New Brunswick — Premier Brian Gallant stormed into his bedroom and slammed the door this afternoon after his mother, who wished to remain anonymous for reasons of embarrassment, cut off his allowance until he learns to be more responsible with his money.
“Ugh, Mom… this isn’t fair!” wailed the premier, tears flooding his sparkling blue eyes. “I… I hate you!!”
“I’ve always told him, ‘Don’t make promises you can’t keep,'” explained Gallant’s mom. “It’s part of growing up. And for heaven’s sake, don’t commit to something you know you won’t be able to follow through with! Have I taught that boy nothing?”
Gallant’s mom listed off several examples of her son’s failings while drying her hands on a dish towel.
“There’s this ‘contingency fund’ as he calls it. I have to say I agree with Auditor General Kim MacPherson — he says it’s to ‘absorb overspending,’ but Kim and I think that’s just his fancy-pants way of saying he can’t manage his money properly and doesn’t want taxpayers to know just how bad a situation he’s put them in.
“I even made him a nice spending spreadsheet,” she said, gesturing toward the refrigerator, “and he gets smiley-face and star stickers when he sticks to the plan, but I guess that just doesn’t motivate him like it did two years ago when things began spiralling out of control.”
Gallant’s mom said that instead of budgeting the allowance she gives him wisely, he increases taxes “willy nilly,” hoping to milk New Brunswick residents for all they’re worth.
“He got rid of the tuition tax credits for university and college students, he increased property taxes on businesses, he added a gas tax, a diesel tax, tobacco taxes, bank taxes… oh and let’s not forget that he upped the provincial HST by 2 percent. And now he’s talking about a tax on pop, but where did all the money go? And if that young man believes I’m going to keep buying him pop as a treat with dinner after he taxes the heck out of it, he’s lost his mind.
“He should have plenty left over from the other taxes he’s imposed,” she went on. “I checked his pockets for receipts but Lord knows he doesn’t hold onto a single thing — heaven forbid he be able to make sense of his spending.”
Gallant’s mom said her son has a nasty habit of throwing other politicians under the bus rather than owning up to his own shortcomings.
“If there’s one value I’d hoped to instill, it’s consistency between one’s thoughts and words. But he seems to have no problem bad-mouthing that nice man David Alward for breaking promises in his 2010 platform, all the while not keeping his own word. It’s a bit hypocritical if you ask me.”
At press time, Gallant could be heard kicking the walls in his bedroom and muttering indignantly to himself.
“Oh, he’ll tire himself out eventually and go to sleep, and by morning he’ll forget all about this little outburst,” said his mom, shaking her head. “But I’m not giving him another red cent until he grows up and starts to take his responsibilities seriously.”