Relayed
by GLOBALink - The International Tobacco-Control Network
by MICHAEL
TUTTON
Source: Canadian Press, 2002-04-04, via tobacco.org
HALIFAX
(CP) - After four decades of deficits, Nova Scotia presented
a balanced budget Thursday with a razor-thin margin, relying
on drivers, smokers and gamblers to help meet its goal. Finance
Minister Neil LeBlanc's budget calls for a small $1.3-million
surplus this fiscal year, but it will impose almost $79 million
more in taxes, user fees and higher prices for liquor.
Spending
in the budget, the last this year in Atlantic Canada, is expected
to total $5.3 billion in 2002-03, up $51 million from last year.
EXCERPT
But the
deficit will be avoided by new revenues coming from smokers
and drivers, with tax increases of $5 per carton of cigarettes
and two cents for every litre of gasoline.
EXCERPT
Sitting
before a bronze-coloured pie chart depicting the hundreds of
millions in revenues still being swallowed by debt, the finance
minister defended his hikes in user fees and taxes.
He said
the smoking tax would help reduce use of cigarettes, and promised
that every dollar of the gasoline tax would go to a $32-million
increase in spending on the province's deteriorating roads and
bridges.
END EXCERPT
