REGINA – The provincial government is still working its way through the fine print of Tuesday’s federal budget and its $78 billion deficit.
“Obviously we're looking at it in more detail, you know sometimes the devil's in the details,” said provincial Finance Minister Jim Reiter to reporters Wednesday.
But on an initial first look at the budget Reiter did not seem surprised by the fact that there was a increased deficit. He said the large deficit would “obviously be concerning but understandable.”
“We're in a situation in the world today where economic headwinds are affecting revenues, I think, of all jurisdictions, so obviously that's impacting the federal government. I think probably as we move forward this fiscal (year), you'll see it's impacting all the provinces as well.”
One thing that provincial as well as municipal leaders had been lobbying for was for infrastructure funding to replace the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program, which is fully subscribed. The province and municipalities had gone to Ottawa last month looking for a replacement for that program, and had offered a proposal to pitch in for infrastructure projects at 1/3 each.
What there is in the 2025 federal budget is considerable commitments to infrastructure spending, referred to as “communities strong spending.” That was something Reiter was interested in learning more about.
“You know, happy to see that infrastructure program, again, trying to get some details on that,” said Reiter.
“It was a very high level announcement, we want to see how they envision it. You know, we had announced previously that if they do an infrastructure program, we'd be in for a third. So we want to see if that's the way it's structured, if the municipality's in for 1/3 like previous programs or not. So more work to do, you know.”
When asked if the government had a wish list of infrastructure items they wanted to see federal funding for, Reiter said they were making the assumption it would be much like previous programs which would be a one-third each split between the federal, provincial, and municipal government.
“And if that's the case, there is a long waiting list with municipal governments right across the whole (range) of projects that they'd like to see. So we'll have to work that out, what the parameters of the program are with the federal government, and hopefully get that kickstarted fairly soon. I know municipal governments will be happy to see something.”
The other budget item the government is looking closely at is what is going to happen to the industrial carbon tax — and what the impact would be on the province's Output Based Performance Standards or OBPS program after the Saskatchewan government stopped charging people for the Carbon Tax earlier this year.
While the province has stopped charging people for the carbon tax, the OBPS remains on the provincial books as a budget item and the province has been in talks with the Feds about what to do about it.
“I would say in those, in the carbon tax, we've been having some discussions with the federal government that's continuing," said Reiter. "We're optimistic something can happen in the next little while on that. There's a number of things we've asked for that aren't mentioned in there, we're going to continue to advocate for it.”
When asked about the possibility that that budget could bring down the minority Liberal government and sent Canadians to a Christmas election, Reiter said he would “let the federal parties see how that plays out.”
“You guys are, I'm sure, watching with interest, just as we are. Things seem to be changing by the minute there, so I'll leave that to them to negotiate.”
