- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 210
No increase for military, Manley says
'We are not going into deficit to build the Armed Forces or to build anything else': Admits underfunding
Sheldon Alberts
National Post
National Post
John Manley, the Finance Minister, said yesterday that U.S. concerns over the lack of Canadian spending on the military have merit, but warned that the government will not rush to increase armed forces funding.
OTTAWA - John Manley, the Minister of Finance, said yesterday U.S. complaints that Canada's military is underfunded are valid, but warned that demands for an extra $2-billion a year for the Armed Forces are unrealistic and would drive the government into deficit.
Despite repeated calls by the U.S. administration and Canadian military analysts for Ottawa to increase defence spending, Mr. Manley said he is not willing to risk the government's shrinking surplus with a large infusion of cash for the military.
Mr. Manley also said Ottawa is planning to be just as cautious in the area of social spending amid fears in Canada's business community that Jean Chré'©en is planning a spending spree during his last 18 months as Prime Minister.
"We don't have $2-billion available right now [for the military]. We'll have to see how the economy goes over the next year, but our fiscal situation remains paramount," Mr. Manley said in an interview with the National Post. "The United States has gone from a more than $200-billion surplus to now forecasting a roughly $150-billion deficit. But they are the United States. We can't do that. We are not going into deficit to build the Armed Forces or to build anything else."
Mr. Manley added: "We have fought too hard to regain our credibility internationally based on managing our finances to put that at risk now. So that is the cornerstone. Everything else will flow from there."
Mr. Manley's comments came on the heels of new criticism from Paul Cellucci, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, that the federal government is failing to spend enough money on defence in the wake of last year's Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
The Chré'©en government has heard repeated concerns -- from groups as wide-ranging as the C. D. Howe Institute to the Commons defence committee -- that the national military is so underfunded that Canada is virtually defenceless. There have been several calls for Ottawa to increase the Canadian Forces budget by an extra $2-billion to $4-billion over the existing $12-billion it now spends each year.
Mr. Cellucci said this week the level of concern among U.S. officials about Canada's military funding reaches the highest levels of the Bush administration.
Mr. Manley said Canada has done more than its fair share in providing military support to the U.S.-led war on terrorism over the past year by contributing ground troops in Afghanistan and naval support in the Persian Gulf.
But he acknowledged the U.S. complaints have some merit and said Canada may have to re-evaluate its funding levels if it hopes to continue meeting existing international commitments.
"Obviously, our military capabilities have been called upon in the last year in ways we never expected they would be. We never thought we would have ground forces in Afghanistan, for example, or naval forces in the Gulf," he said. "We have all heard how strained we have been to do those things as well as continuing to meet our obligations in Bosnia with peacekeeping. So there may be some validity to it."
Mr. Manley is expected to deliver his first budget as Finance Minister later this fall or early next winter. The problem Ottawa faces as it contemplates increased military spending is that Canadians' appetite for more defence funding is waning as the memory of Sept. 11 begins to fade, he said.
Calls for increased defence spending must be weighed against the expectation for more health care funding that is likely to come after this fall's release of the long-awaited report by Roy Romanow, the former Saskatchewan premier, on the state of Canada's health care system, he said.
"For many other Canadians, [Sept. 11] is increasingly remote and the distance is growing," Mr. Manley said. "When you do these polls and ask people what the key issues are, we saw security spike up in late September and October of last year and then gradually subside. It is still higher than it was a year ago today, but other issues are now more important in the public consciousness."
The government's latest budget earmarked $7.7-billion over five years for security-related spending in areas such as border security, including $1.2-billion for the military. Much of that money is still to be designated, Mr. Manley said.
He said he believes Canadians are growing weary of the continuing focus, particularly in the media, on Sept. 11 as the one-year anniversary of the terrorist attacks approaches.
He thinks it is a mistake, however, for Canadians to grow complacent about the potential threat the country faces from terrorism. He said it is important, when questioning the continuing government focus on issues such as border security, to remember that 25 Canadians died in the attacks.
"I think there is a certain amount of ambivalence about [the Sept. 11 anniversary]. I think that the feeding frenzy on Sept. 11 stories that we are all seeing on the American networks is probably going to wear a little thin on Canadians," Mr. Manley said.
"We wouldn't mind one day of that, but we probably aren't going to enjoy 10 days of it. I think there is a continuing sense of the scale of what happened on Sept. 11. I don't think Canadians have forgotten how big this is or how important this is. But I think they have, over the course of the year, distanced themselves from the immediacy of its impact on them ... I think that Canadians need to remember that Canadians did die on Sept. 11, both in the planes and in those buildings."
