Questions arise over spending promises in N.B. Liberal platform

New Brunswick Liberal leader Brian Gallant in Dieppe, N.B. on Thursday, August 21, 2014. (THE CANADIAN PRESS / Andrew Vaughan)

MONCTON, N.B. -- New Brunswick's Liberal leader released a platform Monday loaded with expenditures but questions arose over how his party would sustain that kind of spending.

The document largely consists of promises Brian Gallant has already made over the first half of the election campaign, such as expanding daycare, hiring more doctors and raising the minimum wage.

Central to the platform is a previously announced proposal to spend $900 million on infrastructure over six years, a measure Gallant says will help create 10,000 jobs during a Liberal mandate.

"That's the basement, that's the guarantee," Gallant told a news conference in Moncton where he released the platform.

"On top of that, we could create a lot more if our economic development agencies work the way that we think they are going to be able to."

Gallant said a Liberal government would increase taxes for the richest one per cent of New Brunswickers, rescind property tax breaks for businesses and look for other ways to generate the money needed to support his promises.

Other commitments in the Liberal platform include grants to seniors to renovate their homes, free eye exams for four-year-olds and a $111.4-million surplus by the 2020-21 fiscal year.

The platform says the commitments won't come without some fiscal pressure. A chart in the fiscal plan says more than $1.3 billion would be added to the province's $12.2 net debt by 2019-20 -- something deputy premier Paul Robichaud latched onto.

"This is the first time in my political career that I saw a political party promising to increase the debt," Robichaud quipped.

He also took issue with the Liberals offering promises beyond a first mandate.

"This is arrogant ... to presume or pretend that they're going to be elected for two mandates when it's not even sure that they're going to be elected for a first mandate," he said.

NDP Leader Dominic Cardy said the platform was vague on details, particularly how much would be borrowed to fund the promises.

"What (Gallant) needed to have in there is something that is missing, which is an application for a very, very high credit limit," he said.

"We are talking about hundreds of millions of dollars in borrowing that the province cannot afford."

The Liberal platform release came a day before the first English- and French-language leaders' debates were scheduled to be televised Tuesday evening on CBC and Radio-Canada.

Gallant said he would use the debate as an opportunity to hold his rivals' feet to the fire on their promises.

"The only thing I've been interested in doing is reading the platforms of the other parties to fully understand them and be able to keep them to account with the numbers and some of the things they want to do," he said.

Premier David Alward didn't schedule any campaign or media events Monday as he prepared for the debates, a spokesman with the Progressive Conservative party said.

All parties have now released their platforms for the Sept. 22 election.