MPs will be asked to vote on $11.2-billion in new budgetary spending, and billions more in statutory measures are set to flow from Ottawa’s coffers, according to the government’s latest round of spending estimates released last week.

Supplementary estimates A, the first of three expected sets of additional spending plans for 2024-25, tack on a total of $12.7-billion to the $449.2-billion the Liberals already set out in the main estimates released in February. MPs have yet to approve that spending with committees still studying it. The new spending plan also lays out an additional $1.3-billion in non-budgetary measures—items such as loans and investments that affect Ottawa’s fiscal position but do not change its bottom line.

The latest estimates were tabled in Parliament on May 23 by Treasury Board President Anita Anand (Oakville, Ont.). They bring total budgetary spending requested for this fiscal year to $461.8-billion—already 90 per cent of the $534.6-billion outlined in the April budget for the same time frame. That percentage puts the Liberals on pace with requested spending by this time in the last two years, but both times they went on to spend billions more than outlined in that year’s budget. And in all three Supps A, the estimates barely include the budget commitments made in the fiscal blueprint just months before.

For example, in 2023-24, adding last year’s Supp As to the main estimates saw the Liberals seeking approval for $454.8-billion—or 93 per cent—of the $490.5-billion outlined in Budget 2023 for that fiscal year. Final figures for the last fiscal year have not yet been released but, as of the final estimates for 2023-24, government spending requests had already gone beyond that figure, and projections in Budget 2024 show that spending ultimately ballooned even further.

In the 2022-23 fiscal year, the first set of supplementary estimates saw the government seeking approval for $407.2-billion—or about 90 per cent—of the $452.3-billion Budget 2022 projected as the final tally for the year. However, in that fiscal year, the government ultimately spent $473.5-billion on programs and public debt, according the final figures for that year provided in Budget 2024.

Higher public debt costs drive new spending

The $12.7-billion outlined in 2024-25 Supps A is broken into two key parts: the $11.2-billion in measures that MPs will vote on, and $1.5-billion in statutory measures—expenditures already authorized under legislation that do not require further approval.

New statutory spending includes a $1.9-billion increase in public debt costs, which the government says is “primarily due to higher projected interest rates and higher borrowing requirements.” That represents about 15 per cent of the total spending request.

With this increase, Ottawa has already allocated $48.4-billion this fiscal year on servicing the debt. That’s $9.8-billion more than it had spent on debt in the corresponding set of supplementary estimates last year. It also represents a slightly larger share of the government's total budgetary projections for debt spending than it had at these estimates last year—and would go on to blow past its budgetary allotments for debt servicing by $3.3-billion.

As of the current estimates, Ottawa will have allocated 89 per cent of the $54.1-billion that Budget 2024 allotted for debt servicing in this fiscal year. In last year’s Supplementary Estimates A, the $38.6-billion Ottawa had set aside for public debt at that point amounted to 88 per cent of the $43.9-billion promised in that year’s budget. The government went on to spend more: at least $47.2-billion on public debt—according to projections provided in Budget 2024—and that still does not represent final debt spending for 2023-24.

Budget 2024

Only a fraction of the spending in these estimates is related to new measures in Budget 2024.

The estimates state that only $1.6-billion—or 0.3 per cent—of the requested spending to year-to-date is for Budget 2024 measures. That’s a drop from the corresponding estimates last year which contained $7.2-billion in spending related to Budget 2023—1.5 per cent of the spending requested at that point in that fiscal year. It’s more on par with the corresponding 2022 estimates which contained only $1-billion of spending related to new measures in Budget 2022—0.2 per cent of the total spend requested as of those estimates.

Parliamentary Budgetary Officer Yves Giroux has questioned on several past occasions why the government has been slow to roll out budget announcements into actual spending at a department level given they should be "well developed—or should be sufficiently developed" in order to make it into the budget in the first place.

The government highlighted some of the Budget 2024 measures that are included in these estimates. The new spending request includes:

• $604.9-million to the Department of Transport to provide purchase incentives for zero-emission vehicles;
• $411.2-million to the Department of Citizenship and Immigration for temporary healthcare coverage for “specified groups of foreign nationals, including asylum claimants and refugees, who are not yet eligible for provincial or territorial health insurance;”
• another $141.1-million to the same department to provide temporary accommodation for asylum claimants;
• $13-million to Canadian Heritage for the establishment of an Indigenous Screen Office;
• $15.2-million for the collection and destruction of assault-style firearms from businesses; and
• $75.7-million to support the operating requirements of VIA HRF Inc.—a subsidiary of Via Rail that is tasked with managing the development of high-frequency rail.

Big-ticket items

The government also highlighted a number of large new spending requests in these estimates that are not related to Budget 2024. Many of these items are linked with the Departments of Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs, and the Department of Indigenous Services.

Crown-Indigenous Relations is seeking approval for spending related to a variety of settlements. This includes $1.5-billion for settlements related to the Federal Indian Day Schools and Indian Residential Schools Day Scholars; $1-billion for the Specific Claims Settlement Fund; $447.9-million for historical claims; $393.1-million for land related claims and litigation; and $303.6-million for the Federal Indian Boarding Homes settlement.

Indigenous Services is seeking to spend $769.7-million for water and wastewater treatment, and $633.5-million for First Nations child and family services.

Giroux previously told The Hill Times that these measures tend to be allocated primarily in supplementary estimates—not the mains—because they are dependent on the pace at which the government reaches agreements with Indigenous Peoples to resolve accumulated litigation and claims.

icampbell@hilltimes.com

The Hill Times

 

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