I think you need to consider a couple more questions before making your choice.
For starters, how often do you anticipate making it out to a range or shooting area in a given season, and perhaps the length of the range. About how many rounds do you reasonably expect to shoot? Some people shoot alot out of their .22 rimfire and just practice enough with their centrefire to sight it in/familiarize themselves to it, while others like to really practice with their centrefire. Do you have all the time in the world, especially during the off season to reload, or is it a better investment of your time and money to buy ammo, which also depends on the calibre and its availabilty. Plus, if you reload, the price and quality of your equipment may effect the speed at which you can churn out rounds, possibly a factor if you want to produce alot of ammo. If you're planning to hunt, is it in thick bush with short range shooting the norm, or do you expect longer shots across farm fields? Might you consider eventually scoping your milsurp with a no-gunsmithing mount? And at the end of the day, money is always a factor.
If you're new to shooting and need lots of practice, don't automatically discount the SKS. For less than $500 you can get a rifle and case of ammo, which could last you for quite a few trips to the range. If you spend each time practicing from the various shooting positions (i.e. off the bench, prone, sitting, kneeling, standing, both supported and unsupported), I think that you'll spend a good amount of time practicing at that from 50-200 yards before you max out on your abilities and need/want to get another rifle. If you just want to hunt deer in the bush, the SKS will do.
A Mosin Nagant M91/30, M38 or M44 carbine could similarly be put through the same regimen of target shooting. The basic rifles cost a bit less and the ammo a bit more when shipments of surplus are available. Various Finn varients or the Repro-Snipers could add some variety for a bit more. The cartridge gives you a bit more range and is suitable for anything that you'd hunt with a 30.06. The sights might be a bit too crude for longer range work though, and the action is not as smooth as most and can take some getting used to. Ammo availability (both hunting and surplus) may be an issue and these rifles would provide a good opportunity for reloading. No gunsmithing mounts for scout scopes are available.
If you move up to an unsportrized Lee Enfield, you'll be paying more for your rifle (about $350 plus tax and shipping for Enfields from India or Pakistan is not unreasonable), and surplus ammo is virtually non-existant. You can however find .303 British in any Canadian Tire or Walmart that sells ammo, and I'm always scouring the range for any left behind brass. There's lots of people out there who know how to accurize these rifles, and the peep sights on the #4 and 5 models are probably better suited for hunting. It's better than 30.30 or 7.62x39, but not quite as powerful as .308 or 30.06. As one of the other posters mentioned, casting bullets are a good option with these rifles and have given me some good shooting, but casting bullets can be a hobby in its own right.
The Swedish Mausers are a good bet, though they will share the same issues of surplus ammo availability as the Enfields. They are a good candidate for reloading, shoot a fine cartridge for hunting that doesn't kill one's shoulder and are amazingly accurate rifles. If you can get an M96 or M38 (shorter rifle) for a decent price like $300 I say go for it. If you don't like it, someone from here will buy it off of you in very short order.
The Swiss rifles are also very good shooters. Ammo availability is the major issue (as well as the rifles, the bulk of which have already been imported to North America), but if you reload, they use .30 cal bullets that are readily available. These rifles can be amazingly accurate, and you could probably get the diopter sights or no-gunsmith scope mounts for the K31 if you want to take it a step further. For hunting, it's much like a .308 in performance.
There's usually a variety of other Mausers available on the market, and the 8mm Mauser cartridge is usually available at most sporting goods stores, though probably not at your local Walmart or Canadian Tire. European companies load the 8mm to 30.06 performance levels, though N. American companies load them to little more than 30.30 levels on account of fears of liability issues (there's more ancient surplus rifles around here than in Europe that don't take well to the full load). A Russian Capture might not be too expensive (they were about $350 with taxes and shipping when they were available up to about a year ago). Though surplus ammo isn't readily available anymore, I've had good luck shooting cast bullets through two of mine (a Brno and RC). Lots of history and character in these rifles. No gunsmithing scout scope mounts are an option if you ever tire of the open sights, which in the case of German Mausers are hard on my eyes.
Some mausers were rechambered to 7.62 Nato/.308 which can make them more practical for both target shooting and hunting, but you may want to research those models that were converted, since some of the pre-98 actions can be pushed to their limits by commercial .308, which is hotter than the NATO load.
Most of the options above are still available for reasonable prices and good for hunting, but you will probably have to get into reloading for any significant amount of shooting with anything other than the SKS or Mosin bolt guns. Aside from a few semis like the SVT 40 or Norinco M14s that might be available within the same price range, most other semis (i.e. M1 Garand) will probably put you back further in the pocket book.
