It's back to the future for the upcoming provincial budget. If the past year of unbridled spending is any indication of what to expect in the new budget then all bets are off for any major tax relief.

The cover of last year's budget features a mother filling a glass of orange juice whilst surrounded by her smiling middle class family. One year later and the proverbial grail - representing the province's wealth - has been drained into an abyss of careless and feel-good expenditures.

The Manitoba NDP primed a black hole of spending this year that swallowed up an extra $244 million in zero-return investments. As though a $6.4 billion budget wasn't enough, the NDP couldn't resist the temptation to max out the province's credit cards with another last minute spending spree.

What floors me is that this year's program expenditures are already $1.3 billion or 27% more than they were in 1996. But it doesn't appear that anyone around the NDP cabinet table is counting or even cares.

The NDP minions will likely rattle on about the so-called $244 million "investment in Manitoba." They'll refer to the non-budgeted $75 million for healthcare, the $52 million subsidy for farmers and the $30 million cash infusion for universities.

If pressed at a NDP cocktail party (to which I'm rarely invited), I might even say that sacred cows like health, education and the family farm are worthwhile targets, providing spending is axed elsewhere. Aye, there's the rub.

The NDP should stick to their budget come hell or high water. If spending priorities are changed in midstream on account of unforeseen circumstances, then the Doer government should take some leadership and lower spending in other departments.

With the shadow of a recession looming, it beggars belief that the NDP would fritter away a quarter of a billion dollars and virtually flat line on tax relief. Instead of insolating the province from the crippling effect of a recession, the NDP have drawn us one step deeper into its clutches.

This year's $350 million windfall in extra tax and equalization revenues could have been used to chip away at personal income taxes, the provincial education tax, bracket creep or the $6 billion debt.

But the option to leave more disposable income in the hands of Manitoba families didn't even register on the government's radar screen. Why then should we expect anything out of the ordinary on budget day? Answer: Personal humiliation and a shipwrecked economy.

"The highest taxed province in the land" is the kind of reputation all Premiers who care to win another election could do without. The latest pillow fight between Premiers Doer and Dosanjh over an alleged error in a BC tax comparison chart shows that a high provincial tax ranking is about as popular as the plague.

The more pressing concern is Manitoba's ability to compete with other western provinces for new investment, jobs and population growth. A recent study by the Frontier Centre for Public Policy shows that Manitoba's overall tax load will double that of Alberta in 2004 unless the Doer government gets medieval on provincial taxes now.

The indignity of being lapped by Alberta's tax cuts should inspire anyone with a competitive bone in their body to get back in the race. Judgement day for the NDP is April 10th.