The next federal budget will be presented on Tuesday, April 16, the government of Justin Trudeau announced Monday.
“Our economic plan is to build more housing, faster, make life more affordable and create more good jobs,” Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement.
The one who is also Deputy Prime Minister has insisted in recent days on Ottawa’s promise to find the right balance between investments aimed at supporting Canadians and “responsible” action from a fiscal point of view. .
“We set out fiscal guidelines in the fall economic statement and we will respect them,” assured the minister regarding the 2024 budget.
The document tabled in the fall to which she referred contains a commitment that the budget to be presented on April 16 will be prepared with the idea of having a deficit for 2023-2024 “equal to or less” than 40.1 billions of dollars.
This deficit ceiling is equivalent to the projection that was made in the previous budget, that of 2023.
In its fall economic statement, Ottawa reiterated its long-standing goal that the debt-to-gross domestic product (GDP) ratio gradually declines, but this time added a new component. Thus, the government established that the 2024 budget should be designed based on achieving, by 2026-2027, a ratio of less than 1%, which should then be maintained below this bar.
According to Mme Freeland, the drug insurance plan recently developed by the Liberals during negotiations with the New Democrats will not cause the federal government to deviate from its fiscal anchors.
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