Waterloo region reacts to Trudeau government's 3rd budget

Trudeau's government tabled its third budget this week and political leaders in Waterloo region were paying attention to how much money would trickle down to local municipalities.

• Budget 2018: Liberals spend billions to close gaps for working women, Indigenous families
• Budget 2018: Highlights of Bill Morneau's 'equality + growth' budget
• Looking through a gender lens: 5 things to watch for in today's budget

Ken Seiling

"There weren't a lot of major items," said Regional Chair Ken Seiling after looking through the budget report. "I think they were just carrying through from last year's budget."

That said, Seiling told The Morning Edition's Craig Norris the federal government does seem to be responding to the need for more affordable housing and child care.

Harold Albrecht

Kitchener-Conestoga MP Harold Albrecht was also pleased to see commitments to affordable housing in the budget, but cautioned that budgets are made to look good.

"There's always good things in the budget," he told Norris, but "big things are [only] great if we can afford them."

While the focus of last year's budget was affordable housing and child care, this year the cornerstone was gender equity.

After presenting the budget in the House of Commons, Finance Minister Bill Morneau said "We believe that Canada's future success rests on making sure that every Canadian has an opportunity to work and to earn a good living from that work, and that includes Canada's talented, ambitious and hard working women."

• Why the rhetoric of federal budget fails the reality of Canadian women
• The 2018 budget is a pitch to Canadian women voters. But is it enough?

Tammy Schirle

The government stated that the entire 2018 budget was informed by a gender-based analysis.

Tammy Schirle, director of The Laurier Centre for Economic Research and Policy Analysis, said it was a good first step toward gauging how policies might affect men and women differently.

"Overall, when we look at some of the policies that were put forward, some of them look more like baby steps than big leaps forward, but there's clear progress here on how we're thinking about budgets and gender equity," she told Norris.