CBC - Manitoba Votes 2003

Election Promise Box
Compiled by Wendy Sawatzky, CBC News Online

Lower taxes. Better roads. Shorter waiting lists. More money for schools. During election campaigns, politicians tend to make a lot of promises.

Some they keep. Some they don't.

See how the NDP did at keeping their 1999 promises

Throughout the 2003 Manitoba election campaign, CBC Manitoba is keeping track of those promises.

The New Democrats promise to . . .

spend $1 million to expand the province's arts curriculum to include drama, visual arts, dance and music, set up more after-school arts and music programs, and to support professional development for arts teachers. More>>
eliminate the $300 co-payment for home care services and equipment and increase the funding for home care for mental health patients. More>>
spend $100,000 on a family resource center at the Gimli hospital to provide information to people caring for sick or dying loved ones. More>>
spend $1 million over four years to build trails and nature walks in the province to promote healthy living, and eliminate the taxes municipalities have to pay on these trails. More>>
cut the interest rate of Manitoba Hydro Power Smart loans by two per cent and establish an "energy rate guarantee" for businesses. More>>
pass legislation to stop the privatization of MPI without a referendum. More>>
develop 1,000 housing lots in the south Fort Garry area of Winnipeg, and re-invest some of the proceeds from the development in inner-city housing. More>>
hire 20 new police officers and eight new Crown attorneys, and introduce new legislation to allow police to seize and impound vehicles used in street racing. More>>
hire 200 more technologists (100 to fill existing positions) over the next four years to run lab, X-ray, CT and MRI machines. More>>
extend the free fishing for seniors for their licenses for another four years and allow free entrance to provincial parks on the Labour Day long weekend. More>>
create a $10,000 award for emerging filmmakers. The "Take One Manitoba" Film Award would be selected by a jury made up of members of the local film community. Leader Gary Doer says a re-elected NDP government would also commit $1 million a year over four years to the budget of Manitoba Film and Sound. More>>
reduce taxes in the middle-income bracket by 10 per cent plus bracket adjustments, cut property taxes by 10 per cent for all homeowners, and cut farmland education property taxes by 20 per cent. More>>
expand reading programs ($500,000), create 500 new nursery school spaces ($500,000) and provide parent resource kits at school libraries ($150,000). More>>
cut the small business tax rate from five per cent to four per cent and cut the corporate income tax from 16 per cent in 2003 to 14.5 per cent in 2006. More>>
set up three new MRI machines, one in Brandon and one at the province's first "community-based" unit at the Pan Am Clinic in Winnipeg.
expand the forgivable loan program for local medical students by $500,000 annually, expand the program to students coming from outside Manitoba, or those from Manitoba who want to come back home. More>>
implement a post-graduate scholarship fund to encourage Manitobans to continue their post-secondary studies in Manitoba, increase the province's post-secondary bursary program to $8 million from $6 million, and continue the current tuition freeze for undergraduate programs. More>>
add 15 new spaces to the University of Manitoba's school of medicine, at a total operating and capital cost of $4 million. More>>
open 20 more school gymnasiums around the province after-hours for youth activities. More>>
provide on-site job training and certification for workers employed on the expansion of the Winnipeg Floodway. More>>
boost enrollment in nursing courses to 3,000 within four years. More>>
continue to balance the budget and reduce provincial debt. More>>
improve rural access to post-secondary education by giving high school students and adults the opportunity to complete up to two years of post-secondary credits while remaining in their home community.
subsidize soil testing and decreas taxes on farmland; help farmers diversify through long-term support for irrigation and highway infrastructure, drainage, a flexible crop insurance program and healthy livestock.
regularly increase the minimum wage. More>>
expand the Family Doctor Connection phone line to rural areas, support a centralized doctor recruitment effort and hire additional nurses, doctors and technologists in rural areas.
invest in rural infrastructure and environmental protection. More>>
improve access to education, training and apprenticeship opportunities and invest in universities, colleges and public schools.
twin the Trans-Canada Highway from Virden to the Saskatchewan border by 2007.

The Conservatives promise to . . .

