Alternative Federal Budget 2012 calls for greater social program spending and reductions in defence spending

With the 2012 Federal Budget only two weeks away,  The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA), in coordination with the Rideau Institute and more than 30 other Canadian civil society organizations,  has offered a different vision for Canada’s future. Titled A Budget for the Rest of Us, the 2012 Alternative Federal Budget provides a road map for Canada combat income inequality and avoid a “lost decade” of high unemployment.

Highlights of AFB 2012 include; creating a National Child Care Program, expanding the public health care system, subsidizing affordable new housing, increasing scholarships for students, and developing a more fair system of taxation.

Additionally, the AFB proposes reining in military overspending by returning the Department of National Defence budget to the more sustainable levels of the pre-9/11 period, freeing up $1.28 billion dollars for much-needed social programs in the next year alone:

The National Defence Budget must be brought in line with the changed realities that Canada faces in the world, a decade after the events of September 11, 2001…With Canadian involvement in Afghanistan winding down and our commitment to addressing the global financial crisis, an immediate reduction in the defence budget and an eventual return to pre-2001 levels are realistic goals that would set Canada on the path to fiscal responsibility in the field of expenditures.

The plan also calls for a return to Canadian peacekeeping and a significant increase in the humanitarian aid budget of the federal government.