Halifax, NS – The 11th Nova Scotia Alternative Budget entitled “Finding a New Balance: Building Capacity for Nova Scotia’s Future” was released today by the Nova Scotia office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).
“This year’s Alternative Budget challenges the assumption that we are in a fiscal “crisis” and addresses the real crisis which is a ballooning social deficit,” says Charlene Croft, Chair of the Alternative Budget Working Group.
The 2010 Alternative Budget expands the provinces the fiscal capacity to deal with structural deficits by generating $523 million in revenue through increasing personal income tax rates for the wealthiest 40 per cent of Nova Scotians, closing corporate tax loopholes and growing the economy.
The budget prioritizes important social services such as community health care, post-secondary education and reforms to income assistance and also proposes $150.3 million in new investments in 'basic needs' and for the development of three new Crown Corporations to focus on Provincial Transportation, Public Auto Insurance and Worker's Co-operatives.
“This budget emphasizes the need for a new balance in Nova Scotia that addresses rural/urban divisions, focuses on local capacity building, and redirects public funds out of the hands of private for-profit interests into Nova Scotian communities,” says Croft.
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Members of the Alternative Budget Working Group are available for interviews in English and French.
For more information, contact Charlene Croft, Chair Alternative Budget Working Group (902) 719-0891.
Since 2000, the CCPA-NovaScotia has stimulated the dialogue on Nova Scotia’s economy through its ‘Alternative Budget’ document, a tool to assess the fiscal situation and the choices available to governments in Nova Scotia. Provincial budgets, like all public policy, are about choices and values.