demand Crown attorneys seek a minimum of five years in jail for anyone convicted of sexual assault involving a child, seek the maximum sentence for anyone involved in child prostitution, and oppose bail when an offence is committed against a child.
immediately begin establishing a safehouse for child prostitutes.
give social workers the ability to apply for restraining orders against pimps.
implement a province-wide school safety program.
make the finding of civil liability at time of criminal convictions, which would make it easier for crime victims to sue for damages.
give Legal Aid the final say over the lawyer an accused criminal can access.
establish a Criminal Deterrence Act to allow municipalities to deny zoning or occupancy permits if there is evidence the business would be used as a front for gangs.
hire 40 more police officers, but likely not in the
first year of his mandate.
implement a "three strikes, you're out" policy under which a criminal would face a maximum sentence after three convictions. More>>
hire 20 more Crown attorneys, starting during the second year of a Tory mandate. More>>
institute a "no-bail" policy for people who have violated bail conditions and implement a two-year minimum sentence for anyone convicted of assaulting a police officer. More>>
reform the Elections Act so Manitobans would vote on the same day every four years. More>>
stop product advertising by the Manitoba Liquor Control Commission and put the money spend on advertising into prevention of fetal alcohol syndrome. More>>
increase the size of student loans given to individual rural or northern students. More>>
establish a "Manitoba Heart Institute" to consolidate cardiac care in the province into one hospital and add two more doctors. More>>
add mandatory province-wide standardized testing to Grades 6 and 9 to the existing tests in Grade 12, decrease class sizes for kindergarten to Grade 4, give about $25 million more support to special needs students, and look creating a province-wide anti-bully program. More>>
establish a $250,000 "centre of excellence fund" for schools that want to specialize in fields like music, drama or science. Also establish a $5 million fund for teachers to apply to acquire more professional development through courses they could take on evenings or weekends or in the summer. More>>
repeal Bill 44, which makes it easier for unions to become established in a workplace, nd and Bill 18, which requires buyers of federally-regulated businesses to take on existing collective agreements. More>>
help the city upgrade its waste-water treatment system. More>>
pay farmers near Riding Mountain National Park $5 per animal to defray the costs of rounding up their cattle to have them tested for bovine tuberculosis. More>>
spend more money on improving residential streets in Winnipeg, and build an underpass to ease traffic problems at a rail crossing on Kenaston Boulevard. More>>
improve roads from the airport to downtown and landscape the west and east entries to Winnipeg on the Trans-Canada Highway. More>>
work with business to create a youth summer employment program for aboriginal people.
spend less money advertising Manitoba's casinos and offer more on the province's tourism Web site. More>>
introduce amendments to the Provincial Parks Act to prevent changes to the boundaries of provincial parks.
re-introduce legislation requiring able-bodied social assistance recipients to volunteer for local organizations, and to re-instate the welfare fraud tip phone line. More>>
set up a $1.5 million fund to subsidize the cost of ambulance transfers in rural Manitoba. More>>
not close any rural hospitals. More>>
change the name of Manitoba Health to Manitoba Health and Wellness
re-instate the Department of Rural Development, which was folded into the Department of Intergovernmental Affairs by the NDP. More>>
ensure housing programs available in urban areas under the Affordable Housing Initiative are made available to rural residents. More>>
commit to paying Manitoba's share of transition funding under the Agricultural Policy Framework. More>>
erect a statue of activist Nellie McClung on the grounds of the Manitoba Legislature. More>>
create a mental health advocate to report to the health minister, and implement an external review of psychiatric wards to examine whether men and women patients should be on the same ward. More>>
plump the nursing recruitment and retention fund from $7 million to $10 million, which would involve paying bonuses to older nurses to keep them in the profession. More>>
introduce legislation to protect Crown corporations from being raided by government to balance the budget. More>>
expand the first income-tax threshold to $35,000 from $30,544 and reduce the middle-income tax rate from 14.9 per cent to 13. More>>
create an online registry that would list the waiting time for various surgeries in different parts of the province. More>>
work on a plan to develop an agreement with independent clinics to provide various kinds of care. Stuart Murray says the government would purchase the private clinic services and Manitobans would not have to pay for them out of pocket.
change legislation to make it possible for the government to ban net fishing on certain as-yet-unspecified bodies of water.
"end deceit in hallway medicine shell game" by producing an annual "health accountability and transparency report." More>>
remove the provincial sales tax from diapers and give a $500 tax credit to middle-income families with a stay-at-home parent.
reduce property tax bills by up to 50 per cent by eliminating education taxes from residential property and farmland. More>>

The Liberals promise to . . .

expand Pharmacare coverage to a wider variety of vaccinations. More>>
subsidize milk prices in Manitoba's north so they are the same as milk prices in the south. More>>
pass legislation so that any publicly announced wage increase or pension change for elected officials does not come into effect until after the next election has occurred. More>>
create a fair and transparent tendering process for the procurement of government services and purchases.
detail how federal transfer money is spent, and open up one cabinet meeting a month to the media. More>>
create a professional College of Educators to set standards for teachers and take responsibility for handling complaints from parents and students. More>>
give money to groups that encourage people to make their homes more secure with better lighting, locks and deadbolts and provide more money for graffiti removal. More>>
dedicate every cent of the provincial gas tax roads, instead of administration, and set up an arms-length authority to manage highway spending. More>>
allow Manitobans to deduct both the interest and the principle on students loans on their taxes. More>>
implement a new, $40-million water management strategy.
reduce and then eliminate the payroll tax within a five-year framework. In the first year, the tax would be reduced by $25 million; after that reductions would be based on "foreseeable economic growth.” Cost: $260 million. More>>
cut personal income taxes by 27 per cent, starting with cuts for Manitobans under 30 and gradually extending to all Manitobans. More>>
open clinics across the province, staffed by senior volunteers, which will focus on identifying and treating seniors' medical problems at the earliest stages. More>>
extend provincial Pharmacare coverage to include stop-smoking aids like nicotine patches, gum and Zyban pills.
restore provincial funding to the federal farm safety net program.
respond to the long-running crisis in cardiac care by setting up a Cardiac Care Manitoba facility that would focus not just on treatment but prevention and research. More>>
remove provincial sales tax from all farm input products, such as fertilizer, pesticides, seeds, fuel, etc.
remove the education tax from farmland. More>>
double spending on amateur sport and recreation; a Liberal government would spend a total of $20.6 million in this area. More>>
guarantee timely access to health care in this province. Any patient who waits too long for care – as determined by a new "quality council" – will be sent out of the province for treatment, on a Liberal government's dime.