As with every federal budget, a veritable buffet of advice is on display for federal finance minister Paul Martin to feast upon. And in this post-September 11th world, a good many of the dishes on offer are of the spending, big-ticket, mega-project spending variety. While most Canadians acknowledge the need for an increased (read: more money) focus on public and national security, prudence and valued purchases in this field should still rule the day.

As for the other tempting meals being cooked up by a hodgepodge of economists assembled by the CCPA (Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, $11 billion in spending) and more recently, CATA's (the Canadian Advanced Technology Alliance) proposal for $10 billion of stimulus (over half of this in direct corporate welfare to biotech and technology companies, YIKES!)
- Mr. Martin would do well to follow every mother's advice, "take a deep breath, and push away from the table still feeling a little hungry."

Indeed, once public security concerns are addressed in next Monday's budget, that should be it for government dining at taxpayer expense. There are a variety of reasons why this spend-only-on-security diet should be followed.

To start, the U.S. National Bureau of Economic Research has confirmed that the American economy is in recession. It has been in recession since March. Given our reliance on the U.S. economy (87% of our exports go south, over $1 billion every day), it is safe to say that we are in a recession as well. Indeed, two major Canadian banks have said as much.

The last time a government tried to spend its way out of a recession it was the early 1990s and the Bob Rae administration was ruining Ontario. Running $10 billion a year deficits (20% of Ontario's entire budget) was a disaster and partly explains why the U.S recession of the period only lasted four months while Canada's stretched over two years - Ontario dragged the rest of the Canadian economy down with it.

On a global scale, Japan has been trying to "prime the pump" to kickstart its lagging economy since 1993 spending over $1.1 trillion (bullet trains to nowhere, a tunnel under Tokyo Bay, etc.) on public works projects throughout the land of the rising sun. In 1996 alone, the stimulus package was 4% of annual GDP. The result: marginal gains.

In fact, it wasn't until the government started controlling expenditures and cutting taxes at the turn of this century that the Japanese economy started to show marked signs of recovery from its decade long slump as a result of the Tokyo real-estate crash in the late 1980s.
So the task for Minister Martin is clear. He must meet public security priorities while still balancing the budget, respecting his tax cuts schedule and socking away more money for debt reduction. He must ensure that program overall program spending is reined in and grows no faster than inflation and population growth. And given the focus on security (the military, CSIS, RCMP, etc.), this should translate into spending cuts in some areas and reallocations of monies in others (read: corporate welfare, regional development agencies, and multicultural programs).

Is this doable Absolutely! This week's report from Auditor General Sheila Fraser points to some $16.5 billion in discretionary government programs (read: politically influenced, pork-barrel, vote-buying vehicles) that need to be monitored and evaluated. The CTF goes further and would advocate for shutting down many of these initiatives entirely. It is not a question of better management; it should be a question of assessing the proper role of government.

This brings us full circle to our Hamlet word play, to spend or not to spend The proper choice, indeed the only choice is to govern, and to govern, the Liberals must shelve any big-ticket spending ideas.