Defend Public Healthcare

Actual provincial program spending is much less than "planned" Provincial Spending was $6.4 billion less than planned over the first 9 months of the fiscal year 2022/3 according to the Financial Accountability Office (FAO). That is 5.0% less than budgeted. After the first half of the year, the FAO had reported that the government had underspent its budget by 4.1% ($3.5 billion).  Health was underspent by $1.25 billion – or 2.3% less than planned. This is an increase from an underspend of $859 million reported by the FAO after the first half of the year.   The news of the $1.25 billion underspend on health comes just as the province scooped up another $776 million from the federal government for health care to deal with urgent health needs like the hospital crisis.  But, instead of dealing with urgent hospital needs, it looks like the province will bank the cheque and underspend the health budget it set last March.      Despite the health underspend, the for-profit clinic

Ontario government revenue is way up -- $16.6 billion higher than the forecast in the Budget just six months ago. That’s an average increase of $2.7 billion per month -- or up another 1.5% every month.  Revealingly, the quarterly increases in revenue reported have grown sharply: from a modest $1.2 billion in the first quarter report, to $5.8 billion in the second quarter report, on to a whopping $9.6 billion now in the government's new 3rd quarter report .  Yet the fact that the government was massively underestimating revenue was obvious right from the get go when the Budget was re-introduced in August.   The slow recognition of the extra revenue reduced pressure on the PC government to improve health care funding during a hospital capacity crisis. And not one extra penny was added for hospitals, despite the crisis.   It would be hardly surprising if more revenue is recognized in the final two reports for this fiscal year – the 2023 Budget and the September 2022/3 Public Accounts.

Health Care: To ease future cuts, the government established a budgeting system this year which would see much of the COVID-related funding budgeted under special funds distinct from the normal ministries. So much of the increased funding for the Ministry of Health or Ministry of Long-Term Care is not reflected in their line items but instead through special funds that are then later allocated to a ministry. So first the good news: The health and LTC  special COVID funds  are “budgeted” to continue for a couple of years.  An additional $4 billion in 2021–22 and $2 billion in 2022–23 is currently planned to help the health sector address COVID-19.   The bad news, however, is that even with that continuation of special COVID funds, overall health care and LTC funding is budgeted to go down -- by $1.9 billion in 2021/22 and another $500 million in 2022/23. That's a lot of cutting.  Of course that is “down” after a major increase this year.  Including the special funds, $72.8 bil