Stephen Harper

Budget Cuts Dept: Instead, there were the politicians of all party stripes, decorating the budget with a muddled undertaking to start paying more for their pensions in 2013, but otherwise postponing further changes until, say, sometime after the next election, according to CBC. Harper was on top of the situation, we were told, and a new and more modest MPs' pension plan would be in place this fall. The conversation has been had," an official said in an email. "The rest of the basic pension reforms will happen, with details to be presented in the fall. Everyone is on the same page." BUDGET CUTS What does $5.2 billion buy and among all the political images Stephen Harper had hoped to evoke from his government s promised transformational budget, it surely wasn t the picture of self-serving MPs digging in to protect their so-called gold-plated pensions. Parliamentarians sharing the pain of budget cuts was a key part of the government s public relations strategy to sell Canadians on tight times ahead. Austerity begins at home and all that. The Prime Minister s Office that never leaves anything to chance was quick to issue reassurances as the budget was being released Thursday. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.