Prime Minister Susan Holt established a list of objectives on Thursday night that says that her government is tried, while recognizing a new level of uncertainty about New Brunswick due to the tariff threat of the United States.
Holt used the annual discourse of the State of the province, the first as Prime Minister, to establish 15 measurements in medical care, affordability, housing, education and environment.
“These 15 metrics are the metrics with which we are going to continue over the next four years,” said Holt, who described himself as a “Nerd of data” and promised to put the same goals on the screen in next year’s speech.
“My team has asked me if I am crazy that we are taking off our neck … we are committed to being the most responsible and transparent government that New Brunswick has seen.”
But that commitment occurred as part of the same speech in which Holt acknowledged that the possible tariffs of the president of the United States, Donald Trump, in the imports of Canada, could do significant damage to the economy of the province.
“Economic winds are blowing quite hard and cold on our faces at this time,” he said.
On Wednesday, Holt said general tariffs could cost the province between 4,000 and 6,000 jobs. In Thursday’s speech, he said they could eliminate between 1.3 and three percent of the gross domestic product of the province.
Trump said this week that he will probably impose 25 percent tariffs to Canada and Mexico on February 1, but Holt said some economic activity is already decreasing due to threats.
“I can’t sweeten him. He’s going to hit New Brunswick very hard … He has changed the game in terms of what we believe we can do in next year.”
The upset message outside the upper part, Holt’s most grim description of the possible impact so far, gave way to a lighter tone when he presented the 15 objectives in a way that broke from the usual format of the state of the state of the province.
Traditionally, the day prime minister is the only approach, using the event to describe his leadership and vision directly to the new Brunswickers through a local cable television broadcast.
But Holt invited five of his cabinet ministers on stage to help establish the measures, often joking with them during carefully rehearsed presentations.
“You want to see you here,” Claire Johnson told the Minister of Education.
“It’s almost as we planned,” Johnson joked before listing the objectives of improving literacy and mathematics evaluations in Anglophone and Francophone school systems in approximately five percentage points each.
Some of the metrics were repetitions of electoral promises, such as the promise to increase the number of people with a 79 percent practicing doctor or nurse, the figure of last year, to 85 percent.
Other objectives were new, including the improvement of the salary growth rate of 2.5 percent between 2014 and 2019 and three percent between now and 2028.
Holt also promised a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in relation to the Gross Domestic Product of the province, 323 tons for $ 1 million to 253 tons.
“We want to make sure that we are not growing our emissions at the same rate as our GDP,” he said, recognizing that the amount of climate warming emissions can still grow in general.
In an objective, improving air quality in government buildings, the prime minister acknowledged that the Government does not have a measurement of the situation now.
“We had no data. It is a bit shocking and frustrating that we did not know the state of the air and its quality in schools, the hospital and public buildings in New Brunswick,” said Holt.
But, he added, after discussing whether to eliminate the goal, he decided to leave it with a precise number to determine later.
“That will force us to understand where we are and then work improving the quality of the air that affects our children, our patients and all in New Brunswick.”
Speaking to journalists after the speech, Holt said the objectives were important despite the fact that Trump’s threats have injected so much uncertainty.
“Imagine if we had no goal,” he said.
“We believe that these are the correct objectives for the new Brunswickers and their future, already measured the conditions, we will have to adjust our plans to how we are going to achieve those plans, but the objectives will not change.”
