"Conservatives"???

I am a Conservative minded voter and as such I was happy to see the endless minority Parliament come to an end with a Tory majority.

It is now time for the Right Honourable Stephen Harper to produce a Conservative budget.  During the minority years, I suppose it was understandable that the Conservatives produced budgets that were not dissimilar to what a Liberal or NDP administration would have produced....after all, they didn't have a majority and couldn't really govern like they did.

The Harper Conservatives strayed from Conservative principles with boneheaded moves like cutting the GST.  People may not remember but the GST was originally supposed to be 9% (replacing the 13.5% Manufacturers Sales Tax).  It was a sound policy to bring in the GST as the MST served as a tariff on our own exports.  It was cut to 7% to make it more politically palatable despite the lack of merit behind such a move.

The Harper team cut the rate to 5%.  This was unnecessary and harmful to Canada's fiscal position.   It should go back to 7%...at least!  Further cuts in income taxes should wait as well.  Canada is in very good fiscal position only when compared with other G8 nations who are all basket cases.  Canada should lead the way in eliminating the deficit and aggressively paying down the debt...which is an immoral tax upon future generations.

The Hudak team provokes similar concerns.  Income tax cuts are a great idea......if we weren't running a 15 billion dollar deficit.  Tax cuts should wait, spending cuts should not.

Hudak is playing politics with energy prices and I don't like it at all.  Utility bills are going up because the cost of energy is going up around the world.  The Green Energy Act may have its flaws but it should not be scrapped entirely.  In fact, Ontario (and Canada) will become much more energy efficient if prices stay high.

Harper and Hudak talk a good game about fiscal responsibility.  As Conservatives they know exactly what the right things to say are.  One hopes that they actually put some of that fiscal responsibility into action.

If they do not, then they risk being labelled Tax and Spend Conservatives....and they will lose the votes of conservatives across the country.  Look south for an example.  This is what happened to George W Bush conservatives as they looked at the fiscal wreckage he had left.