Budgets will now be tabled in the fall and Canadians should 'rejoice' at fiscal situation, Champagne says

OTTAWA — The federal government will table its annual budget in the fall from now on and distinguish capital spending from operating costs, breaking with a longstanding tradition of presenting the annual spending plan in the spring.

Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne announced the new budgetary cycle and presentation on Monday morning. He said budgets will be tabled in the fall for the following fiscal year while the fall economic update would move to the spring. Finally, pre-budget consultations would move to the summer.

In a background technical briefing, senior government officials explained that the new schedule aims to make the government’s fiscal year planning more predictable for the private sector and other levels of government.

They also noted that it would better align with construction season, announcing capital investments further ahead of the summer construction season. “In the old cycle, budgets didn’t allow projects to take full advantage of the construction season. A fall budget cycle changes that — giving builders and investors a real head start,” reads a background document published by Finance Canada.

Appearing at the House of Commons finance committee later on Monday, Champagne repeated his justifications for the changes to the budget cycle and said the new budgeting methods are simply a fresh lens that is “an additional way of presenting figures.”

Conservative MP Pat Kelly accused Champagne of “distracting Canadians with accounting changes” and asked the minister when the federal government would balance its budget.

Champagne wouldn’t directly answer, but instead repeated the vow to balance the operating budget by 2028-29 and compared Canada’s fiscal position favourably to other G7 countries. He said Canadians should “rejoice” at Canada’s fiscal situation and credit rating.

“I’m left to conclude the budget will never be balanced under this government,” Kelly told Champagne.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government also made good on the campaign promise to separate capital investments and operation spending in future budgets.

Champagne said capital investments would be spending that falls into one of six categories: capital transfers, capital-focused corporate income tax incentives, amortization of federal capital, private sector research and development, support to unlock large-scale private sector capital investment and measures to grow the housing stock.

Remaining spending would be classified as day-to-day operating spending. That would include many major government expenditures including transfers to persons, health and social transfers as well as government operation spending (such as salaries and benefits).

During the briefing, senior officials promised that the budget document would still contain the traditional unified accounting information including total spending, revenues and budget balance (such as the total value of the deficit if applicable).

More to come .

National Post

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