Eleven billion. This is the unprecedented scale of the deficit forecast in the 2024-2025 budget tabled Tuesday by the Minister of Finance, Eric Girard. While waiting for a return to balance in five years, the minister is already pulling out the scissors. Here are articles and columns that paint a picture of the situation.
Record deficit of 11 billion in Quebec
Quebec’s deficit is exploding and breaking a record: $11 billion, almost four times more than expected. The Legault government is postponing a return to balanced budgets in five years. He is taking a first look at tax credits, but the real cleaning will be done later, largely after the 2026 elections.
Read Tommy Chouinard’s article
The CAQ has “lost control of public finances,” says the opposition
The opposition parties denounce the bad choices of the Legault government which led to a “historic” deficit of 11 billion dollars.
Read the article by Charles Lecavalier
Six things to know about the budget
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, LA PRESS
With his sixth budget, which could be the most deficit in history, the big financier of Quebec, Eric Girard, promises to table next year a plan to return to budget balance, the achievement of which is postponed to 2029 -2030.
With his sixth budget, which could be the most deficit in history, the big financier of Quebec, Eric Girard, promises to table next year a plan to return to budget balance, the achievement of which is postponed to 2029 -2030. Until then, he is launching a project to “optimize” state spending. Here are six things to know about a budget written in red ink.
Read the article by Hugo Pilon-Larose
What’s moving in your wallet
PHOTO DAVID BOILY, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
Smokers taxed, Ride green arrested, improved retirement… Our journalist draws up a list of the elements which risk moving your portfolio.
Read the article by Karim Benssaiseh
Chronicle by Francis Vailles: What explains the record deficit of 11 billion
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, LA PRESS
Tell you how surprised I am. I expected a dull, severe budget, under the sign of austerity, but that is not what Minister Eric Girard presented to us.
Columnist Francis Vailles
Read the column by Francis Vailles
Column by Marie-Eve Fournier: RRQ – disabled seniors win their battle against Quebec
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
Misfortune never comes alone, as disabled elders discover with horror on the occasion of their 65th birthday.e birthday. In addition to having to deal with an unfavorable state of health, their retirement pension is reduced because they have not worked – or contributed – for a certain period. After 27 years, this unfair way of doing calculations will be corrected.
Columnist Marie-Eve Fournier
Read Marie-Eve Fournier’s column
Chronicle by Paul Journet: The red transition
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, LA PRESS
Quebec Premier François Legault
This is undoubtedly not the budget that the Minister of Finance, Eric Girard, wanted. And he won’t be fond of the next ones, if he’s the one who drops them off. In one sentence, he mentioned that the person who will replace him, when he goes elsewhere, if he does of course, will be a woman. We’ll see…
Columnist Paul Journet
Read Paul Journet’s column
Editorial by Stéphanie Grammond: The Minister of Finance’s trickery
PHOTO EDOUARD PLANTE-FRÉCHETTE, LA PRESS
Finance Minister Eric Girard and Quebec Premier François Legault
It happened in December. Economists and public finance experts saw nothing but fire. But with this trick, the Minister of Finance, Eric Girard, took the liberty of shoveling Quebec’s budgetary problems even further by postponing the return to a balanced budget until 2029-2030.
Editorialist Stéphanie Grammond
Read Stéphanie Grammond’s editorial
The “vagueness” around investments in public transport worries
PHOTO MARTIN CHAMBERLAND, THE PRESS
Municipal elected officials in the metropolitan region fear that the provision of public transport services will once again be put at risk due to the absence of a predictable financial framework in Quebec’s 2024 budget. Added to their concerns are those of transport companies, who deplore the lack of “commitment” from the government.
Read Bruno Marcotte’s article
Subsidies for electric vehicles: brake for Ride green
PHOTO PATRICK SANFAÇON, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
The time of juicy subsidies offered to buyers of electric cars is coming to an end. The Quebec government announces a significant reduction in its program Ride green from next year and its scrapping in 2027.
Read the article by Gabriel Béland
Quebec infrastructure plan: the “hidden debt” continues to rise
PHOTO DAVID BOILY, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
The asset maintenance deficit (AMD), a sort of “hidden debt” of the State, continues to climb in Quebec despite record investments in infrastructure maintenance. Optimistic, the government thinks it can get things back on track.
Read the article by Gabriel Béland
Cleaning starts with IT and video games
PHOTO MARCO CAMPANOZZI, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
The Legault government is giving a foretaste of the cleaning aid to businesses that it is preparing by reducing the generosity of tax credits from which several IT and video game companies benefit. They will have to pay tax here to be entitled to their full extent.
Read Julien Arsenault’s article
The housing crisis with absent subscribers
PHOTO DAVID BOILY, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
With housing starts stagnating and a lack of new investments in affordable housing, young people hoping to buy a home in the coming years will not find a “ray of sunshine” in the Girard budget.
Read the article by Charles Lecavalier
Seniors at the heart of health investments
PHOTO MARTIN CHAMBERLAND, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
The Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, will count on an envelope of 3.7 billion additional dollars over five years to “offer the best possible care to Quebecers”. Seniors are at the heart of health investments, with an additional €1.1 billion allocated to maintaining and improving the quality of their care and services.
Read Alice Girard-Bossé’s article
Quebec saved half a billion in wages during the strikes
PHOTO DAVID BOILY, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
The government saved more than half a billion dollars in salaries during the education strikes last fall, more than the sum of 300 million invested in the educational catch-up plan, reveals the 2024-2025 budget tabled in Quebec on Tuesday, which forecasts growth in spending reaching 7.6% in education.
Read the article by Marie-Ève Morasse
The performing arts sector worried, the audiovisual sector happy
PHOTO JACQUES BOISSINOT, CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
The Minister of Culture and Communications of Quebec, Mathieu Lacombe
Quebec grants culture, heritage and the French language a sum of 187 million over five years. A budget which worries the performing arts community, which will have to share a shrinking pie, while the audiovisual sector emerges as a winner, encouraged by tax measures requested for several months.
Read the article by Jean Siag and Catherine Handfield