? Copyright 2002 National Post
'We are not going into deficit to build the Armed Forces or to build anything else': Admits underfunding
Sheldon Alberts
National Post
National Post
John Manley, the Finance Minister, said yesterday that U.S. concerns over the lack of Canadian spending on the military have merit, but warned that the government will not rush to increase armed forces funding.
OTTAWA - John Manley, the Minister of Finance, said yesterday U.S. complaints that Canada's military is underfunded are valid, but warned that demands for an extra $2-billion a year for the Armed Forces are unrealistic and would drive the government into deficit.
Despite repeated calls by the U.S. administration and Canadian military analysts for Ottawa to increase defence spending, Mr. Manley said he is not willing to risk the government's shrinking surplus with a large infusion of cash for the military.
Mr. Manley also said Ottawa is planning to be just as cautious in the area of social spending amid fears in Canada's business community that Jean Chré'©en is planning a spending spree during his last 18 months as Prime Minister.
"We don't have $2-billion available right now [for the military]. We'll have to see how the economy goes over the next year, but our fiscal situation remains paramount," Mr. Manley said in an interview with the National Post. "The United States has gone from a more than $200-billion surplus to now forecasting a roughly $150-billion deficit. But they are the United States. We can't do that. We are not going into deficit to build the Armed Forces or to build anything else."
Mr. Manley added: "We have fought too hard to regain our credibility internationally based on managing our finances to put that at risk now. So that is the cornerstone. Everything else will flow from there."
Mr. Manley's comments came on the heels of new criticism from Paul Cellucci, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, that the federal government is failing to spend enough money on defence in the wake of last year's Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
The Chré'©en government has heard repeated concerns -- from groups as wide-ranging as the C. D. Howe Institute to the Commons defence committee -- that the national military is so underfunded that Canada is virtually defenceless. There have been several calls for Ottawa to increase the Canadian Forces budget by an extra $2-billion to $4-billion over the existing $12-billion it now spends each year.
Mr. Cellucci said this week the level of concern among U.S. officials about Canada's military funding reaches the highest levels of the Bush administration.
Mr. Manley said Canada has done more than its fair share in providing military support to the U.S.-led war on terrorism over the past year by contributing ground troops in Afghanistan and naval support in the Persian Gulf.
But he acknowledged the U.S. complaints have some merit and said Canada may have to re-evaluate its funding levels if it hopes to continue meeting existing international commitments.
"Obviously, our military capabilities have been called upon in the last year in ways we never expected they would be. We never thought we would have ground forces in Afghanistan, for example, or naval forces in the Gulf," he said. "We have all heard how strained we have been to do those things as well as continuing to meet our obligations in Bosnia with peacekeeping. So there may be some validity to it."
Mr. Manley is expected to deliver his first budget as Finance Minister later this fall or early next winter. The problem Ottawa faces as it contemplates increased military spending is that Canadians' appetite for more defence funding is waning as the memory of Sept. 11 begins to fade, he said.
Calls for increased defence spending must be weighed against the expectation for more health care funding that is likely to come after this fall's release of the long-awaited report by Roy Romanow, the former Saskatchewan premier, on the state of Canada's health care system, he said.
"For many other Canadians, [Sept. 11] is increasingly remote and the distance is growing," Mr. Manley said. "When you do these polls and ask people what the key issues are, we saw security spike up in late September and October of last year and then gradually subside. It is still higher than it was a year ago today, but other issues are now more important in the public consciousness."
The government's latest budget earmarked $7.7-billion over five years for security-related spending in areas such as border security, including $1.2-billion for the military. Much of that money is still to be designated, Mr. Manley said.
He said he believes Canadians are growing weary of the continuing focus, particularly in the media, on Sept. 11 as the one-year anniversary of the terrorist attacks approaches.
He thinks it is a mistake, however, for Canadians to grow complacent about the potential threat the country faces from terrorism. He said it is important, when questioning the continuing government focus on issues such as border security, to remember that 25 Canadians died in the attacks.
"I think there is a certain amount of ambivalence about [the Sept. 11 anniversary]. I think that the feeding frenzy on Sept. 11 stories that we are all seeing on the American networks is probably going to wear a little thin on Canadians," Mr. Manley said.
"We wouldn't mind one day of that, but we probably aren't going to enjoy 10 days of it. I think there is a continuing sense of the scale of what happened on Sept. 11. I don't think Canadians have forgotten how big this is or how important this is. But I think they have, over the course of the year, distanced themselves from the immediacy of its impact on them ... I think that Canadians need to remember that Canadians did die on Sept. 11, both in the planes and in those buildings."
? Copyright 2002 National Post
