WINNIPEG -- A local political scientist says the 2020 provincial budget delay is unprecedented.
The Pallister government was set to table the budget on Wednesday.
Delay tactics from the NDP prevented the budget speech from moving forward. The budget has yet to be released.
Chris Adams from St. Paul’s College says this is unfamiliar territory.
“I don’t in living memory remember this happening,” says Adams
The postponement comes in the middle of the global COVID-19 pandemic, with Manitoba announcing its first presumptive case.
Adams says there will be blame placed on both the NDP and Progressive Conservative government for this during the pandemic.
“I think it goes both ways as one there’s people who worry about the budget being delayed, there might be measures in the budget that’s been put in, but at the same time the government could have overridden these delays and presented the budget anyway,” says Adams.
The government says it will release the budget once the finance minister is able to read the speech in the legislature. It’s not known when that will happen.
NDP Leader Wab Kinew said his party is not preventing the budget from being tabled, it’s trying to block 20 government bills from being introduced.
The premier called the NDP’s actions “disrespectful.”
