Changing times

VOCM reports on the Premier's appearance before the microphone at Confederation Building today:

The Premier has ordered a stop on all discretionary travel after energy forecasts put oil under $100/barrel through 2013.


Kathy Dunderdale says the budget hasn't been revised just yet, but steps are being taken to adjust spending. Dunderdale says the hold for the next couple of months also includes keeping job positions open where possible. These measures she says will save just tens of millions of dollars when the province is looking at hundreds of millions in shortfalls.

For the record... the "Conservative" governments of Danny Williams and Kathy Dunderdale have increased public spending by a cumulative total of almost $16.4-billion, compared to the annual public spending in the year before the "Conservatives" took office.

Adjusted for inflation, that figure expressed in 2012 dollars is over $17.1-billion.

Against this astronomical increase in public spending, Dundergov is now aiming to save "tens of millions".

This is what "tens of millions" — nine of them, in fact — looks like, compared to the $17-billion "Conservative" government spending spree of the past near-decade.