Conservative Lies of Omission: Part 4 Conference Board of Canada

The Conservatives made a big to do about the Conference board of Canada saying their platform is fully costed. To put this into perspective this is akin to the NDP holding up the fact the CCPA says their platform is fully costed. That is not the problem though. The Conference board of Canada economist who did the analysis is now saying that the platform he examined is not the same platform the Conservatives released. In other words, the Conservatives were trying to pass off the new platform off as the one given the ok by Conference board of Canada. Global and Mail: “Economist washes hands of new Tory agenda”

“Paul Darby, deputy chief economist of the Conference Board of Canada, originally concluded that Stephen Harper's Conservative platform “is affordable in each fiscal year from 2005-2006 through 2010-2011.”
The Conservative party promoted that conclusion last week as evidence its election platform had been “independently verified” by the Conference Board, an Ottawa-based think-tank.
But Mr. Darby says the version of the platform he was given to vet didn't include a Conservative health-care guarantee which states patients will be transported to another jurisdiction if they can't get timely care at home.
It also omitted a Tory platform promise to redress the so-called “fiscal imbalance” between Ottawa and the provinces.
Mr. Darby wouldn't comment on whether the timely health-care guarantee would bear a significant cost.
“Talk to Harper,” he said. “It is not in the platform I received from them.”

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