CCA Bul­letin 08/08

March 4, 2008

Just the Facts

The fed­eral gov­ern­ment has released its Main Spend­ing Esti­mates fol­low­ing the pre­sen­ta­tion of the 2008-09 fed­eral bud­get by the Hon. James Fla­herty, Min­is­ter of Finance, on Feb­ru­ary 26, 2008.

The release of the Main Esti­mates, fol­low­ing the fed­eral bud­get, is a wel­come return to the tra­di­tional man­ner in which the Main Esti­mates are pre­sented. In recent years the gov­ern­ment has released the Main Esti­mates before tabling the bud­get, result­ing in some scram­bling to make sense of ini­tia­tives and mea­sures announced in the bud­get and their impact on spend­ing esti­mates until Sup­ple­men­tary Esti­mates were tabled, often sev­eral months after the bud­get had been presented.

Another pos­i­tive devel­op­ment: this year the gov­ern­ment has changed the man­ner in which Sup­ple­men­tary Esti­mates are pre­sented in reduc­ing the size and scope of them. This will make under­stand­ing fed­eral bud­getary mea­sures some­what eas­ier and more transparent.

The Main Esti­mates are orga­nized around a whole of gov­ern­ment frame­work that includes four spend­ing areas and thir­teen out­come areas. They are as follows:

Eco­nomic Affairs

1. Income secu­rity and employ­ment for Canadians;

2. Strong eco­nomic growth;

3. An inno­v­a­tive and knowl­edge based economy;

4. A clean and healthy environment;

5. A fair and secure marketplace

Social Affairs

6. Healthy Canadians;

7. Safe and secure communities;

8. A diverse soci­ety that pro­motes lin­guis­tic dual­ity and social inclu­sion; and

9. A vibrant Cana­dian cul­ture and heritage;

Inter­na­tional Affairs

10. A safe and secure world through inter­na­tional cooperation;

11. Global poverty reduc­tion through sus­tain­able development

12. A strong and mutu­ally ben­e­fi­cial North Amer­i­can part­ner­ship; and

13. A pros­per­ous Canada though global commerce.

Gov­ern­ment Affairs

The Main Esti­mates show that the fed­eral gov­ern­ment will spend just over $ 4 bil­lion in 2008-09, i.e. 1.8 % of the total bud­get, on the pur­suit of cul­tural and pat­ri­mo­nial objec­tives. This includes a 3.9% increase on Cul­tural pro­grams between 2007–2008 Main Esti­mates ($ 3,867 mil­lion) and those for 2008–2009 ($ 4,018 mil­lion). As expected, the Main Esti­mates include the $30 mil­lion increase to the base bud­get of the Canada Coun­cil for the Arts and a num­ber of other com­mit­ments pre­vi­ously announced, like funds for urgent repairs to national muse­ums and to the National Arts Cen­tre and the gov­ern­ment par­tic­i­pa­tion in the Cana­dian Tele­vi­sion Fund. What is new is the addi­tion of $24, 5 mil­lion to the bud­get of Library and Archives Canada for the National Por­trait Gallery, cur­rently the object of a call for ten­ders from nine Cana­dian cities.

Tell Me More…

The Main Esti­mates detail an increase in pro­gram spend­ing at the Depart­ment of Cana­dian Her­itage by 2.1% on pro­grams and ini­tia­tives such as;

The National Arts Cen­tre, the National Gallery of Canada, the Cana­dian Museum of Civ­i­liza­tion, the Canada Sci­ence and Tech­nol­ogy Museum and the Cana­dian Museum of Nature all receive addi­tional increases to deal with urgent cap­i­tal repairs. Some of these funds were announced in last year’s fed­eral budget.

The CBC gets an increase of 6.8% bring­ing their Par­lia­men­tary Allo­ca­tion to $1,115 mil­lion to meet addi­tional oper­at­ing costs, a part of which will be met by increased self-generated rev­enue. Tele­film Canada ben­e­fits from a mod­est increase of 2.4% from $ 104, 6 mil­lion to  $ 107, 2 mil­lion in sup­port of the National Train­ing Schools Pro­gram in the Film and Video Sec­tor. The National Film Board of Canada sees a decrease of 3.1% from $67 mil­lion to $ 65 mil­lion due to a “reduc­tion in oper­at­ing bud­get requirements.”

Library and Archives Canada will receive an increase of 32.1% from $ 119 mil­lions to     $ 157, 6 mil­lion, for a vari­ety of pro­grams and ini­tia­tives, includ­ing $ 24, 5 mil­lion for the Por­trait Gallery of Canada, some fund­ing to replace obso­lete sys­tems and pro­vide the capac­ity to man­age dig­i­tal pub­li­ca­tions and records, and fund­ing to sup­port the con­struc­tion of a preser­va­tion facility.

The CCA will be pro­vid­ing a more detailed analy­sis of the fed­eral bud­get and Main Esti­mates for 2008-09 in the com­ing weeks.