Kinew seeks to make Manitoba ‘net contributor’ on equalization front

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This article was published 19/01/2024 (672 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Manitoba can cut its dependence on federal equalization payments over the next decade by going big on zero-emission advanced manufacturing, Premier Wab Kinew says.

“Over the next few terms in government, should we be honoured to receive an additional mandate or two from the people, I want Manitoba to stop being a have-not province and to start being a have province,” Kinew said Friday morning at a forum hosted by the Downtown Winnipeg Business Improvement Zone.

Over the past nine years, Manitoba has received more than $21 billion in equalization from the federal government, and will get a $4.4 billion equalization payment from Ottawa in the 2024-25 fiscal year.

The payments are based on a legislated formula intended to address fiscal disparities among the provinces and are based on a measure of a province’s fiscal capacity, according to the federal government.

The payments help provinces with a lower capacity to provide public services at comparable levels to other provinces, at comparable tax rates.

“I want us to not be an equalization province, in the future,” Kinew said. “I see the potential in Manitoba for us to be a net contributor when it comes to equalization and for us to be one of the engines of economic growth across Canada.”

The ambitious goal could be reached within 10 years, and would be achieved through building up a zero-emissions advanced manufacturing sector, the NDP premier argued.

“We have a low-carbon electricity grid. We have the biggest bus manufacturer in North America (NFI Group Inc. is based in Winnipeg), which specializes increasingly in zero-emission vehicles,” Kinew said. “We have critical minerals and a mining industry that can bring goods to market with high environmental standards, high labour standards, high respect for human rights, especially when you compare to other mining jurisdictions around the world.”

The government must pursue a “few signature investments” that will make Manitoba a hub for mineral extraction, component assembly and exporting locally manufactured goods, he added.

“We have a strong, diversified economy already. We’re going to be careful stewards of that and set the conditions for economic growth,” Kinew said. “The real growth opportunity beyond that in Manitoba is for us to build out the supply chain for a zero-emissions future.

“If we land some of these big manufacturing opportunities, big mining opportunities and we do it in a good way, I think that is how we make Manitoba a have province.”

The premier acknowledged reducing Manitoba’s reliance on equalization is a lofty goal.

“I’m very, very ambitious and I think setting a fast timeline is the way you get things done,” Kinew said. “If you set the high expectation, then I think it sets the message to other folks that we’re going to deliver on something.”

Progressive Conservative interim leader Wayne Ewasko said the NDP’s plan to boost Manitoba’s fiscal capacity sounds similar to the path his party wanted to pursue.

“The NDP premier is repeating the very same PC messages he opposed just a few months ago, because he has no plan to grow the economy” or pay for election promises, the Opposition leader said in a statement.

danielle.dasilva@freepress.mb.ca