Prince George, B.C. – Cariboo-Prince George Conservative MP Todd Doherty has delivered a scathing review of today’s federal budget.

It was unveiled early this afternoon in the House of Commons by Liberal Finance Minister Bill Morneau and included the promise of a 10-year $11.2 billion national housing strategy and a further $7 billion over the next decade to create child care spaces (see full details of budget here).

Garth Frizzell – Prince George city councillor and FCM Board member

“Canadians were hoping for a better outcome from the Liberal budget announced today. At a time when Liberals are making life more expensive, Justin Trudeau could have offered lower taxes and a job creation plan that actually works,” he said.

“Instead, Canadians are getting nickel-and-dimed by this Prime Minister so he can continue to fund flawed Liberal ideas.”

Doherty said the budget showed Liberals “simply don’t understand Canada’s middle class” noting they should have focused “on supporting policies that will create jobs for young Canadians. In the last year, Canadians aged 15-24 lost 42,000 full-time jobs.”

Garth Frizzell, Prince George City Councillor and Federation of Canadian Municipalities Board member on the other hand was pleased with what he saw – in particular the promise of a national housing strategy.

“Ever since I got on the Board we’ve been asking for a national housing strategy. Countries all around the world have these in place and finally it looks like Canada’s going to get one,” he says.

“There’s been a mish-mash of different programs that have been available at the federal level and though we’re still waiting to get some analysis on what this is going to look like it looks like this could be very exciting for us.”

Cariboo-Prince George Conservative MP Todd Doherty

Does he expect some of those dollars will filter into Prince George?

“Well that’s the hope. I mean the work that we do with FCM – it’s explicit that it’s not just the big cities that we’re working for. It’s not just rural and remote Canada. So, I fully expect that this is going to be an announcement that benefits all communities in Canada regardless of size.”

And though details are scant so far – Frizzell was pleased to hear money some money will be dedicated to the government’s infrastructure bank which is aimed at providing low-cost financing for new infrastructure projects.

“That was a promise and we’re waiting to see what that roll-out means for Canada but also for B.C. It’s early hours after the budget was dropped so the next few hours should be interesting.”