In 2003, the Ontario Liberals were elected with another solid majority. Since then they have reneged on nearly every one of the promises on which they were elected, culminating in a budget that casually discards the two most solemn and binding commitments of all: That they would not run deficits, and that they would not raise taxes, or not without a referendum. Actually, the promises, the very cornerstones of the Liberal campaign, were simpler than that. They required nothing more than that they abide by the laws that already constrained them in either event.

But apparently it is too much to ask of political parties in Canada that they obey the law, let alone keep their promises, so both are now out the window. And what price will the Liberals pay for this? What protests will they face? I can predict it now: They will be congratulated for their prudence and candour, for facing up to "harsh truths" and making "hard choices."

The Star will be extravagant in its praise, the Globe will be measured, and the Post will be anxious not to seem too critical. This is the acme of political courage in this country: raising taxes when you said you wouldn't, running deficits that are prohibited by law, for no reason other than because you want to. (And without even admitting that is what you are doing. Raise personal income taxes? Heaven forfend! It's a "health care premium.")

Not that the Tories are in any position to complain, having done precisely the same while in office, their earlier enthusiasm for telling the truth having waned at about the same pace as their commitment to restraint. What chance have mere laws against the determination of political parties to do whatever it takes to get elected? What meaning have such laws, indeed, in the culture of deceit that now permeates Canadian politics?

The Liberals are trumpeting their own Fiscal Transparency and Accountability Act as a replacement for the Tories' Balanced Budget Act, boasting of how it would "require" the government to do this and "force" it to do that. Oh yes? Until when? Until the government finds the constraint binding, at which point it will be tossed aside like yesterday's newspaper. Or, indeed, like the Balanced Budget Act.

What fiscal emergency compelled the Liberals to raise taxes with such dispatch? The Liberals will say it was the deficit, to which they remain unalterably opposed and which they had no idea they would face until the day they took office.

But even if we accept these fictions, it does not quite explain their behaviour. After all, if they truly needed to raise taxes, they had only to go to the voters and explain -- how they had no alternative, how the cupboard was bare, how this was the only way to save medicare. The Taxpayer Protection Act did not prohibit them from raising taxes. It only obliged them to ask before taking the taxpayers' money -- a not unreasonable request, fresh from an election in which they had promised to do just that.

They did not, for the simple reason that they have no case to make. Though the budget proclaims, in bold face no less, that Existing Revenues Are Not Enough, it is belied by its own numbers. In the fiscal year just ended, 2003-04, the government collected more than $68-billion in revenues, or nearly $5,700 for every man, woman and child in Ontario. That was off the peaks reached in the Tory boom years, but it was more than any previous government could have dreamed of. That's right: Revenues were higher, in real per capita terms, under the tax-cutting Tories than they were under their tax-raising predecessors. The NDP, for example, never took in more than $5,000 per capita, in constant 2004 dollars, while the Peterson Liberals were forced to make do on average per capita revenues of about $4,800 and change.

The tax increases proposed by the current generation of Liberals would jack the government's take up to more than $6,300 per capita, and leave it there -- an all-time record. And they still can't balance the budget! Why? The budget papers seem to suggest an answer. "Between 2000-01 and 2003-04," it intones, "provincial program spending increased by 22%, far exceeding tax revenues.... This imbalance between provincial spending and revenue created a situation that was not sustainable in the long run."

It repeats the point for emphasis: "Starting in 2000-01, program spending growth ... began to outpace taxation revenue growth."

The diagnosis would appear to be clear: Contrary to their own promises, and contrary to everything the Liberals had said about them in opposition, the "slash-and-burn" Tories had, in fact, spent the past several years ramping up spending at a terrific clip, to a level that "was not sustainable in the long run." Health care, in particular, enjoyed its most explosive growth in spending ever: from less than $18-billion when the Tories took power, to more than $28-billion when they left office, an increase of more than 25% even after inflation and population growth are taken into account.

Yet what do the Liberals propose to do? Pump another $4.6-billion into program and capital spending this year. Added to the increases of the Tories' second term, that means real per capita spending has now climbed all the way back to the levels recorded under the NDP -- in the middle of a recession. The Common Sense Revolution might never have occurred. And health care? Another $2-billion-plus tossed into the void, to the usual wan chants of "buying change," but without the slightest commitment to serious reform or restructuring of any kind. Indeed, the most they will promise in the way of restraint generally is a comically half-hearted program review exercise that, the budget is in haste to assure us, will result in savings "of less than one per cent of total expense at maturity," four years from now. Take pride, Ontario: Your government is more than 99% efficient. That's most people's experience of government, isn't it?