EDITORIAL: Delayed budget bad omen for taxpayers

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How bad do federal finances have to be for Prime Minister Mark Carney and the Liberals to announce they won’t release a federal budget this year? 

Instead, Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said Wednesday that the Liberals will deliver a fall economic statement; ostensibly a mini-budget. 

But that’s no comfort given that the last fall economic statement the Liberals delivered in December 2024 under former prime minister Justin Trudeau, overshot their own deficit target of $40.1 billion for the 2023-24 fiscal year by 54%, coming in at $61.9 billion. 

According to parliamentary budget officer Yves Giroux, that document also lacked transparency, downplayed the economic risks facing taxpayers, including rapidly increasing contingent liabilities, and was evidence of the government’s deteriorating “ability (or willingness) to produce high-quality, timely financial statements.” 

The Liberals’ failure to deliver a budget this year — the last time that happened was during the pandemic — is inexplicable given Carney’s release of what was supposed to be their “fully costed” campaign platform less than a month ago, on April 19. 

It called for $130 billion in new spending over four years, with a deficit of $62.3 billion in this fiscal year, which started on April 1 and ends on March 31, 2026, compared to $42.2 billion predicted by the previous Trudeau government. 

In 2026-27, Carney’s projected deficit is $59.9 billion compared to Trudeau’s $31 billion, in 2027-28 $54.8 billion compared to $30.4 billion, and in 2028-29, $47.8 billion compared to $27.8 billion. 

In total, Carney’s projected deficits of $224.8 billion over the next four years is an increase of 71% compared to $131.4 billion projected by the Trudeau government. 

Carney’s platform also contained detailed information on the Liberals’ anticipated revenues and expenditures from 2025-26 to 2028-29, so any Liberal claim they don’t have the necessary information to deliver a budget when Parliament resumes on May 26 is absurd. 

Unless, of course, the Liberals were just making up the numbers contained in their campaign platform. 

One would have thought that with the Liberals now led by a former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, the age of “the budget will balance itself” logic under the Trudeau government would be consigned to the dustbin of history. 

Apparently, that’s not the case.