Whenever I hear that there isn't that much waste in the government I think of Paul Champagne. The guy who was able to steal $100 million dollars from DND over a few years. The entire reason he was able to steal the money was because he became know as the guy who could help people spend any money that they had left over as year end approached. Departments would come to him and say that they had $40 million left in their budget and they were worried that they would lose the money next year if they didn't spend it this year. At first he would find something for them to buy but eventually he figured that if he was just wasting the money anyway he might as well benefit from it.
I know that is federal and not provincial, but that is one man in one department and the money he stole is a small fraction of the money he wasted.
I don't know what the solution is and yes, I know that this happens in private businesses as well but that doesn't mean that it shouldn't be fixed. Blowing a budget at year end is the height of irresponsibility. I would rather see them tell departments that half the surplus at the end of the year could be handed out as performance bonuses.
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