A poor excuse

While Jack Layton is looking to build bridges to other levels of government, Stephane Dion is surprisingly rejecting Canadian municipalities in their call for a GST transfer:

The day after municipal leaders from across Canada voted to ask the federal government for what amounts to a share of the GST, Liberal leader Stephane Dion said he cannot support the request.

But Toronto Mayor David Miller, who led the charge for the "one cent" campaign says the municipalities will win in the end "because we're right."

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities says that towns and cities need the federal funding of about $5 billion a year to fix crumbling roads, transit systems, sewers and water mains. Toronto's share would be $400 million.

The amount is equivalent to diverting one percentage point of the GST to towns and cities – one cent of the six-cent tax on each dollar spent.

But Dion told reporters after a speech to the convention that the federal government needs the money to fight poverty...

"The Prime Minister is committed to decrease the GST by one additional point, that's $5.5 billion. I will use it to fight poverty, and I will work with municipalities on that."

Of course, it's a laudable goal to make a greater effort to fight poverty. But there's no apparent reason why Dion sees the two goals as incompatible - suggesting that Dion's claim is based primarily on an effort to change the subject, rather than a meaningful attempt to direct attention to Canada's neglected poverty issues.

After all, a stable funding arrangement with Canadian municipalities could surely include assurances that the funding would contribute to housing and support programs along with other infrastructure spending. But that would involve working with the municipalities on their proposed number, rather than looking for reasons not to transfer money to the local level.

Instead, Dion seems eager to use poverty as an excuse not to provide funding which could in fact help address the problem - without having any apparent alternative plan to address it with the money that's kept at the federal level. And while Dion may be receiving some credit for not being Deceivin' Stephen, neither municipalities nor those concerned with poverty in Canada should be the least bit happy with his deflection tactic.