Pity poor Andrea Horwath. How do you defeat the budget of your dreams, a document any NDP leader in their right (or left) mind would support in a heartbeat?

Tax the rich — the top 2 per cent? Check.

Boost wages for poorly paid workers? Check.

Raise welfare rates and child benefits? Check and check.

Create a new public pension for workers lacking a workplace plan? Check.

Allocate billions for transit to help commuters getting to work? Check.

Hit up big corporations for more money? Check (albeit a small one).

Boost job-creation funding for youth and other workers? Check and check.

Perhaps that’s why Horwath went underground on budget day, declaring a day of radio silence so she could sleep on it. The NDP leader took an unprecedented rain check from Thursday’s traditional budget news conference, where party leaders deliver their verdict to a breathless press.

Horwath begged off for a day, just as she refused Wynne’s invitations to meet in the days before the budget (the PC and Green Party leaders did). A terse statement announced that Horwath “will NOT be holding a press conference today.”

On Friday, she is scheduled to tell Ontarians what the NDP thinks — or very likely ask Ontarians what they think, by setting up her annual toll-free number (No, it’s not 1-800-HORWATH). She may also ransom the Liberals, as in past budgets.

Either way, Horwath is on the spot. She has the power to bring down Kathleen Wynne’s Liberal minority government, weighed down as it is by the baggage from Dalton McGuinty’s premiership.

But triggering fresh elections requires her to turn thumbs down on this budget — a budget probably more progressive than any other since the NDP held power under Bob Rae two decades ago (a feat not likely to be repeated soon).

Opposition Leader Tim Hudak — who mocked Horwath’s absence and once again tried to goad her into giving him the election he so wants — vowed that in power he’d ditch every one of those budgetary measures: His Tories would lower taxes for the rich instead of raising them, cancel wage hikes for the working poor and scrub the pension reforms Horwath has long sought.

That’s politics. Governments live by their budgets, die by their budgets, and campaign by their budgets. This one serves as a ready-made Liberal campaign platform that has the virtue of being fully costed (as much as budgets ever are):

This budget taxes the rich while sharing the wealth with welfare recipients, the working poor and kids in need. Instead of targeting just those notorious 1-per-centers, it captures the top 2 per cent of Ontario’s taxpayers — applying higher tax rates to that portion of an individual’s income over $150,000. At the same time, the Liberals are raising welfare rates, boosting the Ontario Child Benefit, while raising wages for child care workers and personal support workers in the health sector.

The budget is remarkably bold on pensions. It’s also a big political gamble because critics will cast it as a “job-killing payroll tax,” or a way to pick people’s pockets. Why entrust your money to a Liberal government that wasted your money cancelling gas-fired power plants?

In fact, pension premiums aren’t taxes that go into the government’s coffers, they are personal savings that are held by an arm’s length pension trust. The Ontario Retirement Pension Plan (ORPP) would mirror the tried and trusted Canada Pension Plan, except it would not be mandatory for anyone with an existing workplace pension plan. Its purpose is to help the two-thirds of employees who lack a workplace pension, especially middle-class Ontarians who face the largest gap in retirement income (self-employed and low-income workers are exempt).

The budget paves the way on transit despite huge political roadblocks. The government needs to raise more than $40 billion over the next 20 years to fund its GTHA transit blueprint and other infrastructure. It’s a compromise plan that shies away from tolls and higher gas taxes, but it’s a good start, given the NDP’s unhelpful anti-tax rhetoric.

What are the New Democrats most fussed about in this budget? Doubtless they would like to soak corporations a little more (this budget targets only large, Canadian-owned corporations for an extra $50 million a year). Horwath has called for a “modest” increase in the corporate rate, which the Liberals have resisted — so far.

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Will this budget rise or fall on the question of that corporate tax rate? The two sides could surely work it out if they wanted. But what does the NDP want?

We shall see Friday — a day late — when Horwath is back on the job. And we’ll know more by next Thursday, the deadline set by Wynne for a final answer — and the last check mark.

Martin Regg Cohn’s provincial affairs column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. mcohn@thestar.ca , Twitter: @reggcohn

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