The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) dropped a bomb on the province's
deceptive "Our Future is Wide Open" campaign and the government is still
reeling in the aftermath.

Using freedom of information legislation, the CTF exposed $1.5 million in
overspending on the campaign. This revelation led to another revelation -
the government was using money earned from utility bills under Crown
Investments Corporation (CIC) to help pay for the plan.

The end result is an almost comical can of worms for the government.

Let's review the history of the controversial campaign, for it provides an
important lesson about how this government operates in secrecy to avoid
accountability. In November of 2002 the province launched an advertising
campaign aimed at convincing expatriates to come back to Saskatchewan. They
commissioned a rock anthem, assembled slick television and radio
commercials, and held a launch event at the Regina Center for the Arts.

At the launch event they announced the plan would cost $2 million in the
first year of the three-year campaign and the cost of subsequent years would
be determined at a later date. With a tough election campaign looming in the
near future, the campaign reeked of political partisanship. Confirmation of
the political nature of the campaign came when Premier Calvert appointed NDP
political strategist and umpteen-time cabinet Minister Ed Tchorzewski to
head up the effort.

In June of 2003 the CTF obtained information indicating the province spent
$4.3 million in the first nine months of the campaign - which meant the
campaign was already substantially over-budget. Responding to reporters'
questions, a department spokesperson attempted to clarify that $2 million
was actually budgeted for the campaign, and that they were only modestly
over budget. This was news to everyone involved. Industry and Resources
Minister Eric Cline said that the CTF's assertion that the campaign was
grossly over budget was "absolutely false."

Of course, the government can deny anything they want without offering a
lick of evidence to support their claim. The CTF publicly demanded the
original budget, and challenged the government to prove us wrong. The
silence from government was deafening.

The CTF then used freedom of information legislation to try to pry the
original budget out of Industry and Resources' hands. They denied this
request, saying the budget was subject to "cabinet confidence." This led to
a series of new requests and a review by Saskatchewan's Information
Commissioner. The Commissioner sided with the government.

When all was said and done, the government and their lawyers had
successfully delayed releasing any damaging information until after the
election was decided. Finally, the government revealed that they were $1.5
million over budget for the first two years of the campaign, but still
refused to release the original budget.

Then came the revelation that CIC had actually paid for part of the program
and the government just forgot to tell anyone about this arrangement. The
Premier initially denied knowledge of this, and then denied denying
knowledge of this. After a week of steady pressure, the government tells us
the original budget for the three-year campaign was actually $12 million,
and apologized for any confusion.

Put simply, the government lied about the cost of the campaign, they lied
about how they were paying for it and they lied by saying they weren't over
budget.

The CTF's assertion that the campaign was over budget was proven to be true.
We think we proved a point. The "Our Future is Wide Open" is a cynical and
deceptive waste of tax dollars, and it needs to be scrapped immediately. It
only serves to remind the people that their government repeatedly lied to
them.