunds to people who registered their guns,
and millions more in legal fees that mounted during
court challenges.
A spokesperson for the Coalition for Gun Control
disputed Zone Libre's calculations, calling the $2
billion figure inaccurate.
The auditor general has pledged to re-examine the
gun registry to come up with an updated assessment.
Last month, Prime Minister Paul Martin rejected calls
to scrap the program. But he said the government
intends to review the way it's being run and is
prepared to make changes. '
cbc.ca |
