YORKTON - To say we are living in volatile times would be a huge understatement.
U.S. president Donald Trump seems fixated on stirring chaos at every turn plucking ridiculous tariff numbers out of thin air against any perceived slight he receives internationally – numbers with seemingly no forethought to repercussions even to Americans.
That hits Canada – hard.
Trump is going to very much hijack the next federal election in this country as dealing with the bombastic arrogance of his presidency has to be issue one – who among the Canadian parties has a leader best suited to protecting Canada’s sovereignty.
That Trump is an issue is unfortunate but there you have it, we do not always get what we would wish for.
It had been expected to be a federal election fought largely over the battlefield of carbon tax.
However, it appears new Liberal leader and Prime Minister Mark Carney has diffused that issue – at least in part – by an apparent claw back of the carbon tax by Carney.
Details of the change are still rather muddied, but in light of tariff pressures from Trump relieving some of the impact by scuttling the carbon tax makes a lot of sense.
The question now though is how much relief the consumer sees?
There is a likelihood -- in more cases than we might like -- businesses along the chain will absorb the savings on a carbon tax cut into their bottom lines with no cuts to consumers. It will be rather easy on their part to point to tariffs as the reasons consumer prices remain high – it’s a built in cover story at least some will use.
Against this financial upheaval the Saskatchewan Party had to create a budget – released today.
The party has often found budgeting revenues a rather difficult prospect, missing the mark on important features such as potash returns on more than one occasion through their years in power.
This year one can forgive them at least somewhat if the numbers end up askew – again the Trump effect is real. Trying to determine what tariffs will be real and which merely blustering threats seems an impossible task. It’s doubtful even Trump knows what he will do, or say, or threaten day-to-day. He appears to react on ill-informed whims and nothing more.
For Canada’s economy it will fall to Carney – at least until a federal election is held – to build alliances other than the U.S. to buffer our economy. In that regard his first trip being to Europe was again at least optically a good choice.
But, what comes of alliances that do not include the US remain to be seen.
Regardless of what plays out in the months ahead it will have ripple effects we in Yorkton and Saskatchewan will feel locally whether we wish it or not.
