It’s just a contraction, Harper insists

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This article was published 01/09/2015 (3853 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — Conservative Leader Stephen Harper kicked off the fifth week of the election by avoiding questions about whether the economy is in recession.

As the prime minister and the Conservatives brace for a Statistics Canada report expected today, which many economists expect will say Canada’s economy was in recession, the prime minister wouldn’t use the word.

“We’ve had a contraction that has been focused almost entirely on one sector of the economy,” he said. He added Canada is well ahead of its fiscal projections in the first quarter, with a $5-billion surplus.

Harper and some economists have previously argued even if today’s report shows Canada’s economy contracted in the first half of this year, it was restricted to the energy sector, and 80 per cent of the economy is still growing.

A recent analysis of that claim by The Canadian Press found it to be inaccurate, with the GDP shrinking 0.4 per cent between December and May even when the energy sector is factored out of the calculation. The June figures are what will be reported today.

Opponents, such as the NDP, have said Harper’s job growth has been flat in the last few years, while the Liberals accuse him of sending money to millionaires instead of investing in the middle class and in the economy directly.

Harper sharpened his attack on the NDP in recent days as that party has taken a clear lead in almost every poll. Meanwhile, Harper’s party has fallen to third place in three polls in the last week. The Conservatives say the NDP has an $8-billion hole in the first year in its spending plan, while the Liberals say it’s $28 billion over four years.

Kildonan-St. Paul Liberal candidate MaryAnn Mihychuk was among the Liberal candidates trotted out as the Liberal economic experts team Sunday. Mihychuk was a cabinet minister in Gary Doer’s Manitoba NDP government between 1999 and 2004, but says she chose the Liberals for her return to politics after a decade away because she has more confidence in the party.

“This is a party that slayed a massive deficit,” Mihychuk said.

She and the Liberals are pushing the Liberal record in the 1990s that saw the party slash spending to balance the books. However, the party is now the only one that says it will run a deficit and charges the other parties are going to have to run deficits or not fulfil spending promises because of the economy and the “mess” the Conservatives have left in the budget.

Winnipeg Free Press | Newsletter

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Harper argues deficits are not the answer to the current economic situation — although his own government produced deficit budgets for the last seven years. “As Conservatives, we borrow money only when we must and then we repay as planned,” Harper said, noting his opponents “borrow in hard times because they must and they borrow in good times because they can.”

He is pushing hard that now is not the time to take a risk on someone new.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair was in Saskatoon Monday announcing a national strategy to combat violence against women. Mulcair dismissed the other parties’ suggestions the NDP platform isn’t affordable and said it’s just an attempt by the other parties to stop NDP momentum. He said the economy is weak and that is on Harper’s back.

None of the three main parties has released a fully costed platform.

mia.rabson@freepress.mb.ca