Conservatives ignore slowing growth and economic warning signs

Conservatives ignore slowing growth and economic warning signs

Flaherty delivers Economic Update when House isn't sitting to avoid accountability for bad news

Despite missing their own deficit targets, mounting reports of slowing growth and double digit unemployment in many regions, Conservatives are ignoring economic warning signs and charging ahead with their cuts agenda.

 “Under their watch, our economy is underperforming and we have lost hundreds of thousands of jobs. Unfortunately, based on what we heard today, Conservatives have no strategy to address this,” said NDP Finance critic Peggy Nash. “Conservatives are simply continuing their unbalanced approach of putting all our economic eggs in the natural resources basket.”
For the fourth time since taking power, Conservatives chose to avoid parliamentary oversight and deliver their Economic Update outside of the House of Commons.
“This is another example of Conservative contempt for our democratic institutions,” said NDP Deputy Finance critic Guy Caron. “Just as with their omnibus budget bills and their withholding financial information from the Parliamentary Budget Officer, this is yet another attempt to avoid being accountable to Canadians about cuts to the services people rely on.”
Despite the warning signs, Minister Flaherty refused to outline any contingency plan to deal with slowing growth and increasingly negative fiscal indicators.
“Conservatives keep claiming our economy is better off than all the others, but the reality is even the I.M.F. is now predicting slower growth in Canada than in the U.S.,” said Nash. “And yet Minister Flaherty continues to push full speed ahead with his shortsighted approach to managing the economy.”