At the ‘four’ front: Key items in the budget for you

The 2023-24 Saskatchewan budget was released Wednesday. Here are four major items it contains:

The state of taxes

There’s nothing new in the budget in terms of taxes.

That means no tax increases and no new taxes — including no new “sin taxes,” the tariffs charged on things like cigarettes, tobacco and alcohol.

But there aren’t any tax cuts, either. The government isn’t removing its tax on fuel, nor is it taking the PST off construction projects.

As well, the home renovation tax credit — created a couple of years ago to stimulate the economy during the COVID-19 pandemic — isn’t being extended.

Cheque it out

With a $1-billion surplus, people may be expecting some more Moe bucks this year — something akin to the $500 affordability cheques that were sent out in 2022.

That may be a possibility at some point down the line in the 2023-24 fiscal year, but there’s no guarantee.

Instead, the government says this year’s surplus is going to go to pay down operating debt. That’ll reduce interest costs by $44 million this year, with that money going into other services and programs.

The government already believes it has made it affordable for people to live in the province. It notes a family of four has the lowest costs in the country when taxes, utilities and housing are factored in.

The waiting game

People needing surgeries are well aware how long Saskatchewan’s surgical wait list is.

The budget includes an extra $42.5 million to address that. That funding is expected to pay for another 6,000 surgeries in the fiscal year, bringing the total for the year to 103,000.

If that happens, the wait list will shrink by next March to the level it was at before COVID-19 arrived. That’s a year ahead of schedule; the plan was to get the list down to pre-pandemic levels by March of 2025.

Even so, the investment this year will still only get the wait list down to just under 12 months. The government’s goal is to reduce wait times to three months.

Other options to lower wait times include having surgeries done at private centres on the public dime, or sending people out of province to get their operations.

Doctor, doctor, gimme the news

People in Saskatchewan have been struggling to find family doctors, with many not accepting new patients.

The budget is trying to address that shortage, as well as the lack of nurses that also has plagued the province. The lack of staffing has led to ERs closing in rural areas.

More than $98 million is being pumped into the province’s Health Human Resources Action Plan to recruit and retain doctors, nurses and other health-care professionals.

A further $55.5 million is in the budget to recruit 250 full-time positions and expand part-time positions in rural and remote areas of the province.

The province has been recruiting health-care workers from the Philippines, and recently jacked up the incentives to get doctors to practise in rural areas.

There’s also nearly $12 million in the budget to support the recruitment and licensing of internationally educated health-care workers who already live in the province.